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Chombo · 05-26-2010, 04:12 AM

So i have made a few batches of brew and for some reason random bottles will be gushers, not really sure why.

all have conditioned for over 4 weeks some for a few months and all gushers have been chilled for over 48+ hours. and none of them have off flavors, infact they are all delicious. is there any reason for this? starsan was used on all bottles, and i have been quite careful with sanitization so im confident it isnt an infection problem. any ideas? its kind of annoying because the gushing is kicking up all the yeast at the bottom making some pretty cloudy beers. thanks!

carnevoodoo · 05-26-2010, 07:22 AM

Are you priming in bulk or do you prime each bottle?

HotbreakHotel · 05-26-2010, 01:34 PM

Maybe little bits of gunk left in the gusher bottles? I carefully inspect every bottle I use. I hold them to the light and look inside to make sure there are no little pieces of gunk in the bottom.

**Revvy** · 05-26-2010, 01:39 PM

We need more info before folks start armchair theorizing. Let's get down to basics.

How are you bottling your beer, bulk or individually?
How much sugar are you using?
What temp are bottling at?
Do you crash cool or not?
What temp are you storing them at?

**Homercidal** · 05-26-2010, 01:44 PM

Usually, gushers come from either not mixing your priming sugar good enough (some bottles have more sugar than others), or from infections caused by not having your bottles clean and sanitized.

We could use the information the Revvy is requesting to help figure out what needs to be done to prevent this in the future.

OsbornBrewing · 05-26-2010, 02:01 PM

My experience with a gushing situation like yours, reinforcing what Homer said, is poorly mixed priming sugar.

NOT to try to discredit Revvy, as his avatar shows, he the Jedi-master to my padwan. So do not hesitate to answer his questions as completely as possible.

My experience: gushers do to a sanitation/infection issue - a few good beers most gushing. My cleaning/sanitation will be poor for the batch, I'm in a hurry, not paying attention, etc. So all or most of the bottles end up bad, instead of just a few.

A few gushers, and mostly good beers - mixing issues. The sugars will mostly mix giving a few over-carbed beers.

Again just a generalization on my experience.

I have also had gushers from rushing to bottle before letting fermentation finish, that was an entire batch thoughi, as too much sugar from the malts remained in the wort, so with the added corn sugar it went nuts.

A good, quick rememdy, that has worked well for me: sanitize a rubbermaid container, cooler (something shallow and wide) place your bottles in it, and start popping tops. Let the gushers gush, if a bottle isn't gushing recap it right away. Recap your gushers and put em in the fridge, or wherever you store your bottles. Poor the beer out of your container into a glass and enjoy

! The CO2 is heavier then air and bottle pressure is greater then atmospheric, so if you don't dawdle or watch the Lost finale after you pop the tops your risk of oxygenizing your bottles will be slim to none.

Hope that helps. CHEERS!

Dynachrome · 05-26-2010, 04:34 PM

I just did a little mechanical work on some bottles this morning. I'm having the same difficulty. I burped them in the sink. It's apparent which ones they have quite a lot of head room after foaming. I'll just drink those mysely sometime. I'm not going to refridgerate - just finish bottle aging.

The last couple batches I've tried to decant into a bottling pot with a siphon hose to leave the trub behind. Some yeast always seems to get through.

I've put about 3 tablespoons of corn sugar in first. Give it a good mix, and a couple gentle stirs along the way.

I have tried to avoid stirring the beer too vigorously to avoid disturbing the settled yeast on the bottom of the pot.

Is this why people go to secondary? I was thinking of starting a new thread "Philosophy of Seconrady Fermentation" to get opinions.

The gushers are kind of fun to watch as long as you get them before they go al nuclear!

The similar threads at the bottom of the page have interesting titles. Is this a technical term?

jigidyjim · 05-26-2010, 05:16 PM

I had a gusher this week. When I poured the bottle out, I saw two clumps of what looked like mold or something similar stuck to the bottom of the bottle. I added water to the bottle, swished it around, and watched as the clumps poured out. Ewwwwwwwww... The other bottles are fine.

I've had uneven carbonation problems, but they've never been as extreme as a gusher due to infection. When I have uneven carb, I get a bigger hiss on opening, and more head when I pour. When I get a gusher as soon as I open the bottle, foam starts coming out. With that said, I use less priming sugar than most people (closer to 4 ounces instead of 5 ounces) so I probably don't run into way too much sugar in one bottle issues as much as others.

Justibone · 05-26-2010, 05:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dynachrome

Some yeast always seems to get through.

If *no* yeast got through, there wouldn't be any carbonation. A certain number of yeast are in suspension -- even if the beer looks clear -- so unless you filter you will never get rid of all the yeast. (I suppose you could centrifuge... that'd get most if not all of the li'l fellas.)

You mean you get chunks of trub in bottles? I've never done that, I guess because I siphon to a bottling bucket fairly carefully. Also, my trub is not a crumbly cake while it's still wet, it's more like a trub-slime on the bottom of the bucket.

Dynachrome · 05-27-2010, 02:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Justibone

If *no* yeast got through, there wouldn't be any carbonation. A certain number of yeast are in suspension -- even if the beer looks clear -- so unless you filter you will never get rid of all the yeast. (I suppose you could centrifuge... that'd get most if not all of the li'l fellas.)

You mean you get chunks of trub in bottles? I've never done that, I guess because I siphon to a bottling bucket fairly carefully. Also, my trub is not a crumbly cake while it's still wet, it's more like a trub-slime on the bottom of the bucket.

Justibone

Most of the time its not a problem in itself to have the last two or three bottles to have a little extra - I'll use the term "sediment" - in them. It's just that it appears that these are also the bottles that might be having the caps bump out.

The liquid yeast I just tried for the first tiime had little round balls of yeast maybe 1.5 mm in dia floating in it. They settled out fairly fast. I wasn't overly cautious decanting into my bottling pot from my fermenting pot. That last few bottles had a couple millenia worth of sediment - cretaceous, paleozoic, etc. :-)

Seriously - Maybe I just need to be more careful with the decanting to bottling step, but what about secondary? How do you time it? Do you need to leave some of the original sugar? I'm not really set for more of an investment in Carbouys right now. I'm thinking Id get oxidation with my SS pot method.

?