Wannbe home-brewer - bottling and explosions

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Hello,

Having a very positive experience with the fermenting of food (my favourite being sauerkraut), I'd like to start brewing beer, too.
What is holding me back at the moment is the fear of exploding bottles - which might be dangerous and do make a nasty mess anyway (no garage / basement / garden is at my disposal, alas). Therefore my question is, how to avoid it? What I can think of (please correct me) would be

1. wait until the initial fermentation is over, then bottle and add a dash of sugar to generate the fizz - but how much is a dash?
2. let be a day or two to make sure fermenation has indeed started, then bottle adding some yeast killing / inhibiting agent. Potassium sorbate, perhaps, could do the trick, since the living, active yeast would provide the fizz, and after the current generation dies the CO2 level should not increase anymore since there won't be yeast anymore in the brew. Does it work?

Of course the bottling process itself has to be done properly (eg bottles well filled so that the yeasts will die off quickly due to not much oxygen available in the bottle), but I wonder whether this is enough to aboid exploding bottles.
And finally - how do commercial brewers make sure that their bottles won't explode? Pasteurisation? Chemicals? I've always wanted to know....

Thanks for your patience and advice,
Cheerio,
Bob
 
If you've never brewed before why not buy an extract kit from a reputable home brew store (online or local). The kits generally come with all the ingredients you'll need to make a batch.

You're kinda over thinking things. It's ok because everyone does. The process is pretty straight forward. Cleanliness is the key. But you boil your wort and cool it. Pitch your yeast and let things ferment. After that you siphon to a keg or a bottling bucket. That's when you add your priming sugar (usually 3/4 cup or 5-6oz. Of corn sugar dissolved in just enough warm water to make it liquid.) That's usually all you'll need for most batches. I keep my newly bottled beer in towel lined milk crates for 2weeks minimum at room temp. I've never had a beer bottle bomb yet! Now cider? That's a different ball of wax lol.

Like I said most commercial beer kits will come with all you need. Just make sure you have all your equipment too. It sucks to need something when you've got beer brewin and no way to get it fast.
 
Actually, if you look at the history of homebrewing, most bottle bombs came from priming individual bottles, because that was how it was done throughout the history of early homebrewing even up to the 1970's when it was legalized. . Because you really can't accurately measure sugar and easily get it in the bottle with those tools, and even one or two grains can be too much sugar. Plus adding dry sugar to wet beer can much more easily lead to inconsistant carbonation as some of the sugar my clump and not easily dissolve, and just sit in the bottom of the bottle, it is much better to boil it up and prime bulk. Additional there is a further risk of bottle bombs by dry priming sugar in bottles, and that is due to sanitization....especially if you grab your sugar right out of the sugar jar at home, boiling the sugar in water actually sterilizes it.

Back in the day it wasn't just one rare bottle that blew up, but entire cases, sounding like a string of firecrackers going of, BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM...you get the idea....

They also often bottled before fermentation was complete, all you need to do is to take a couple hydro readings and you will know when to bottle.

The bottle bomb is a RARE thing these days, precisely because we bulk prime in the bucket, and don't put the dry sugar in the bottle..

Besides the afore mentioned "how to brew" also read my bottling tips thread; https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/bottling-tips-homebrewer-94812/
 
Agreed with the above. Or just read around the threads here. They're a bit ore informative and not as out of date. To ensure no bottle bombs, you NEED a hydrometer. This is what grand pappy did not have, and why he did have bombs.
 
Usually people add 5 oz by weight of sugar to finished beer to avoid bombs. This amount can be more or less depending on style, but usually people go by this guideline. You have to really mess something up to get bombs, and I would wager that greater than 90% of homebrewers will never have this problem.

I think that your understanding of bottling is a bit off.

Yeast eat sugar and make ethanol (alcohol) and CO2. During bottle conditioning (making your beer carbonated) the CO2 is what we are interested in. Since the bottle is a closed system, the priming sugar (usually 5 oz) that you add to the 5 gallon batch is going to restart a small fermentation and create CO2 in the headspace of the bottle that will eventually dissolve back into the beer.

