Sunday, November 1, 2009

Beer Gadgets - Siphon Pan

There are many house-hold items that can be used in your brewing. Some of them, like this wallpaper pan, can be found at your local hardware store.
One of the most basic tasks in brewing is to clean and sanitize everything that comes in contact with your beer.

Siphon tubes, long spoons and racking canes can be particularly difficult to clean and sanitize because of their length. I typically use a 5-gallon bucket of water with 1 oz of Star-San to sanitize my brewing equipment. The problem with this is that only about half of the racking cane is immersed in the sanitizer.

Well, a trip to my local True Vale and a few dollars solved that problem; now I have this wonderful pan to clean and sanitize my siphon equipment. It only takes 2-gallons of water to fill it and at 36 inches it is several inches longer then my auto-siphon and biggest racking cane.

It is a thin injection molded plastic that will probably not last very long, so I bought two. An inch or two added to the tray width would make it a little easier to fit tubing that is attached to racking canes, so I'll have to keep my eyes open for wallpaper pans at other hardware stores. Perhaps there is a professional grade pan that is wider and sturdier.