overly carbonated beer

Beer has been in bottle for (4) weeks. I put six in fridge 4-5 days ago and have been drinking them without a problem. Today when I opened them up the last two in the fridge they are seriously overcarbonated. One of them is just pouring out foam non-stop in the sink. The thing is, I have been chilling and drinking them no problem since they hit the (3) week in the bottle mark. Why did these two get overcarbed? I opened both to see if I would get the same results and of course I did. So then I opened one that hadn't gone in the fridge yet and it was totally fine.

What happened with those two beers?

Thanx!

By no means an expert, but I think the gusher could possibly be an infection or potentially under carbing instead of over carbing.

ErkenneDichSelbst said:

By no means an expert, but I think the gusher could possibly be an infection or potentially under carbing instead of over carbing.

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That doesn't sound right at all.....an infection shouldn't cause your beer to foam out of the bottle.......and really not sure how under carbing would do that

I think you prob just over carbed it. Maybe it wasn't quite done fermenting, i dunno, u could have cold crashed it too soon and immobilized the yeast, which then became more active when moved to a warmer climate somewhere. Maybe you sucked up a bit too much trub....could be a lot of things, we'd have to know exactly your process leading up to this

I did (1) week in primary then moved into secondary for (2) more weeks. This is my first batch and I now know that it wasn't necessary to move my Brown Ale into secondary. Anyway, after those three weeks I bottled and let it sit for 3 weeks. All I know is that these last two beers had been in the fridge the longest of any. I had probably drank around 12 prior, but those beers had probably only spent 24-48 hours in the fridge before I drank them. The two overcarbed ones that I opened today had been in the fridge for 4-5 days.

How did you carb? If you used priming sugar, there's a chance you didn't adequately mix the beer and sugar, resulting in varying carb levels.



However, it could possibly be a gusher infection. Perhaps those two bottles weren't cleaned and sanitized as well as the rest?


Or the whole batch could have been overcarbed, but because the rest spent minimal time in the fridge, they did by have a chance to absorb all the co2 present in the headspace.

Since it's your first, I'm assuming you use a kit? Did you make sure you had exactly 5 gallon in the fermenter? Anything less will result in overcarbing.

I'm leaning toward #3

Used a Northern Brewer brown ale kit.

I did use priming sugar, maybe it wasn't mixed evenly.

What is a gusher infection?

Can you explain this:

"Or the whole batch could have been overcarbed, but because the rest spent minimal time in the fridge, they did by have a chance to absorb all the co2 present in the headspace."

I've never heard anyone mention about exactly hitting 5 gallons in the fermenter or else.

Thanx!

Before you put a beer in the fridge, at least during the first few weeks, most of the co2 is in the headspace. Co2 is not a soluble at room temperature as it is at colder temperatures.

Putting the bottle in the fridge makes the co2 more soluble. However, it takes time to fully dissolve into the beer; generally a few days.


The priming sugar included in the kit is measured for 5 gallons. If you had less than 5 gallons, it would amount to more sugar per bottle.


See the link for info on gushers: http://www.howtobrew.com/section4/chapter21-1.html

jjphillybrew said:

I did use priming sugar, maybe it wasn't mixed evenly.

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That was my guess too. I used to have that problem pretty often, but now I use a plastic (plastic only!!) racking cane to gently stir the beer/sugar in the bottling bucket before bottling, and a couple times during bottling. No gushers since.

McMalty said:

That doesn't sound right at all.....an infection shouldn't cause your beer to foam out of the bottle.......and really not sure how under carbing would do that

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The link posted below by someone else about gusher infections is good, and they're talked about in almost every other book on brewing. Under carbing wasn't meant to imply not enough priming sugar but that carbonation wasn't complete causing a difference in pressure between the gas and the liquid in the bottle causing it to bubble out.

ErkenneDichSelbst said:

The link posted below by someone else about gusher infections is good, and they're talked about in almost every other book on brewing. Under carbing wasn't meant to imply not enough priming sugar but that carbonation wasn't complete causing a difference in pressure between the gas and the liquid in the bottle causing it to bubble out.

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ok, well that makes more sense, i misinterpreted your terminology

I really doubt it is an infection.

I'm with the camp on poor mixing as the cause.

Infections are NOT common.

Common things occur commonly. Unless you:

Dissolved you sugar in sterile water...

Poured this sugar solution onto the bottom of the bottling bucket...

Racked onto the solution in the bucket...

And then gently stirred...

You have poorly mixed beer that will unfortunately undergo erratic carbonation.