If you add too much sugar, the bottles CAN (may not all the time, depends on a variety of factors) explode. You want to bottle immediately after you add the small amount of priming sugar so that you get the desired level of carbonation into your beer.

You don't have to do anything to kill the yeast, you very much want them alive when you bottle your beer lest you end up with something flat.

I believe that a lot of commercial beers are filtered and then force carbonated with CO2 and then bottled, while some pasteurize their bottle conditioned beers.

Basically, you won't get bombs unless you add too much sugar because they won't have anything to use to create the CO2 that can make bombs. If it were that big of a concern, I don't think you would see near as many people doing it. I don't think that anyone has the time, space, or patience to deal with bottle bombs.
 
This post from last week, should help you understand the process of it as well.

johnnyt471 said:
i get that...but that doesn't really answer my question. i'm looking for a limit of what will start giving me bottle bombs.
Click to expand...

Oh that's what you are after???? :D

In natural bottle conditioning we talk about Volume of CO2. The amount of gas dissolved into beer is measured in volumes. If one liter of beer is carbonated to 2.5 volumes, then there are 2.5 liters of CO2 gas dissolved into the beer.

In a typical beer that is bottle carbed w 5 ounces of sugar @ 70 degrees provides 2.5 volumes of co2. It's going to be 2.5 volumes of co2 regardless of whether ir is in a 12 ounce bottle or a 1 gallon jug (which I hope you aren't planning to bottle you beer in a 1 gallon jug, it is not made to handle the pressure of carbonation.

We only really talk about PSI in terms of force (keg) carbonation, not bottles.

Pressure, measured in pounds per square inch, is defined as the force at which the CO2 molecules in the head space of the keg push on the beer. As the pressure increases, the gas hits the beer with more force and dissolves into the beer more easily. As the pressure decreases, the gas does not dissolve into the beer as easily and gas can come out of the beer.

High pressure increases the carbonation level, low pressure reduces the carbonation level. The right amount of pressure in a keg will maintain the right carbonation level.

Most breweries or distributors can give you suggested pressure settings for the beers they sell. If you make your own beer use a carbonation chart to determine the proper pressure.

Temperature and CO2 Balance

The temperature of the beer effects the amount of pressure needed in the keg to control the carbonation level. As temperature increases, CO2 bubbles expand and will come out of the beer. As temperature drops, CO2 dissolves more easily into the beer.

For example, at 38 degrees F, Coors Light needs 15 psi to maintain its CO2 level. At 40 deg F it needs 16 psi. At 36 deg F it needs 14 psi.

Generally, a two degree increase in temperature requires a one pound increase in pressure. A two degree decrease in temperature requires a one pound decrease in pressure.
Click to expand...

Many Styles are carbed higher than the standard 4.5- 5 ounces of sugar/2.-2.5 volumes of co2 that comes with basic kits, and often that is more sugar than that. Think of belgian beers for instance, or some pilsners, or Autralian sparkling ales. They are all carbed higher than most basic beers, and except for beligians are often bottled in normal bottles and they don't gush or explode.

You can just look at beersmith and see the different amounts of sugar needed to carb by style.

For example the style volume of co2 range for an Australian Ale is 2-2.8 volumes of Co2, and if the beer is @ 70 degrees at bottling time, then you would need, 6.12 ounces of sugar if you wanted to carb at the highest volume for that style.

That 4.5 - 5 ounces really just tends to be the baseline for most gravity/ styles of beer, (when bottled at 70 degrees) but there are plenty of styles that use less or more sugar to be less or more carbed than that.

Here's the volumes of co2 for most beer styles...you can see how high Belgians and German weizens can be carbed.

Style & Volumes of CO2
American ales 2.2–3.0
British ales 1.5–2.2
German weizens 2.8–5.1
Belgian ales 2.0–4.5
European Lagers 2.4–2.6
American Lagers 2.5–2.8
Click to expand...

