Did I just bottle future bombs? Opinions please.

I just bottled my 3rd batch after 1 week in bucket primary and 1 in a BB secondary. Over that time I've been reading a ton of HBT forums posts and learning a lot. Last night I spend a few hours reading historical threads about when to go to secondary and when to bottle, and now I'm stressing that I bottled too soon.

When I went to secondary on day 7, there was still krausen (I now realize this was too soon). The gravity at that point was 1.014. Yesterday when I bottled, on day 14, the gravity was at 1.012. I was pretty happy, since the recipe said it should be between 1.010-1.012. (This is a pretty standard Ale recipe; I didn't take an OG reading, but the recipe says it should have been 1.042-1.046.)

After racking to the bottling bucket, I put the airlock back on my secondary (I was planning to rack batch #2 onto it, which had a stuck fermentation). There was about an inch of beer around the bottom and a small yeast cake (there was a bigger yeast cake in the primary the week before). As I was bottling, I noticed the airlock still bubbling about 1x/minute. This seemed a little odd, but I'd never reapplied the airlock to my secondary, so I figured this may be normal since the yeast had been disturbed.

I was laying caps across the tops of my bottles as I went along, until I got to 6 bottles, at which point I've crimp them on. A few times as I was bottling, the loose bottle caps "popped" as if releasing gas. The lip of the bottle was wet with starsan, so it must have made a seal that was broken by some CO2. At the time I figured it might be CO2 released by the swirling in the bottling bucket.

I spent last night reading about when to go to secondary and bottle and I realized:

1. I should have left it in the primary until the krausen was gone.
2. I should have given it at least 3 weeks to ferment.
3. I should have been careful to do a hydro reading over 3 days before bottling.

So, my question is: am I screwed? I really don't want bottle bombs. I've found a few posts about people getting hurt by exploding bottles, and it's freaking me out.

Should I carefully pour these back into a bucket, and let them age for a few more weeks? Or, since I'm close to the target gravity, should I just RDWHAHB?

If it was me, I'd open one in a couple of day and see what kind of stuff happens. Over the sink, or outside. If it goes crazy, you can vent the caps, or take them all the way off then recap them.

There will always be some CO2 dissolved when you're bottling, so there's a touch of carbonation to it. Not much, but it could have done the popping thing.

Somebody more knowledgable than me will come along soon enough and chime in, too, I'm sure.

How much sugar did you use to prime it?

As long as you didn't overprime it, and your yeast isn't unusually attenuative, it should be fine. With a gravity of 1.012, the fermentation should have been done or very close to it. It could end up with a little more fizz than you want, but I don't think you'll have any problem with it.

Do like GrizlyGarou says and open one after a few days to check on it. If it doesn't foam over, you could even recap it.

I don't think you'll have bottle bombs, but it wouldn't surprise me if they come out a little over carb'd.

The only time I've had exploding bottles was 10 years ago when I bottled a stout at like 1.024 that should have bottomed out at 1.016. "But hey, it went 3 weeks...I'm bottling it!"

4 weeks later I had two cases of exploding bottles in my bedroom. SWMBO was displeased.

If you are able, put your bottles into a box or even a cooler with a lid, that way, if something does happen you won't have as big of a mess to clean up. I had one bottle bomb but it was due to over-priming. Good luck!

Thanks everyone for the replies. I used the standard 5oz of priming sugar that came with the kit.

I'll get these into a rubbermaid tonight, and will pop a bottle tomorrow to see what it's like. If it looks okay, then in a few weeks I'll wrap one in a towel and open it outside!

If the one tomorrow is ok, then I'd pop one in the fridge for 24 hours each week. If it's carbed after a week, then I'd get them all into cold storage to stop them from going any further.

ChshreCat said:

If it's carbed after a week, then I'd get them all into cold storage to stop them from going any further.

Click to expand...

So, if it takes more than a week to carb (2-3), would you read that as carbing normally, and you'd store at room temp? Or are you saying to be on the safe side and keep it as cool as possible after it's carbed? That's not a bad idea. The garage is in the low 50's now (Seattle "winter"), which is the best I could do -- not enough room in the fridge for 2 cases of beer, alas!

If it doesn't carb until the 3 week mark, you're probably fine. But it would be good to stick 'em in the garage anyway, so long as it doesn't freeze in there. If we get a cold snap, you might make sure they're against an inside wall at least.

I vote RDWHAHB, for the record.

The airlock activity while you were bottling could have been due to a temperature change, or any of a number of non-fermentation factors. If it wasn't bubbling when your beer was in there, don't worry. Airlocks only indicate pressure differentials- not necessarily fermentation.

The deal with the caps popping was CO2 coming out of solution, which it does when you slosh it around a bit, like when you bottle. If it only dropped 2 points in the last week in secondary, it wasn't going to be doing anything fast upon bottling.

Lastly, as someone said above, 1.012 is a decent FG, especially if you had a slightly low-attenuating yeast or more non-fermentables in your wort.

Well, tonight is day 3, and I just opened one. Nothing but an almost inaudible pssft. No bubbles that I could see rising in the bottle. Not wanting to waste it, I re-capped and marked the bottle so I remember which one it was.

I'm feeling better about this now, thanks for all the advice. I'm planning to do the check-once-a-week thing, if for no other reason than to get some experience with how bottles carb and how the flavor evolves.

MrRoche,
You should be good to go. Just keep the bottles covered with something bulletproof ;-)
and check on them a couple times. Make sure you store them at a good fermentation temp and they should do fine.

If it was extract, you might have actually been very close to the terminal gravity. At any rate, I would not sweat it. I don't think you will have had enough sugars to make bombs in a standard beer bottle.

But the smart man would find a couple of plastic totes to store them in...

Well, it's week 3, and I'm sitting down to enjoy one of these beers.

I did a taste test every week.
Week 1: barely carbed, not too fun to drink.
Week 2: almost there, but I was hoping something would get "better".
Week 3: nicely carbed, tasty beer.

I put the cases out in the cold garage for the winter, just to be safe (and besides, I need room in the brew closet for upcoming brews).

Thanks for helping a newbie along with advice. This is a great forum.

I just bottled again today, but this time I let the beer go 4 weeks in the primary, and I nailed the terminal gravity of 1.011!