Reddit reviews Regular 5/16" Auto Siphon with 8 feet of Tubing, clear, 1 piece

Don't buy a kit! They sell you all kinds of shit you won't use when there are better options for similar money.

Get a brewing bucket as if you don't have a bottler then this will make your life so much better.

Get 2 carboys (glass is best but better bottles will work too). Check Craigslist for these...you can get some awesome deals.

Get 1 Refractomoeter instead of a hydrometer because they use WAY less of your must to calculate and they aren't mega fragile like hydrometers are.

You will want an auto siphon

You will want a carboy brush that fits on a cordless drill because cleaning a carboy without one fucking sucks (and for 18 bucks this is a no brainer).

You will need sanitizer. I personally like Iodophor because it's super cheap, it doesn't really foam up and it lasts forever. I bought one of THESE bottles like 2 years ago and it is about half full even though I brew between 50-100 gallons a year.

I always advocate people start with beer bottles rather than wine bottles. The reason for this has less to do with the bottles and more to do with equipment. The Ferrari Bottle Capper is 14 dollars while a good floor corker for wine bottles will set you back 60 bucks. In addition, it's cheaper to bottle in 20 ounce beer bottles with caps rather than in wine bottles with good corks. Use of a double lever corker for wine bottles should be considered a war crime...seriously...unless you're a masochist who loves dumping wine everywhere and having to clean it afterwards...then just avoid them...they are absolutely awful.

If you go the wine bottle route then NEVER use agglomerated or colmated corks (the ones made from tiny pieces of cork glued together) as they fall apart and will leave chunks in your bottles. In addition they don't age well, so you are much more likely to lose your brew to spoilage. I like synthetic Nomacorc but you can also buy very good quality solid natural corks as well.

Good oxygen absorbing bottle caps on the other hand are mega cheap. Again...this isn't about one being better than the other, so you can use either one.

For wine bottles, I REALLY like the ones with screw tops because they make it nice and easy to cap your bottles once opened. But for all of your bottles buy these locally...shipping will double or triple the cost of these vs buying locally. I get them for 15 bucks a case a few miles from my house...they're almost 30 a case on Amazon or close to that from Midwest or from Ohio (shipping is like 11-15 dollars a case.)

For beer bottles...I prefer clear, but they'll be tough to find locally so I often end up with brown ones. Again...buy these locally not online due to shipping costs. Your local brewing supply stores buy these pallets at a time so even Amazon can't compete with the lack of shipping costs.

For my own recommendation I would say do an extract beer can kit. You'll get about 40 bottles of beer out of it.

Almost everything below you can get at your local homebrew shop. In fact, many of these items might be part of a "beer starter kit" etc. I do recommend getting the 5 gallon carboy instead of a kit with pails. You'll thank me later. pails can get messy.

1. Coopers Brew Can Kit ($15) *comes with yeast you need
   
2. A 5 gallon carboy (I recommend a big mouth plastic one) ($20)
   
3. An Airlock for your carboy ($5)
   
4. A 4 foot blowoff tube to attach to the airlock center column ($5)
   
5. An empty 2L pop bottle to use as the blowoff container. (free)
   
6. 1KG of sugar *and some more for bottling later ($2)
   
7. A Hydrometer to take your Specific Gravity readings and a container for the hydrometer $25
   
8. A 5 Gallon pot $30 (I highly recommend you follow the kit or use 3 gallons of water during the heating/boiling as I have done...dont try to boil 5 gallons in a 5 gallon pot)
   
9. An Auto-Siphon for siphoning the beer. $13
   
10. A Wine Thief for stealing the samples from your beer (which you read with the hydrometer and then drink) without disturbing the beer too much and risking infection. $13
    
    Total $128 by my guestimates, but you do get 2 cases of beer out of it and $113 worth of brew equipment. Hell, in Ontario the two cases of beer can easily be more expensive than $128 lol... Not cheap, but everything here you will use over and over and over again (except of course the sugar and the brew kit)
    
    ---------------------------------
    
    The Coopers Can Kit comes with instructions to make your beer, a hopped extract and yeast.
    
    After you make your beer it'll be a few weeks before the fermentation is done (which you'll know by hydrometer readings)
    
    In that time you can start getting your stuff together for bottling and carbonating them.
    
    You'll also need (for bottling) 48 empty clean bottles (cleaned and then sanitized with star-san solution) NON TWIST OFF TYPE
    A handheld Beer capper
    Bottle caps (box)
    
    
    I gotta run, but this was fun to type out. If you need any help, glad to help ya.

