Tube that fits on a drum tap?

[Invalid Stout]

Hey all,

I've established that whenever I make a stronger beer it doesn't come out at all well and I think it's oxidised due to my poor bottling practice. I just open the tap on the fermenter and let the beer run down the side of the bottling bucket. Should I be attaching tubing to the tap instead so the bottling bucket fills up from the bottom? If so, what size of tubing fits on a drum tap?

[6470zzy]

You should certainly attach a tube so as to not splash the green beer at all. You'll need to get out your ruler to measure the tap I'm afraid as I am not familiar with the size, normally tubing is measured by the ID (inside diameter)

Cheers

[crowds]

I picked up some rom B&Q that fits nicely over my Drum Tap... ill just nip and meaure the size of the tube.

[crowds]

It's about 18mm (inside diameter) and costs just over a pound from B&Q. Pick up a jubilee clip while your at it just to be on the safe side.

Edit: just to make sure...
It is this type yes ?

[Invalid Stout]

Yes! Thanks very much!

[flything]

I've got sooo paranoid about oxidisation recently that I've stopped transfering beer using a tube as wide as that, I found that unless the beer was thundering through the pipe it wouldn't fill it and if not full meant that as the beer flowed through the pipe the beer to air surface area seemed pretty big.

So I've gone back to siphoning, with a bit of care using an extension on the siphon tap and a quick spray of iodophor on the end after it's been in my mouth and a blast of CO2 in the bottom of the bucket or keg I can transfer beer with almost no exposure to air at all.

An alternative would be to use a water butt style tap, you can push siphon tubing inside those, basically I think you want a relatively narrow bore tube so that it restricts the flow enough to ensure it pushes the air out rather than runs down the side of the tubing.

[Invalid Stout]

Good point, but I got the tap in the first place because I hate siphoning. Maybe I should get an auto-siphon...