55 Gal Barrel Fermenter Build

[DetroitDIY]

I’m taking the plunge into a big fermenter so that I can run the still more between fermentations… have a few barrels to fill and I’m looking for a bit of expediency. Collected all the parts over the past couple of weeks, and today I went out a built it. You can see these ideas elsewhere on HD, but I thought I would include some of my assembly process photos and compile a couple of tricks all in one set of posts.

I’m starting with a 55 gallon plastic (HDPE) barrel that does not have the convenient, completely openable top. Instead, these come often with (2) 2” diameter ports. Sometimes with smaller screw on caps within the 2” caps. If you can find a cheap barrel that has a fully openable top, that’s easier to use and requires less retrofit.

First thing I needed to do was make a much larger access hole for me to get in for cleaning, mixing, removing solids, etc. This barrel is 22” diameter, and I cut off the top of a 12” fermenting bucket that I had from my local brew store. This one is a 6.5 gallon bucket, but a 5 gallon will do too. I cut such that there was an inch or two of the bucket extending below the lowest perimeter flange. This will make the joining process to the barrel a bit easier. You can see my cut bucket in the first photo.

Next, I used that cut off top to trace the outside diameter onto the top of my barrel. I’ve located it where I can find a flatter portion of the barrel top (mine is a bit irregular). And I also made sure to leave the (2) 2” ports where I wouldn’t get too close to them or limit my use of them in the future.

In the third image, I’ve used a jig saw to cut out the line I traced, starting at a large hole I drilled inside of my cut out area. This is quite easy as HDPE is not so strong of a plastic. Very tough (will stretch without breaking), but reasonably easy to pierce, drill or cut.

Next image, I’ve placed the bucket top into the hole. In this case I had traced and cut well as it fit quite nicely. Before I placed the top into the hole, I cleaned up the barrel cut edge with a little deburring tool. I also drilled a hole into the side of the cut bucket a little below the lowest molded in flange of the bucket. The purpose of this is to make sure that the access bucket portion has a shared air space with the rest of the barrel and one air space never gets cut off from the other air space… and separated from the CO2 vent path. It was important that I drilled this hole where the bucket top goes through the barrel surface at the highest point on the barrel where I cut it open to insert the bucket. If I drill this hole accidentally at a spot where the barrel dips low at the top, I might inadvertently drill a hole to what will be outside the barrel environment.

[DetroitDIY]

At this point, I had a nice large hole in my barrel, and once the bucket is permanently affixed, I won’t have quite as good as access to the bottom inside of the barrel. So I switched gears a bit to add a drain port near the bottom of the barrel.

I started with a stainless, weldless, bulkhead, valve kit. Which I’ve shown in an exploded view in the first image. I’ve known others to use a plastic rain barrel bulkhead valve, but my local box store said they stopped carrying them. In the second image I’ve assembled the parts half way. The nut and silicone O ring go inside the barrel, the rest is connected from the outside. There are seals on both sides of the barrel wall, but I expect the inner seal is providing all the liquid seal function. I’ve also added a bit of Teflon tape to the screw fittings at the ball valve.

Third image, I’ve drilled a hole with my stepper bit just large enough to be able to screw in the outside portion with an interference fit to the barrel wall. This means the threads will cut into barrel wall just a bit. This turned out to be helpful, as the barrel wall was a bit thick and it wasn’t easy to fit these threads through the barrel wall and connect the nut on the inside (with very poor accessibility) and compress these two washers enough to get the nut threads to grab the threads of the fitting. By first screwing this into the barrel wall, I was able to pre compress the outside washer and get just a bit more of the fitting threads exposed on the inside of the barrel to make the connection. I actually did a second barrel at the same time as this. In the second barrel I drilled out a clearance hole for the fitting and it was more difficult to get the nut to connect to the fitting as I couldn’t pre-compress the fitting side O ring.

The other thing you see in this third image is that I’ve marked off the gallons on the side of the barrel, and I’ve located the valve at about 7.5 gallons high. This barrel was pretty much a simple cylinder, so I just measured the height of the barrel, divided the height by 11 (55 gallons / 5 gallon increments), and I had the height that each of my 5 gallon markings should be marked at. I intend to use this barrel for my rum washes, and hope is that the spigot at 7.5 gallons is about the right height to stay above the lees/trub in my wash.

Turns out the HDPE wall thickness is quite thick, and I ended up using my deburring tool to radius the drill hole on the inside and outside. That allowed the silicone washer to recess a bit into that space, which was also helpful in getting the nut to fitting threads to engage. You can see this in the 4th image. And in the last image, I’m connecting the assembly. I ended up shoving the spigot against the wall to apply some pressure towards the barrel, and then used the massive socket wrench you can see in the image to get it all connected. If I had two people it would have been much easier.

