Closed-System Transfers with Buckets
Closed system transfers let you control the airspace over your beer. After sanitizing a container, which for me involves sloshing foamy Star San around inside, the air inside is probably much cleaner than ambient.
I transfer beers in my basement which isn’t the cleanest place. The concrete floor is usually dusty, there’s cat hair all over, and there’s lots of collected dust on the joists and HVAC ducting. I recently had an 8-hour, triple-decocted weizenbock get infected sometime between primary and bottling; not something I want to repeat! Eliminating most of the airborne dust from settling on the beer is a step in the right direction.
When you’re transferring between two carboys it’s easy to do a closed system with your friend the carboy hood. The small lead on the hood has an ID of 1/4″ so two barbed connectors and a length of hose would do it. However with buckets it’s a bit more complicated because there’s not a lid with all the usual ports built-in.
The bottom bucket (my bottling bucket in this case) has the same quick connect fitting on the lid. To seal off the beer hose I used a #7 stopper with the hole enlarged a bit to accommodate the hose.
