Bottling issue

I just bottled my two batches of Scottish Ale and American Light Ale. I had them in a temperature controlled fermenter for 11 days set at 61 degrees. The original gravity was 1.07 and the final gravity was 1.035 on the Scottish Ale. I bottled the beer and opened a bottle after 4 days. The problem is the bottle foamed up immediately and made a mess. It seemed heavily carbonated. Does anybody know why this happened? Do i now have 10 gallons of wasted beer or can i fix it?

Please help.....

I think the scotch ale has not reached the proper attenuation. 1.07 to 1.035 is around 50% attenuation, that's quite low, even for a scotch ale. The reason the bottles are over carbonated is because there are some unfermented sugars in the beer, so when you bottled it the yeast started eating the left over sugar including the sugar you used for priming, creating too much carbonation. Most of your bottles might be gushers, what you could do is try to chill the bottle as close to 32F as possible before drinking it. When you open the beer it won't lose too much CO2 and gush, the colder the liquid the more CO2 absorbed.
I have heard of people who open all thier bottles to purge the excess CO2 and then cap them again, but that would be quite a hassle.

Yeah, 11 days seems a little short, I suspect that Iordz is correct and the primary fermentation had not finished, hopefully your bottles don't start exploding. If you were using a kit the instructions should have given you a range for the expected final gravity, if 1.035 was above that you should not have bottled yet. Perhaps post you complete recipe, including yeast strain and someone could calculate what kind of FG you should expect. What was the starting and final gravities of your American light?


Edit: As an example the Brewers best Scotch Ale kit lists the FG range as 1.010 - 1.012. But it's starting gravity is only 1.050 so clearly yours would be different.

Iordz is correct. A Strong Scotch Ale with an OG of 1.070 should finish around 1.018, so you were underattenuated. The fermentation has finished in the bottle.

Yes, it is a hassle to pop all the tops and recap, but I suggest you attempt it. Otherwise, I'm afraid they might pop themselves later on. Chill those bottles waaaay down, like Iordz said. Uncap, and then just recap. That will help you out. They may still be overcabonated, but they won't be so dangerous.

Your American may not have the same problem, so try one out and see what happened. Those Scottish Ale/Scotch Ale yeasts usually need a little more TLC than their American counterparts.


TL

You know how your primary airlock bubbles on day 3 and 4? You just added priming sugar when you bottled it 4 days ago and it is still actively fermenting. I would wait another week and see how they are.

mrk305 said:

You know how your primary airlock bubbles on day 3 and 4? You just added priming sugar when you bottled it 4 days ago and it is still actively fermenting. I would wait another week and see how they are.

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That's exactly what would worry me. If it is underattenuated, then the bottom bomb potential grows as the fermentation continues.


TL

my one batch of bottle bombs, as I recall, started in the 1.050's for OG, and I chose to bottle around the upper 1.020's. about a month into bottle conditioning they started to explode.

be very careful with those bottles.

I'd be extremely careful with those bottles; get them cold and some place where they won't do any damage if they explode.

11 days is much too short for a scottish (I primaried mine for 3 weeks, then secondaried for over 4 months).

Both of the Scottish Wee Heavy brews that I've done started at or about 1.070 as well. I left them in primary for 2 weeks. The first one was in secondary for 3 months and the other one is still in secondary now (2 months). I can't remember exactly what the fg on my first batch was, but I'm thinking that it was between 1.015-1.020.