A basic 12 ounce beer bottle, or as it is called the Longneck Industry Standard Bottle (ISB) can actually hold around 4 volumes of co2 without breaking. I can't find the numbers, but it IS greater than the normal 2-2.5 volumes of co2, it may even be 5 volumes. for safety reasons it would have to be much greater than the normal volume of co2 a beer is primed at. They are going to vary obviously in wall thickness. But NORMALLY they won't burst, unless as mentioned repeatedly you waaaay over prime, waaaay over heat, or have an infection.

As you can see there is really no easy answer.

Part of the issue is that there is no easy calculation between volumes of CO2 and PSI. A lot of factors come into play like temperature and such.

Also atmosphere and volume of co2 are not quite the same. This thread will give you a headache to try to figure it out. http://www.gotmead.com/forum/showthread.php?t=11358

Different BEER bottle manufactures make different thicknesses of bottles, which are going to be able to hold different volumes of co2. Have you noticed that some of the commercial beer bottles are heavier than others? And that the ones you buy from the LHBs are often so thin you'd swear they were made of candy glass?

And trying to find direct ratings for the bottles on line is near impossible.

A THICK walled 12 ounce industry standard longneck should hold between 3.5-4 volumes of co2. But I wouldn't comfortably put more than 3.5 in them since you can never tell really the pedigree.

And it's really the same with 22 ounce or pints, they all vary in thickness. So you also don't really want to push your luck too much. IF you are carbing something around 3 - under 3.5 volumes of co2 you can comfortably put them in your better beer bottles (and I have) but over that I would go with belgian bottles or champagne/sparkling cider bottles.
Click to expand...

Hope this helps. If you pay basic attention to making sure your beer is finished fermenting, and follow the suggestion of how much sugar to add, and practice basic sanitization, there really is no REASON to fear bottle bombs.

:mug:
 
First of all thanks a lot everybody for the many detailed answers!!
Perhaps I should have mentioned it at first - I'm very interested in experiments, and what now attracts me to homebrewing is the thought of producing nettle beer - no wort or hops, just the juice of boiled nettles and a spot of sugar and yeast ;)
I'm pretty sure I'm thinking too much about it; just don't want to end up with a mess and I'm more used indeed in getting mold on my sauerkraut, which is really not much of a bother.
So all in all, and if I understand you correctly, the key (apart from cleanliness, but this goes for every fermented food) is to get the proper amount of sugar in the bottles when the initial fermentation (in the brewing buket or jar or whatever you use) is done, the which you test with an hydrometer - if the value stays the same for a few days, then fermentation is done.
Afterwards the question is how much sugar should be added to each bottle (I like very much the thick bottles which come with a re-usable plastic cork and a rubber grommet, that you tighten using a metal handle, the way old jam jar used to be); I now understand this should be done by adding syrup, not sugar crystals, to the proportion of 5oz. per gallon of beer - then bottle immediately.
I'll keep browsing the forum and esp. this iteresting thread about bottling you pointed me to.

Thanks again!!!

Cheerio,
Bob
 
Your number still aren't quite right, but you're getting closer. Most people around here use 5oz per 5 gallons of beer, not 5oz per gallon. Although that number really varies depending on what style of beer you're brewing and so forth. 5oz for 5 gallons would be a good upper limit.

And then, yes, you mix the simple syrup (5oz corn sugar + 2 cups boiled water), dump it into your bottling bucket, and rack your beer on top of that. If you're the paranoid sort, you can then stir very carefully (so as not to introduce new oxygen), then bottle from that bucket.

And if you're that worried about bottle bombs, there's another option: bottle in plastic. #1 plastic PETE bottles are fine to bottle in, and they can hold the pressure of beer without a problem (soda is more heavily carbonated then most-all beers, and plastic bottles do just fine there).

Hope that helps!
 
You did :)
But I posted before you so I didn't see it until now.
Thanks again!
Cheerio
 
Seems like I have problems editing posts, so thanks Revvy for your post (replied before I saw it) and Robbyg for your very easy to read explanation, perfect for a beginner like me.
Then all I need is a hydrometer, and put my pans on the fire ;)

Cheerio,
Bob
 

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