is it need in a dead ringer IPA ? and can you use a 5 gallon plastic water jug ? just wondering if a 5 gallon plastic bottle from a water cooler would be ok to use ?
Your going to have to find an air lock for that Water bottle. The neck on those bottles is a lot larger than a carboy!
You do not need to conduct a secondary fermentation for your Dead Ringer IPA. I dry hop in my primary fermenter. I personally place the dry hops within a sanitized muslin bag weighed down by marbles. I achieve ‘good’ dry hopping this way and no hop particulate matter gets into my beer. Cheers!
What he said. Some use marbles, some use stainless steel washers. A gentleman at the homebrew store said he uses pennies. I do not advocate the use of pennies.
FYI, you need to use a LOT of marbles. I put 10 marbles into a muslin bag along with 1 ounce of leaf hops into my secondary fermenter. That was not enough to weigh it down. Those are buoyant little suckers. Especially if your beer is high gravity. My ratio is 20 marbles per 1 oz. leaf hops. Pellet hops do not require nearly as much. 5-10 marbles will work fine.
I've never not had a bag of pellet hops sink... Never even crossed my mind that giant wet mass of mush could float...