If it's a 1 gallon batch get the mini siphon:
https://www.amazon.com/Fermtech-Mini-Auto-Siphon-3-8-inch/dp/B0064ODL1G/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1498080342&sr=8-2&keywords=brew+siphon

if its 3-6 gallons get the big one:
https://www.amazon.com/Regular-Auto-Siphon-feet-Tubing/dp/B00AYHS7ZY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1498080342&sr=8-1&keywords=brew+siphon

They all work fine.

The best way I found to get started is to just get a gallon jug carboy, some starsan, some montrachet wine yeast, yeast nutrients, and 100% grape juice from your local grocery store.

The starsan is a concentrate, I put about a capful into a 2 liter bottle, fill it up with water, and keep it under my sink. It's an antiseptic rinse that should splash over everything that's going to touch the juice; airlock, bottle, your hands, the scissors you use, all that stuff. It doesn't even needed to be rinsed, just shake the bottle out and go to town.

Once you've rinsed, put the juice, yeast nutrients, and yeast in the bottle. Put some water in the airlock and put it on top. Put the bottle of juice and yeast in a dark cool spot until you can easily see a flashlight shine through it, about 2 months or so.

While it's doing it's thing collect 5 old wine bottles or get some from a brew supply store. Old liquor bottles work great, just rinse them good and then splash starsan around inside.

Buy a racking cane! This significantly simplifies the process of getting wine out of the jug without sucking up all the dead yeast at the bottom. Run starsan through it at first, filling the starsan cup with water as it gets siphoned out so that the inside is all nice and clean.

Rack that wine out of the jug and into bottles. That's it! Age for six months if you want, but I often just mix in a little fresh grape juice to sweeten it up a bit right there in my cup and go to town right away, hence my inability to age it.

The only regular cost is the juice. I like to get the frozen 100% juice on sale because I'm doing 15 gallon batches these days (because I'm going to outpace my thirst, darn it), I use about 14 of those per 5 gallon carboy and fill the rest up with spring water from the grocery store.

I also use 4 cups of 5 minute boiled raw sugar in each 5 gallon carboy of juice to boost the abv, but this is personal taste. It makes the wine taste pretty hot but it also has a solid kick to it so I don't mind. After I mix it with a bit of fresh grape juice it just tastes like a light sweet wine and I have a very good time with it.

This is just a little more and a lot better suited.

I AM NOT AN EXPERT MANY PEOPLE KNOW FAR MORE THEN I DO, MAYBE THEY WILL INTERJECT IF I AM WRONG

Alright, let me guide you away from the starter kit. It has helped me know what I'm doing, and develop my process, thinking about and acquiring the pieces I would need. Let's say to start off with you just are busting to brew! Can't contain it anymore!

Start off with these three things

This Pot

This Cooker

-and I know it's not prime shipping but one of these

Plastic Carboys for $25.53 CDN with airlock and stopper

alright so baring the cost of shipping from AiH, plus a propane tank, siphon/tubing, and sanitizer. your looking at a cool $149.25 CDN for a bare bones basic kit for extract brewing.

Now you get a little more fancy, and throw in

This Auto Siphon

this brew in a bag

and this thermometer

and you right around $210 CDN minus a big ass spoon and bottling bucket that would be all you need to do all grain brewing from a bare bones stand point (ok baring ingredients also) but I think you could get off cheaper.. or at least better gear for the same money. especially since the kit you picked out doesn't even have a propane burner or pot this is a hell of a steal. You could go all out, buying a mini fridge and temperature controller for fermentation, an immersion chiller so your not icing down your beer post boil in a bathtub, custom mash paddles, etc.

What I got mad about when I started brewing was how much people were charging for what amounted too a couple of buckets, airlocks, benchcappers, and some "literature". When if you pieced it out it was more like price gauging because I did't know what I was doing.

Either way you go about it, welcome to paradise! Just wait till everyone starts rolling their eyes, when you bring up beer so you seek out friends that brew and you all start your big group beer tastings, I ♥ my beer buddies.

TL;DR : Here's an arguably better (and more utilized) "starter kits" of sorts for a basic bare bones set up. From a newly all grain brewer in a college apt

I don't ferment in a corny keg, but my brews do end up in one. Here's my process:

• Primary fermentation in a 5 gallon food-safe plastic bucket
  
• Transfer the finished 1F to a corny keg using an auto siphon, filtering through a nylon mesh bag along the way to prevent any large particles from making it into the keg. For flavorings, I use juices or simple syrups to prevent solids from blocking the keg output valve.
  
