I've been using the multi-gallon coffee filters for 5 years now, but I still use the small ones for smaller jobs. I have a small plastic colander that matches the small ones (12 cup) and fits perfectly in the top of my 4-L beakers. When you get the large filters make sure you buy the 18" ones for the colanders that fit the top of a 5 gallon bucket. The 14" filters don't fill the large colander all the way to the top, but they do fit the medium , or normal sized kitchen colander, just fine. These medium ones fit the top of a two gallon bucket perfectly.
I keep several sizes of plastic colanders with matching filter papers on hand for whatever sized batch I am running. I buy 500-1000 of the filters at a time. I have three of the 5 gallon sized colanders, four of the kitchen sized colanders (2 gallon), and one of the small ones (4 Liter). I use all of these mainly for my coarse filtrations to remove large debris from solutions before settling followed by vacuum filtration after decanting.
When buying the plastic colanders, be sure to get the ones that are perfectly round and not the oval ones. You also want to make sure they are made of the opaque white plastic and not the thin transparent stuff.
Steve
