I decided to whip up a batch of this, after seeing so many rave reviews. I went to Sams to find the apple juice. I noticed they only sold it in 3qt (96oz) bottles, which I thought was a little odd, but whatever. So that means I need to use 6 full bottles, and 2/3rds of the 7th bottle. Easy enough.
Back at home I poured in a few bottles, then half the sugar and stirred the bejesus out of it. Next, I added in bottles 4 & 5, followed by the rest of the sugar and then bottle 6, making 18 qts so far. Then I poured in the yeast packet. Of course then I realized I had forgotten to mix in that last half of the sugar. Knowing it wasnt such a good idea, I stirred the bejesus out of the mix again, yeast and all.
So all was well and good as I began to add the final 2 qts. This is where things got hairy. I needed 2 of the 3 qts. 2 qts = 8 cups. Easy enough, I'll just use my measuring cup. I began to pour in the remaining fluid into my funnel, when I noticed, about halfway, through that apple juice had begun to overflow the carboy
!! What in the world? how is that possible? I hadn't added the full 5 gallons yet and it was pouring over the top. Mystified, I sucked some apple juice/yeast/sugar mix out of the carboy with my baster to bring the level back down to the base of the carboy neck, closed it up and set it in the closet while I tried to figure out what had happend. A little investigating revealed that the juice jugs were NOT 96oz as stated, but were, in fact, a half cup overfilled, making them 100oz! So in adding 6 full bottles, I had actually added 3 cups more than I thought, hence the spill-over at the end.
Oh well, I'm sure it will be okay. A day later and it's barely starting to bubble...
The moral of this story?
Pay attention to what you are doing, and dont trust the apple juice bottles!
Edit: FYI, my OG was 1.068