• When the keg is full (leaving about an inch of headroom to prevent backflow), let it sit for a couple days at room temperature (~65-70F) to let the flavors incorporate.
  
• Move the keg to a kegerator (at 38F) and attach the CO2 to the corny "IN" at 30PSI. Leave for ~48 hours to force carbonate.
  
• Attach a serving line to the corny "OUT" with 40ft. of 3/16" beverage line to provide enough resistance to prevent foaming.
  
• Draw and discard the first 12 ounces which may contain sediment from the cold crash
  
• Enjoy
  
  If you don't have a kegerator, you can still do most of this process, but I would shy away from primary fermentation in a corny keg because of the yeast sediment that can build up in the various crevices in the corny keg (dip tube, poppet valves, etc.). Aside from that, the speed of 1F is partially dependent on the exposed surface area (where the pellicle forms) - a narrower opening like that of a corny keg makes for a slower 1F.

I would strongly caution against a 35 quart pot. The Bayou Classic 44 quart (11 gallon) pot is only a little more, and it's of dimensions more ameniable to brewing (tall, rather than squat). If you plan to migrate to BiaB, the version with the basket is quite useful; you'll be able to fire your heat source without worrying about scorching the bag.

For ingredients, I would recommend looking around for a LHBS (local homebrew shop). You'll likely not save much money ordering those online, due to their weight/cost ratio, and a LHBS is often the centre of your local community of homebrewers.

With regard to literature, my bible is John Palmer's How To Brew. You can also read the first edition online, but much has been learnt since that was published and the latest edition has current best practices.

That equipment kit is decent, but there are a lot of things in it you'll probably wish you hadn't bought.

You will want:

• 6 gallon primary fermenter carboy
  
• 5 gallon secondary carboy, for dry hopping (can't find any that ship with prime)
  
• A bench capper (wing/emily cappers are cheaper, but it's not worth it)
  
• An autosiphon
  
• A bottling bucket, with spigot
  
• A bottling wand
  
• Sanitizer (Starsan looks more expensive, but a bottle will last a long, long time. Especially if you pick up a spray bottle at the dollar store.)
  
• Two carboy caps and airlocks

I'd like to do 5 gallon batches. I don't think the quantity from the Mr Beer keg is worth it.

How's this look? Total is around $80.

Fermentation bucket

Bung/airlock

Stock pot

Autosiphon

Star San or Idophor (What's the difference?)

Is there any advantage to having a carboy as well? How long would I leave the beer in the fermentation bucket?

So if I wanted to do sours, I'd basically have to get 2 of everything?

Edit - actually, wouldn't this kit be about the same, but with an extra bucket but no stock pot?

Edit 2 - another pot, 36qt is good price, leaving this here so I can find it again.

You could try a racking cane

TLDR: The "Full kit" looks like it has the basics. As others have said, you might want a food-grade plastic bucket for primary fermentation, and you'll need bottles/containers to store the end product in.

If it were a "complete" kit I'd probably put one together which included One step sanitizer to sanitize equipment,a plastic fermentation bucket, and an auto-syphon to make racking (i.e., transferring the liquid from container to container) easier.

If it's something you're interested in pursuing further, there's plenty more you could consider picking up. A bottle filler for the auto syphon, a filtration kit to help clarify wine/mead, fining products, you might want to look into picking up more things like yeast energizer and yeast nutrient (which it sounds like this kit comes with some) and sulfate/sorbate (to stabilize the mead before back-sweetening) etc.

There are lots of recipes and lots of help available, so read up and feel free to ask questions and have a lot of fun experimenting and trying new things :)

This might be a better investment. I use this for my 2F and it works great. You may also want to get a Air lock and a siphon as well.

Ah thanks!

I was considering getting this thing in the future, but it sounds like that spring filler may be better.

When moving kombucha from its fermenting vessel into bottles for consumption, I used to pour it through a funnel straight from the jar, but this really stirs everything up and all of that stuff at the bottom ends up in the bottles. You can run it through a strainer if you want some of the larger particles out, but I bought an autosiphon on Amazon and use this to move kombucha around while leaving the gunk behind.

It has really improved the clarity of the bottles I produce and I think the people I give them to appreciate it, because they seem to be afraid of the stuff that floats around or accumulates on the bottom.