[DetroitDIY]

Now that I’m done needing to reach into the bottom of the barrel, I’ve hot glued the bucket to the barrel. You can find different hot glue types. Probably best to get the same material as the bucket and barrel (both HDPE in my case), and do look up the MSDS of your hot glue material to make sure you’re happy that it’s sufficiently food safe. I did not use a HDPE glues stick, but the base resin was OK (baby teething plastic). However the MSDS also told me that it had a small amount of plasticizer (gum resine) which has some moderate toxicity, do not ingest warnings. The fit of my bucket to the barrel top was quite tight, and I don’t expect liquid to get up to that rim connection, so I went for it, but do your homework before using something that’s not explicitly identified as food safe.

By the way, there is a very firm policy of not using, nor even discussing the use of polymers in your still (with the exception of PTFE, common name Teflon). In this case, the fermenter never contains a high ABV, nor a high temperature, and it’s commonly accepted that food grade HDPE, PP and other polymers are suitable for safe fermentation. I know… that’s all obvious to most, but I do see some newer members confused about this on other threads.

With the bucket top all connected, I bought a conversion kit to change my normally snap on bucket lid to a screw on lid. On Amazon, and in the local box store, there was one type that seemed to be available which I’ve shown in the second image. By the way, the box store was 20% cheaper than Amazon on this one. It has a snap on ring that snaps onto your bucket rim just like a regular lid, ans also has the screw top. In the third image, you can see the rim snapped on and the lid unscrewed.

[DetroitDIY]

Close to done now, but still need a heavy duty air lock, which others have shown finished versions of on this site. Need two such air locks as I’m building two barrel fermenters. You can see all the parts in the first image, top and side views. Bottom is a 2” PVC fitting with 2” thread coupling that fits just perfectly into the top of both of my barrels. Then a 2” to 1 ¼” reducer. As noted by others, the ID of this reducer is about 41 mm and has a slight inner rim reducing the ID to below 40 mm on one end. This is just right to receive a ping pong ball which is 40 mm. Last thing in this image is a 2” cap to contain everything so I don’t so easily lose or damage the ping pong ball.

In order to have the 2 x 1 ¼ recuder fit into a 2” PVC fitting on either end, I needed to remove the slight increase in diameter of the reducer on one end. You can see the two pieces in my second image. The one on the left has the increased OD on one end I’m referring to, the one on the right I’ve sanded off with my disc sander.

Next image you can see one assembly complete and the other with the end cap yet removed. I’ve taken both end caps to the band saw and sliced off a notch. This set up works such that the ping pong ball lifts just a bit to allow the CO2 to escape, but if there’s more than that can handle, it can rise up even further into the cap space without getting lost. If the ping pong ball goes into the cap space, there’s even more cross sectional area for CO2 to escape. Probably unnecessary. If I did this again, I might make a series of slices on the side so that this isn’t prone to have dust settle in it. No adhesive cement used in these, so it’s easy to change or clean if needed in the future.

Last image shows the white barrel I’ve been showing all along, as well as a different make blue barrel that I was building simultaneously. The blue one is better in my book since it has a clamp on ring at the top that allows full access to the interior and doesn’t need the bucket top trick. With the better overhead access of this barrel, I plan to use this one for washes such as UJSM where I can remove the spent corn and such. I’ve also placed this spigot a bit higher (10 gallon mark) to accommodate the grain in the bottom.

And I’m done. Two new high capacity barrel fermenters so that I can have more wash available when I’m ready for it. Hope this was helpful for some of you. As I said at the beginning, none of this is new ideas, I’ve just assembled what I’ve been sorting out from multiple other postings.

Happy stilling!

[Manc]

Nice build Detroit as always thanks for the info

Lee

[Truckinbutch]

Can't fault the build . Nice job .
Was it me , I would have cut the top out of the barrel leaving the rim . Line with a clear industrial size garbage bag . Fill with 50 gallons of mash and cap with another liner . Poke 3 pencil lead size holes in the cap to keep it from blowing off and wait for the show to end . Rack , squeeze ,throw 2 bags away and reload .
Been workin well for me with 32 gallon Brutes . Saves a lot of cleanup .

[MoonBreath]

Good job, advice Tb..
Common sense, don't everyone have.
Like me, you gotta lot of time, effort, and resources in your education.

[hpby98]

Now for the blue barrel find some LDPE food grade bags to fit. Saves a ton of cleanup time

[NineInchNails]

I have used hot glue on many plastics and found the adhesion to be a weak link.

Have you considered 'plastic welder'? It should work for HDPE.

[DetroitDIY]

The trash bag is a nice idea Truckinbutch, but am happy with these barrels. I've elevated them above my boiler so I can just open the valve and let gravity do all the work. Nice and simple on the way out (ladder work on the way in though).

Regarding cleanup time HP, do you mean rinsing out the fermenter? While I'm pretty good about cleanliness, disinfectant and sanitation when it comes to ciders and meads, I have been much looser when it comes to making a wash to distill. I guess the rub will be IFF I want to clean them, then I can't so well empty them all the way with the valves as high as I've set them. The blue fermenter valve is at 10 gallons, roughly 80 lbs, plus another 10 or so for the barrel itself. That'll leave me with having to lean the barrel precariously, or siphoning, when I want to drain it all the way, get it down, clean it out properly. Well... a problem for another day.

