15 Gallon Food Grade Drums

[concord maple]

Been thinking about trying some 15 gallon drums to use as transport containers from sugarbush back to main tank at sugarhouse. (I'm on a small operation of around 60-75 taps). These would go on wagon being pulled by a four wheeler. My question is, I have access to these drums from a local diary that gets these containing teat dip and milk line cleaner Acid/detergent). I also see on Craigslist that a big dairy farmer in Highgate, Vt. advertises these as food grade and he stated that they contained teat dip, detergent, and iodine. Anyone using these drums that may have contained these products?

[jrthe3]

i don't use them but a friend of mine uses them he use about a 100 of them and has been useing them for around 25 years he has not had any prob with them i asked a usda inspector about them ha said any thing that is around a milk house is food grade and if washed out proprtly the are good as any other

[KenWP]

Iodine is one of the essential minerals we need to survive so a certain amount is allowed into the milk and added to out salt for health reasons. Those containers wash out well and there fore you get good containers for a low price. You will get a few people that try to detract from them but it's usually people that have no idea whats safe to eat and what's not.
Dairy I have workings with actually got better milk grades when the new kid working there didn't mix water with the teat dip and used it straight from the jug instead of trying to cut cost's. They actually test for iodine in the milk supply and even thou the teats are covered with it at milking there still is not enough to harm people. So what ever miniscule amount that could be in a plactis barrel or jug could never hurt any one.

[darkmachine]

Last season we used six 55gal drums on a trailer to haul through the woods and dump buckets, it worked great exept for the sloshing, which we solved by draping a piece of fabric over the tops and put bungies around them. The barrels we got were second hand and held apple juice concentrate, they had a baked on finish inside, and were easy to clean up, and we had no residual taste in our syrup. We did scrub them well though.

[Teuchtar]

I bought 10 of those empty drums from Highwater. They rinse out real easy. I use them here and there in the woods where I have a 1/2 dozen trees coming down to the road, and they make a good super-bucket. Screw the bungs on, and you can fit them neatly in the loader bucket. At 150 lbs loaded, they get kinda hard to lift and empty. I empty them using a 5/16" length of tubing into my Zero tank.
You could easily screw a 1/2 valve into the bung to use as a drain fitting. The bungs are already tapped for that.