First airlock disaster

[worlddivides]

I didn't use a blow-off tube because my latest batch is a cider and not a beer and I'd heard ciders are less likely to cause blocked-up airlocks. Plus the gravity was only 1.054, which I guess some people might consider on the lower end of "high-gravity." Plus, there was the fact that I had between 2 and 3 gallons worth of headroom.

So I woke up this morning to find the airlock bubbling away about 3-4 times a second (a new record for me), tons of foam all the way up to the stopper, and a huge huge chunk of pure chunky yeast in the airlock, moving up and down. I had to drive my girlfriend somewhere in 10 minutes, but I had seen the YouTube videos of plastic buckets that exploded from plugged-up airlocks, so I decided I needed to switch out the airlock soon. I made some StarSan water in my boiling pot and threw a spare airlock and stopper in there.

Then I tried to pull out the airlock and it shattered, slashing down my thumb. Luckily my thumb didn't start bleeding until I was away from the carboy, plus I know that I none of the plastic got in the carboy because the stopper hole was way too small and the breakage happened right above the stopper.

Put on a bandaid and had my girlfriend pull out the stopper. Put in the spare airlock, filled it with vodka, and sealed it.

Pros: The airlock was only broken for 3-4 minutes. The stopper was only off for about 10 seconds. The fermentation is going so violently that I doubt any airborne bacteria could have penetrated the thick walls of CO2. The inside of my fermentation bag smells like apple vodka (kinda weird, really).

Cons: Lost an airlock. Got myself a huge cut. Potentially exposed my batch to contamination (although kept to a minimum). The inside of my fermentation bag smells like apple vodka (due to the yeast? Or just the vapors?).

Potentially major disaster averted. Whew! So I'm wondering. Has anyone had a glass carboy explode from a plugged-up airlock?

 

[JohnnyRay]

Oh yea. 6.5 gallon glass carboy. 6 gallons of Russian Imperial Stout spread out in a nice even layer all over my basement. Looked like a black bomb went off in my ferm chamber. Airlock clogged up overnight and I came home the next day to a house that smelled like a brewery. Took me longer to clean up the mess then it did to brew the damn thing.

 

[Hoppity]

bad links

 

[Hoppity]

I had one shear in two with a clogged airlock. Never used anything but 3-piece since. Good thing it was in a tub. Easy clean-up, but I wept over that IPA.

 

[kh54s10]

This is the first I have ever heard of and exploding airlock. I would think it would blow the airlock out of the stopper or the stopper out of the carboy before one would break.

This is also why I start EVERY fermentation, no matter how much headspace, with a blow off tube installed. The only beer I have lost during fermentation was what went with the blow off. Probably less than a bottles worth on the most vigorous blow off.

 

[worlddivides]

Wow. That's pretty crazy.

 

[kh54s10]

I had one shear in two with a clogged airlock. Never used anything but 3-piece since. Good thing it was in a tub. Easy clean-up, but I wept over that IPA.

Besides the danger, this is why I will never use a glass carboy. There are very few threads of a lost batch due to breaking a bucket or Better Bottle.....

 

[worlddivides]

This is the first I have ever heard of and exploding airlock. I would think it would blow the airlock out of the stopper or the stopper out of the carboy before one would break.

I think it was a combination of several factors, the pressure of the CO2 building up not being the biggest. The stopper had somehow become stuck in the carboy top, which it hadn't been when I first stuck it in there. It was almost like it had expanded. The airlock was plugged-up with a ton of yeast. When I pulled on the airlock, the bottom of the airlock snapped and the top shattered pretty much simultaneously. Vodka and yeast went everywhere, and my hand got sliced.

I'm sure if I had just left it there, the carboy would likely have exploded before the airlock did (although I bet that would have taken a couple more hours).

 

[sportpak]

Besides the danger, this is why I will never use a glass carboy. There are very few threads of a lost batch due to breaking a bucket or Better Bottle.....

Buckets for life here. Wow that's scary.

 

[firerat]

That's insane!!

You would think the stopper and airlock would blow out the top of the carboy before the carboy built enough pressure to break!!

Wow!!

 

[Hoppity]

Buckets for life here. Wow that's scary.

Yea, I'm buckets only now also. The hat trick on broken carboys did it for me:

1. Clogged airlock pictured above
2. Misplaced harness in the dark with fresh batch, carboy got 6 inches off ground and slipped through web. Fresh batch gone. Both big toes needed band-aids.
3. Clean-up time: third full carboy lifted into slop sink to drain. Barely grazed lip of sink and it cracked like an egg in my hands. top half fell in sink, bottom shattered on garage floor. Index finger needed crazy glue and band-aids.

Felt I got off lucky both times I got cut. Still have one carboy left...never use it.