does anyone bottle with growlers?

does anyone bottle with 1/2 gallon growlers with a screw on cap?
does it hold carbonation like a 12 oz'er?

Do you mean prime and bottle from the secondary? Or do you mean bottle from a keg?

In either case, if you follow the same proper procedures, the twisters should hold carbonation just as well.

I bottled with a 1/2 gallon growler because I did not have enough 12oz bottles. It was a regular twist on cap, and I put electric tape around it, and the beer was flat as can be. No carbonation what so ever. It had a good flavor, just no co2. I used it for cooking though so it wasnt a terrible waste.

I went to a LHBS and noticed they were selling green wine bottles on the cheap. To buy some and use them for bottling my next batch was pretty tempting. Not sure how that would've worked out, though.

I've had really cruddy luck with those damn growlers. They seem great because if you get a couple of them together you can bottle-away a gallon of beer in no time; what I have found is that when you sanitize the caps for them, you have to be oh-so-careful. Make sure that the paper lining inside of there doesn't wilt or get too water damaged because that is your seal.

I think a good alternative to those, if you want some sort of mass-storage bottle are the Korbel champagne bottles; you can just throw a regular cap on there and away you go. At least, that's worked for me.

Anyway, hope that helps.

Cheers.

Most growlers aren't really made to hold pressure. They're made to be filled from the tap at the local pub and taken home to be consumed within a few days. Bottling with a growler seems ill-advised.

Yuri_Rage said:

Most growlers aren't really made to hold pressure. They're made to be filled from the tap at the local pub and taken home to be consumed within a few days. Bottling with a growler seems ill-advised.

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Yikes! I just did it, I hope it works. It has a top just like my flip top bottles, with a big red plastic ring to help seal it. I guess we'll see.

my Russian River Growler is def. thick enough for pressure. It also has a flop top. The still wine bottles are really asking for trouble. The champagne bottles are great. I use them all the time.

dantodd said:

my Russian River Growler is def. thick enough for pressure.

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I'm not saying it can't be done or that all growlers will shatter if you bottle with them. However, many of them are designed only slightly thicker than those still wine bottles you mentioned. You're betting at least half a gallon of beer that your growler will hold up if you intend to bottle condition in one.

Ó Flannagáin said:

Yikes! I just did it, I hope it works. It has a top just like my flip top bottles, with a big red plastic ring to help seal it. I guess we'll see.

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Those types are more suited for carbonating in. Because the swing top works like a regular swing top bottle.

As to the post about the growler caps with the paper liners.....they sell growler caps with rubber or silicone or what ever it is inside that seals a lot better.

I am not condoning carbonating in twist top growlers but if you are going to at least use the caps with the rubber seals in them.


Cheers

my very 1st batch i bottled with 3 or 4 growlers and all of them turned out fine. the growlers were all rouge dead guy ale. the caps they use have no paper in them they are all metal with a rubbar like ring around the edge inside the cap where it makes contact with the bottle. i may use them again.

i once had a flip top growler explode on me. boy was that a nice way to wake up since it was in a box in my bedroom. i hadn't thought about the growler not being able to withstand the pressure till now. figured it was a hairline crack or something but this kinda make sense.

Tere are plastic caps that have a rubber/silicone seal that actuall protrudes into the bottle. Those have worked well at holding carbonation for a while. I get them from my homebrew shop.
The thing with the metal cap is that to get a good seal you crank them down, but in doing so you are distorting the cap, which prevents a good seal.