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Silicone tubing is a little pricy compared to the clear PVC tubing you'll find at the home centers, but it's worth it when you contrast their features. At hot temperatures, clear PVC tubing will leech plasticizers into the liquid and make your brew taste like plastic. PVC also softens up quite a bit with heat. Our silicone tubing is extruded in the U.S. and is FDA approved for food contact up to 500F. While we would never call any silicone tubing "clear", it is semi-opaque so you can see when liquid is in the tubing and if it has air bubbles for example.
This is the 1/2" ID x 3/4" OD (that's 1/8" wall thickness) tubing that we recommend for use with pumps or any general plumbing around your brewery.
If you're price shopping, be sure to look out for wall thickness (or thinness rather) and super hazy imported tubing. We stand behind our product because we literally pick up our product at the extruder and know where the raw materials come from.
We also stock an imported version of this tubing with some slightly different characteristics. Our imported tubing is made from a more rigid formulation of silicone. All things being equal, it is slightly less prone to kinking with tighter bend radii, is slightly more translucent, and a slightly smoother surface. Being more rigid means it's harder to stretch over the oversized barbs such as the BLQD-Cplus, Cam BigC, and the 5/8" hose barbs on many TC adapters. It's doable, but you'll work for it. For a more visual comparison, here's a picture with the Domestic (Made in USA) and imported tubing side by side. The pricing is comparable.
Warning: Do NOT leave silicone tubing soaking in Star San sanitizer for more than a few hours at a time. Long term soaking, such as several days to a week, can cause silicone to get brittle.
How to get tubing over larger oversized barbs
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