Bottle Bombs are dangerous

[bmick]

I have always been very precise about my bottling when it comes to amount of priming sugars, ensuring full attenuation, etc. The other day I bottled a half gallon batch of cider that was fully fermented (grav readings confirmed), but for some reason just brain farted on calculating the sugar additions at bottling and didn't measure at all. I didn't use a lot of sugar, maybe a few spoonfuls, but that was clearly WAY too much. A week later I came home to glass ALL OVER my kitchen, even up on high cabinets.

The point being, this bottle really exploded with a LOT of force and sent glass everywhere. Very happy SWMBO and myself were at work at the time...word to the wise, be very mindful of doing this correctly, it has the potential to be very dangerous.

 

[Bensiff]

I've never heard of someone getting injured by a bottle bomb, but the possibility exists for sure. From what I'm getting from manufacturers bottles can hold over 150 psi, so that's a good blast.

 

[Hoppopotomus]

A quick story of something that happened to my neighbor. He is a huge craft beer fan, but is not intereted in home brewing (trust me, I've tried to get him involved, so I have someone to brew with in the neighborhood). He has another buddy at his work that is also a home brewer, but as I have learned, is a very impatient one. Here's just one of several stories.

So this guy brings into work a 6 pack of his Oberon clone for my neighbor. He put it under his desk, so his boss wouldn't see it and then carried it out to his car and started home. He placed the 6 pack on his front seat and drove home. When he got home he put the 6 pack on top of the washer in his laundry room, walked into the kitchen and hurd multiple pops with glass breaking. He ran around the corner and discovered 3 bottles in the 6 pack had just exploded. Evidently the first one went and the force cause 2 more to go as well. He said that he had glass all over his laundry room and a piece embedded in the drywall. Paranoid that the others were going to explode he immediately threw a towel over the top of the remaining 3 and closed the door. After a while he worked up the nerve to go back into the room and popped the tops on the remaining 3 before they exploded.

Could you imagine if these things would have exploded when he put them under his desk or more significantly when he was traveling at 75 MPH up I75 on his way home from work as they sat on his front seat? Scary stuff man!

He told his co-worker about the bottle bombs and evidently that guy had multiple bottles explode during the night in his basement. Moral of the story.....use a hydrometer or refractometer to ensure full attenuation of your beer.....and carefully measure your priming sugar! Evidently this guy did neither.

 

[solbes]

I recently split a batch of wheat beer, 1/3 bottled using cranberry extract and 2/3 onto some raspberries in secondary. Messed up the ratios in my head and bottled the cranberry as 2/3 of a batch. Realized it right away, but didn't decide what to do for 2 days. Had them in a Strong Box of sorts. Then I decided to dump them into a corny keg (16 bottles), purged with CO2, and let it sit for a week and a half.

Attached a picnic tap last night and all I got was foam, so I released the pressure. Good thing I switched or I would have first hand experience with BB's. I'll make sure to be a little more careful from now on.

 

[LVBen]

Exploding bottles is one of the reasons why I switched to kegging. If I need bottles for a competition or something, then I can just draw from the tap. Refrigerated bottles won't explode and it is a whole lot easier to refrigerate 3 bottles than it is to refrigerate 50 bottles.

 

[bknifefight]

Exploding bottles is one of the reasons why I switched to kegging. If I need bottles for a competition or something, then I can just draw from the tap. Refrigerated bottles won't explode and it is a whole lot easier to refrigerate 3 bottles than it is to refrigerate 50 bottles.

You would refrigerate an entire batch of beer? I only put what I am going to drink in the next few days in the fridge at a time.

 

[LVBen]

You would refrigerate an entire batch of beer? I only put what I am going to drink in the next few days in the fridge at a time.

If I didn't have kegs, and I had 50 bottles of beer sitting around and some of them exploded, I'd want to refrigerate all of them.

But I have kegs, so I don't have to worry about that.

 

[peter679]

I'm bringing this back from the dead... I did 5oz of priming sugar with 2 cups of water added it to the bottling bucket, and bottled no problems. It sat for a week or so then yesterday POW! Bottle bomb! so I refrigerated them, my buddy tried one last night and said it was just all foam... is my 3C IPA NOW all head and dead??? I was afraid of this...

thanks
Pete

 

[MalFet]

I'm bringing this back from the dead... I did 5oz of priming sugar with 2 cups of water added it to the bottling bucket, and bottled no problems. It sat for a week or so then yesterday POW! Bottle bomb! so I refrigerated them, my buddy tried one last night and said it was just all foam... is my 3C IPA NOW all head and dead??? I was afraid of this...

thanks
Pete

You can burn off the co2 by agitating the beer after you pour it. It will still be a PITA to pour, and you'll lose the head, but it will get down to the right carb level.

 

[peter679]

How do I do this? I've NEVER had priming issues w/ bottling so I have no idea hot to attack this. Basically it sounds like the co2 that in these bottles is built up that popping the top it going to make it more like Champagne than a beer.
I check my 2nd before I racked them, there was very little if any fermentation that I could see.. I'm wondering if somehow the ferment was restarted with bottling..

