First bottle bomb

Sitting at the kitchen table and behind me an explosion goes off like a shotgun. Scared the living bejeesus out of me. Found glass imbedded in the ceiling.
I put cola extract in one of the brews at the bottling stage, apparantly thats a no no.

You just have to make sure you do the math on how much sugar is being added and what level of carbonation it will give you. You may want to either throw everything in the fridge before they all blow up or uncap and recap everything.

KeyWestBrewing said:

You just have to make sure you do the math on how much sugar is being added and what level of carbonation it will give you. You may want to either throw everything in the fridge before they all blow up or uncap and recap everything.

Click to expand...

If u uncap and recap at any time, make sure u wear gloves and eye protection. No bull****.

Pratzie said:

If u uncap and recap at any time, make sure u wear gloves and eye protection. No bull****.

Click to expand...

Yea and you might want to do it in the tub just in case.

I threw the lot out in the yard. Have to get my helmet, glasses, leather jacket and gloves before I attempt opening them. Frickin scary. Dont know how I managed to escape all that flying glass.

Maybe don't leave them there if they are loose. If they're in a plastic bucket or something then that's cool. If they are loose, imagine trying to get a million shards of glass out of your grass. Think about your pets stepping on them, kids, neighbours or whoever. Not a good situation IMO

Gab.

Do you really think it was the extract?

I was thinking of adding maple extract to an upcoming brew. Is there really fermentable sugars in extracts?

Congratulations is in order! Welcome to the club! Now you can be called a brewer....

I had an employee years ago tell me he woke up in the middle of the night with bottles exploding in his closet all over his SWMBO prized shoe collection. First thing I asked was.......Were you able to save any of the beers....

Glad you didn't get hurt.....

Cheers
Jay

mtnagel said:

Do you really think it was the extract?

I was thinking of adding maple extract to an upcoming brew. Is there really fermentable sugars in extracts?

Click to expand...

What kind if extracts are we talking about here? The ones they sell at Austin Homebrew I'm pretty sure don't have any sugar. I got the impression the OP used some kind of soda syrup which would more than likely have a lot of sugar in it.

Yeah I'm thinking an extract like this - http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002PHEDO/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

OP did say extract, so that's why I was asking.

Carefull. Figure out why it happened if you can,and never do it again. Cola extract? Like for making pop/cola?Sweetner? Concentrated stuff?

Its the only thing I can attribute to the high carbonation. Its called homebrew cola soda pop base from rainbow flavors inc. It was a simple irish stout recipe. For the first 2 to 3 weeks there was almost zero carbonation. The taste was pretty awful, very yeasty. Something about the cola that really brought out that off flavor, other than that it would have made a great stout. Thought I would let it sit like a typical stout for a few more weeks atleast but now its ant food. Popped the last few bottles outside because cleaning beer and soda off the ceiling is a *****. Like bottle rockets

This stuff:



I'm assuming so since that's what they sell at my LHBS.

The only thing in there that would ferment would be the gum arabic, but I can't imagine it would be that much to create that much extra CO2. Very weird.

Truly a mystery. I had another brew that was like popping a shaken champagne bottle. I put 2 cups of arizona iced tea mix in the fermenter after a pilsner grain mash. That I could understand with all the sugar but most fermented out. This, just one for the books never to do again.