The Carboy Bumper
Protect yourself. Protect your gear. Protect your beer.
FAQ
These are just little rubber pads. Are you being serious?!
Of course we are serious but these are not just little rubber pads. PORON™ extreme shock absorbing foam was selected for its unique and exceptional state-of-the-art shock absorbing properties. It out performs any traditional rubber foams or materials regularly available.
The material is an engineered shock absorbing microcellular material. The material is soft to touch, but when stressed upon impact, it hardens up to absorb the impact. The Carboy Bumper material absorbs up to 90% of impact energy protecting any carboy from impact damage, in accordance to ASTM-F1614-C.
Furthermore, this material just happens to be anti-bacterial and anti-microbial.
What size carboys will they work on?
The Carboy Bumper works with all carboy sizes and all other glass fermentors. For smaller carboys, see our Tips section for more information.
How many pads do I need?
Six (or one complete set) is the magic number needed to provide the protection that has been tested in order to protect your carboy where it needs it most. The bottom edge is where repeated stresses to carboys are most common and damaging. The pads are completely customizable and can even be cut to optimize the use of material wherever you may want to add protection.
Once properly installed, the Carboy Bumpers will remain in place to reduce impact damage to your carboy.
It says in the care and user instructions to avoid contact with cleaners. Do the bumpers fall off if I soak it in PBW?
Short answer, "no." We worked directly with 3M™ to test and down select an adhesive that is chemical and water resistant. However, brewery cleaners are strong chemical solvents designed to break down chemical bonds. The adhesive used to attach the bumpers to your carboy works by creating a chemical bond between the carboy glass and the shock absorbing material.
We have tested this bond many times (yes, in hot PBW soaks) and have not had Carboy Bumpers come off without a lot of prying and intentional effort. But, over time and repeated extensive soaking or exposure to solvents will eventually take its toll on the bond. That is why we recommend you avoid it. As with most adhesives, keeping them dry and free of solvent exposure works best.
I have never broken a carboy, why would I need the Carboy Bumper?
You are apparently quite careful and fortunate, keep up the good work! But every time you put your glass carboy down on a hard surface, you are creating microfractures that weaken the glass over time. Many folks report carboys breaking for apparently no reason at all. Just picking it up one day and the bottom falls out. In such cases, it had just met the limit of repeated bumps over time.
The Carboy Bumper will prevent that from happening.
Can Carboy Bumpers be removed once they're installed?
Yes, but not easily, which is the point.
Rest assured, once you begin working with a protected carboy, you won’t feel comfortable putting one down without some protection in place. No more pucker factor when you set your heavy and fragile carboy onto a hard, unforgiving surface.
C'mon man... can't I save a few bucks by making these at home with some plastic or rubber?
We tried that in the effort to make this product as low-cost as possible. But there’s no way to get this degree of protection from rubber, plastic, or any other readily available material.
The material used in the Carboy Bumper was carefully chosen for its exceptional and state-of-the-art shock absorbing qualities. It is used on the cutting edge of concussion prevention, motorcycle safety, and other related technologies. It’s also made in the USA.
Yes, it costs more than cheaper materials with far inferior performance. But the results are absolutely worth it in our view.
Have you seen our drop video?