Cedar Rapids Brewing Society

Anyone else in the club have the FastFerment conical? I opened the valve to dump the sediment from the bottom of the conical and nothing came out. i finally got some to release but sediment was still stuck to sides. I only had the beer in the fermenter for 2 weeks. I ended up having to siphon out the beer due to getting chunks of sediment coming out when i opened the valve. Any suggestions on this would be fantastic! This is my first conical and am a wee bit frustrated right now!

I have one, but have only done one batch of beer in it so far. Did not have any problems with removing sediment.

If you're description is correct, you should have had the valve open the entire time, so the sediment builds up in the bulb. You close the valve and take the bulb off to harvest or dump the sediment. You put the bulb back on and re-open the valve for the secondary phase. Close it, dump again, but attach the transfer tube instead and re-open the valve to drain into your keg.

I got one. They say you should ferment with the valve opend and ball attached.

Never had the plug clog up. I did find dumping ball before pitching [overnight setting]. And 2 weeks then 3 to 4 weeks and another before transferring.

Excellent! I figured I was missing something! I will try that on my next batch!

Sometimes the first ball volume isn't enough to clear the beer. Hence the extra dumps.

Also apparently the handle comes off and turns into a spanner wrench to take apart the valve. Though I have not done this yet.

That's good to know too. I was pretty excited about not having to siphon anymore and then this happened. I figured I was doing something wrong!