So frustrating, I hate to think I lost an entire batch..
Anyone HELP!!!

-Pete

 

[MalFet]

How do I do this? I've NEVER had priming issues w/ bottling so I have no idea hot to attack this. Basically it sounds like the co2 that in these bottles is built up that popping the top it going to make it more like Champagne than a beer.
I check my 2nd before I racked them, there was very little if any fermentation that I could see.. I'm wondering if somehow the ferment was restarted with bottling..

So frustrating, I hate to think I lost an entire batch..
Anyone HELP!!!

-Pete

After you pour it into your glass, swish it around. It will foam up, and after a minute or two the foam will subside.

The cause could be a number of things. Perhaps you bottled prematurely, or perhaps you have an infection. Without further tests, it's hard to know. Keep those bottles cold though.

 

[peter679]

I spun my carboy to make sure there was no more movement in the bubbler and there wasn't, it went 2 stages for atleast 4.5 weeks I believe and the last week there was no movement. I'm guessing the primer reignited the fermentation? What can I do let it sit for a long time or what?

Will letting it sit for a while help it, I'm guessing no cause the co2's got nowhere to go obviuosly..

thanks

 

[MalFet]

I spun my carboy to make sure there was no more movement in the bubbler and there wasn't, it went 2 stages for atleast 4.5 weeks I believe and the last week there was no movement. I'm guessing the primer reignited the fermentation? What can I do let it sit for a long time or what?

Will letting it sit for a while help it, I'm guessing no cause the co2's got nowhere to go obviuosly..

thanks

The point of the priming sugar is to restart fermentation, but only to a controlled degree. Either your yeast got more sugar than you wanted it to have (because you used too much priming sugar or because the fermentation had stalled out for some reason) or you've got an organism in there that can metabolize things that yeast can't (i.e., a bacteria or a wild yeast).

 

[Bobby_M]

Looking for bubbles is not the way to check that fermentation is done. You really have to use a hydrometer. I'd get the bottles into colder temps immediately, like a garage, and put them in a closed cardboard box.

 

[jguy898]

.

 

[cimirie]

Haha! Listening to you guys talk about Bottle Bombs and switching to kegging because of it, and all the paranoia associated with these events, makes me laugh. Everything I do is bottled, but bottled with a Counter Pressure Bottle Filler. Absolutely no stupid, nasty, trub, lees or even bits of fruit and/or spices in my bottles. My finished products are so Crystal CLEAR that I have one first place in two local competitions simply because the judges had never seen a glass bottled homebrew Hard Cider that was transparent as fine crystal, had absolutely no yeast to spoil the flavour, and so perfectly carbed. It is no different for any of my Meads, either. Professional grade end products. Even if one of my batches doesn't turn out as good as I would have hoped it never makes a bit of difference with the crowd simply because of the 'Presentation'.
Seriously, look into keg-carbing an already cleared product and then bottling it with a Counter Pressure Filler. Like mine, your friends will pay for the ingredients just to have more when it's ready. I haven't had to pay for a full batch of Mead or Cider in a very, Very long time.

Cheers!
Jonas

I can't tell if this is a paid advertisement for a CPF, or you're just being a bit of an ass!

 

[Hoppopotomus]

+ 1....what cimrie said. This is a forum for sharing and learning, not putting down those trying to learn about the art of homebrewing. Coming on here and acting pompuous and self rightous isn't what HBT is about. You have much to learn young grasshopper.

 

[jguy898]

You know what, gosh darnit I can be stupid.

I just wrote out a whole damn speel, and everything I type today sounds like a horribly put together advertisement.

I am sorry, my previous post was very rude and I regret what I wrote in it. Please don't haze me to death, I can be an unwitting ass sometimes.

I apologize for my previous post.
Jonas

 

[Hoppopotomus]

No worries....

I keg all of my beer....not because of bottle bombs, but because it's quicker, easier, and I have a 4 tap keezer. I also have a counter pressure bottling wand, which is absolutely great for bottling only what I need bottled. I think that you posted with good intent, but it just came across wrong.

Hoppo

 

[cimirie]

You know what, gosh darnit I can be stupid.

I just wrote out a whole damn speel, and everything I type today sounds like a horribly put together advertisement.

I am sorry, my previous post was very rude and I regret what I wrote in it. Please don't haze me to death, I can be an unwitting ass sometimes.

I apologize for my previous post.
Jonas

Well dammit, your reaction was so unexpected and sincere, now I feel guilty for jumping all over you!

And don't sell yourself short: it didn't sound like a horribly put together advertisement. It sounded like a good advertisement.

 

[jguy898]

Well dammit, your reaction was so unexpected and sincere, now I feel guilty for jumping all over you!

And don't sell yourself short: it didn't sound like a horribly put together advertisement. It sounded like a good advertisement.

Nah, don't worry about it. Every once in a while I just type in something erroneously arrogant, and then realize 10 minutes later what the heck I actually wrote down. I'm working on it, but still the occasional ass.