My milk jugs keep splitting from expansion/contraction of the water as it freezes and thaws. I have started filling them about 3/4 of the way full but it isn’t preventing this. As they thaw, water gets in the chamber and I am continually having to wipe it down and dry it out.
I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations to replace them with something else that is easily attainable. 2 liter soda bottles seem to work well but something closer to a gallon would be idea.
Why don’t you just pick up some large refreezable cooler ice packs, they’re not that expensive and designed for the purpose:)
I hadn’t really considered that because I assumed they would be difficult to source in near gallon sizes. I will see what I can find.
Putting the jugs in freezer bags would help extend the life of the jugs because the leaking water will get trapped in the bag but eventually the jugs will leak so much that you’ll have bags of water and the same thing will start to happen to the freezer bags.
If you can’t find larger cooler packs then look for large, thick tupperware that you can fill with water.
I was using Ziploc plastic storage containers before I got my fridge ferm chamber setup. They’re cheap and worked well. I was using quart size but I know they come in 1/2 gallon and maybe larger.
Try 2 liter soda bottles. Milk jugs have an obvious weak point in the seems.
[quote]Try 2 liter soda bottles. Milk jugs have an obvious week point in the seems.
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+1. You can also squeeze them before closing to give some expansion room.
Thanks for the recommendations. I got 8 stackable quart size ziploc containers for super cheap that I am hoping will suffice. They aren’t super thick but they appear to be one molded piece of plastic with no seams. If they fail, I will move onto two liter bottles…
They work fine as long as you don’t try to remove the ice from them. Just use them in your ferm chamber, ice, plastic and all.
Yeah these guys are 100% dedicated to the chamber. Thanks for the idea.
Get a chilling wand made of food grade plastic. They are made for cooling food rapidly in the foodservice industry and have multiple brewing uses such as chilling wort faster (I put mine inside my immersion chiller) and cooling strike water that is too hot.
Thanks for that. Those look ideal.
Is it possible the water you’re seeing is condensation?
I use 1.5L Diet Pepsi bottles in my old water bath cooler. Has to be the Diet, though. Regular Pepsi bottles won’t work. When I get my fermentation chamber built, hopefully in the near future, I will use 1 gallon Lipton Tea jugs. They’re much thicker so they shouldn’t split like the milk jugs.
Sweet or unsweet tea jugs? 
Diet Citrus Green Tea seems to work the best. And they have to have a green cap!
Looks promising for what you want.
There’s all sorts of freezer packs or ice packs available out there. They are fairly cheap. I used them for years to keep my fermenters cool. Then I moved to freezers, which perform better and are a lot less work…