Cpsurfer
Active Member
Sorry this is long but I have to rant.
A few weeks ago I brewed my first batch, a partial extract Nut Brown ale. The brewing and fermentation went great. I left it in primary for a week before racking to the secondary (I wanted my bucket so I could brew another batch!), this is where the fun started.
Once I had the brew in my better bottle carboy I couldn't get the stopper to stay in. It was still wet with the starsan and just kept popping out, so I did what any redblooded American guy would do: I pounded the bejesus out of it with a quick thump. It worked...the stopper went in and didn't come back out. The downside was it was lodged firmly in the neck of the carboy below the lip...great. I tossed the airlock in it and figured I'd deal with figuring out how to extract the stopper at bottling time.
Bottling time was last night. I couldn't get that stopper out so I bit the bullet, sanitized the top and just pounded it again letting it splash into the beer. I primed, then then went to work filling my bottles with all 5 gallons of the brew and loosely placed the caps on top as I went. Here's the worst part:
As I was capping my 7th bottle THE CAPPER SNAPPED IN HALF!!!! D'OH!!! So there I was, with 5 gallons of beer primed and bottled and no way to seal all but 6 of them!!!!! I ended up dumping the rest.
The good news is thankfully I learned a great way to get the stopper out of the carboy that worked like a charm:Remove A Cork From The Wine Bottle*Video
Anyway, now I need to get a new capper, and probably a different kind of cap for sealing the carboy so I can avoid that fiasco again. On the plus side, if I had to dump a batch, it may as well have been the first as it will likely suck. I tasted it last night and it was very watered down and not too good, although I'll try again after my 6 bottles have conditioned a few weeks.
A few weeks ago I brewed my first batch, a partial extract Nut Brown ale. The brewing and fermentation went great. I left it in primary for a week before racking to the secondary (I wanted my bucket so I could brew another batch!), this is where the fun started.
Once I had the brew in my better bottle carboy I couldn't get the stopper to stay in. It was still wet with the starsan and just kept popping out, so I did what any redblooded American guy would do: I pounded the bejesus out of it with a quick thump. It worked...the stopper went in and didn't come back out. The downside was it was lodged firmly in the neck of the carboy below the lip...great. I tossed the airlock in it and figured I'd deal with figuring out how to extract the stopper at bottling time.
Bottling time was last night. I couldn't get that stopper out so I bit the bullet, sanitized the top and just pounded it again letting it splash into the beer. I primed, then then went to work filling my bottles with all 5 gallons of the brew and loosely placed the caps on top as I went. Here's the worst part:
As I was capping my 7th bottle THE CAPPER SNAPPED IN HALF!!!! D'OH!!! So there I was, with 5 gallons of beer primed and bottled and no way to seal all but 6 of them!!!!! I ended up dumping the rest.
The good news is thankfully I learned a great way to get the stopper out of the carboy that worked like a charm:Remove A Cork From The Wine Bottle*Video
Anyway, now I need to get a new capper, and probably a different kind of cap for sealing the carboy so I can avoid that fiasco again. On the plus side, if I had to dump a batch, it may as well have been the first as it will likely suck. I tasted it last night and it was very watered down and not too good, although I'll try again after my 6 bottles have conditioned a few weeks.