I like the plastic welder NIN, though I want to keep spending money on one time toys like a hole in the head. I do know that polyethylene is just about the worst polymer to bond to. Probably should have scuffed up the surfaces a bit to get a better mechanical bond. But so long as I don't put a lot of stress on the bucket, it should be OK for a good while. Maybe one of those welders will be in my future somewhere.

[Truckinbutch]

Everybody finds their own way . I simply offered an alternative . This diversity and sharing of information is how we increase this hobby .
For too many years the art of fermenting and distilling was a closely held secret because of the profit motivation .
Back in the day : if you could make a better drop than your neighbor ; you could sell more .
There was no motivation to share information .
We are craftsmen in a hobby where we try to bring fellow craftsmen to the same level .
It's a great day to be alive !

[Ftero]

I had no idea that these food safe liners were available! What a great idea if conserving water is an issue. Thank you for sharing!

[OtisT]

Nice build Detroit. I have the same blue barrel fermenter with an identical drain valve setup. I switched from multiple 12-14 gallon ferments to a single 36 gallon ferment and really like have one ferment that will result in a full charge for a spirit run.

Here are some of my observations switching from 12 g ferments to 36 gallons ferments with that setup.

I paced my fermenter on a pedestal to gain elevation to help with siphoning/draining.

If you don’t have an electric mixer, you should consider getting one. That and/or a good strong long paddle for mixing.

I have yet to find a plastic racking cane that is long enough to use in the barrel. I ended up slipping a short piece of vinal tubing over the tip of the cane to extend it about 10” so I can reach the bottom when I need to. I have marked the cane for various depths and I clamp the cane to the side so I can control the exact depth.

With some grains the valve is virtually useless, clogging easily. The valve works great with sugar washes and rums, and I’ve had limited success with wheat/barley ferments. Corn and rye are a PITA and I don’t use the valve at all with them any more. To help deal with grains I bought a threaded stainless steel screen about 8” long for mounting inside the barrel. Helps a lot, but draining grains can still get very slow even with added rice hulls. The screen also makes using a mixing blade tricky/risky. My last AG was a bourbon (lots of corn) so I did not mount the screen so I could use the mixer, and I ignored the drain all together. In the end I found siphoning before the squeeze was just easier with corn and rye.

For me, switching from 12 gallon ferments to 36 gallon ferments introduced issues trying to hit mashing temps. I used to have the process dialed in, but the larger volume is tricky. A big part of the issue is that I can no longer heat all the water I need at once because my boiler is only 15 gallons. I’m still trying to work out a consistent mashing protocol that works w/o a lot of measuring and fine tuning of the temp.

I built a new insulation box for the large barrel. This prevents hot/cold spots from forming and holds mashing temps like a champ. When I need to warm the ferment, I can still use my bulb heater. It’s slow, but I was able to raise the temp by about 6 F over 12 hours with a 70W bulb.

I’ve never used a disposable bag liner. I’m sure they are great, but you would not be able to use your new drain.

Otis

[DetroitDIY]

Hey Otis, I too found that corn is a SOB with those valves. I had 40 gallons of UJSM to get out of it, and ended up tipping and shoving in a screen like you said. I've been thinking of the same solution that you mention, with a screen of sorts over the outlet. An extended siphon sounds like a good idea too. Seems like it would be easy to fab up out of a copper tube. Mine are both elevated as you say, but more like 6 feet up to preserve floor space. That makes lifting up backset and dumping it a bit precarious. I have a pump, which I expect to use when I begin the all grains. Similar to you, I'll be boiling 15 gal at a time, insulating the barrel, and filling it in 3 batches (a la SCD's large batch mashing). Not coming from beer brewing roots, so I'll be as much of a rookie there as I started with distilling (so lots of errors likely in store )

I like the blue barrel where the top pops fully off MUCH better than my jury rigged screw top system. So much that I recently bought another blue, clamp-top barrel and will be converting it. Not sure what to do with my screw top barrel now... just don't have enough space for 3, 55 gallon barrels. Maybe a slightly larger water reservoir.

Have a great New Year's Eve everyone. Be safe out there!

[Beerswimmer]

I would use it for your cooling water. I lived in Traverse City and would wheel out my barrel full of water the day before I did a run to get it cold. Then I used an aquarium pump to pump the cold water to my leibig and back. It needed to be completely changed once or twice a run, that's where your valve on the bottom would be useful. Open it to drain most of the water quickly(I used a bucket, 5 gals at a time took a while....) and then fill it back up with a hose. Snow and ice go into the barrel. I always wondered what my neighbors thought when they saw me filling a wheelbarrow with snow and bringing it inside! In the summer I froze a couple buckets in my chest freezer and added one to the barrel during refills.