Hard Cider

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BBKing

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Ok, so I somehow managed to screw up hard cider. Heres what I did; perhaps someone can tell me where I went wrong:

I bought 5 gallons of apple cider at Wal-Mart as it was on sale.

Threw it in my fermenting bucket along with 4 pounds of sugar and a packet of champagne yeast.

I let it roll until the bubbles stopped, then a few days afterwards.

Bottled it up, and let it sit.

I gave a few to my buddy, and he called me like 4 days later and said that they had busted just sitting at his place.

So I opened a bottle here at home, and foam everywhere! A few days later I opened another and there was even more foam. So instead of taking the risk and possibly having a bunch of my bottles bust, I dumped it out.

Except I forgot that I took 3 bottles over to my moms house for long term storage. About 4 days after dumping everything, one of those bottles busted! When I went to dump out the other two, I couldnt believe it, the caps flew off at the speed of sound when I cracked em even the slightest bit. The second one I opened, the cap made it all the way across the neighbors yard and I heard that ZING! as it started flying. I thought I had put a cap into orbit, seriously.

What I think I did wrong was a mixture of the Champagne yeast and fermenting time.

The yeast may have given it the extra bubbly effect (?) and I most likely didnt give it enough time to ferment, thus adding pressure inside the bottles that eventually lead to some breaking.

Any tips?
 
First of all, wrong forum. Cider takes much longer to ferment than beer. You should've taken at least 2 hydrometer readings over a 3 day period to make sure fermentation is complete before bottling. Cider should finish between 0.998-1.002. Don't judge fermentation by airlock activity alone.
 
Did you check the gravity? The bubbles mean nothing. Check your gravity with a hydrometer always. I learned that the hard way with an IPA. Wife was none so pleased.

The sugar in apple juice is 100% fructose, as far as I know, and will ferment out completely with champagne yeast. You should expect a final gravity of 1.000 or even below. If you don't nuke the yeast with some kind of sulfite, it'll keep fermenting until there's nothing left.

My mildly-educated guess is that your cider wasn't done fermenting and you set youself up with the perfect recipe for bottle bombs. One thing that I've learned in this hobby/obsession is to use the tools that have been developed to test things; gut instincts are for the experts, which I ain't one of.

Best of luck. Don't give up, just clean up the messes of the bombs and plan your next attack. :mug:
 
First of all, wrong forum. Cider takes much longer to ferment than beer. You should've taken at least 2 hydrometer readings over a 3 day period to make sure fermentation is complete before bottling. Cider should finish between 0.998-1.002. Don't judge fermentation by airlock activity alone.

Regardless of the forum, SMOKEU is spot on.
 
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