Help, primed with local honey, did I make bottle bombs?

[automatauntaun]

So I made this hoppy pumpkin ale (first batch ). 1.044 was my start Gv, my end was about 4.1 %.
{I got help with all this here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/priming-honey-got-some-questions-362277/ }.
I primed it with some local unpasteurized honey.
I asked how I should measure it out and was given the advice of using 4.7 oz of honey for exactly 5 gallons of beer. Which seemed like a correct measurement when I used a on-line calculator. I kept them in the dark at 75 degrees and swirled them twice a week in warm water at the advice of a friend.

I was advised to wait about three weeks for priming to be done. After one week I opened a bottle to test

at one week I had a LOT of foam. Beer tasted fine not overly carbonated and fizzy like a soda.

Last night {Week two} I opened another bottle for a test and it just shot up out of the bottle. Complet fountain. what beer was left still tasted fine, wasn't overly fizzy but, it is obviously over carbonated.
I am looking to find out two things.
A: is it a bottle bomb situation. Should I just pop these and pour em? i don't want to wake up in the night thinking i'm being shot at al a braking bad.
B: Is their anything I can do to salvage these? Would waiting longer like bottle conditioning have any effect on reducing the explosiveness? Would making them colder or warmer help with the over carbonation? Any help would be apriceated. I have no issue pouring these as its my first batch ever, just want to know if i can save this. SO, yeah thanks in advanced.

 

[TopherM]

Couple troubleshooting questions:

1) Are you putting these into the fridge for at least 48 hours or so before you serve, or are you opening them as soon as they're cold? CO2 produced during bottle carb doesn't fully dissolve into the beer until it is at colder serving temps, and that process takes a couple days.

2) How did you get the honey into the beer? Did you just dump it inand stir, or did you boil to dissolve and gently stir into the uncarbed beer. You may have just not uniformly mixed the honey through the solution, so some bottles have more sugar in them and some have less.

Either of those ring a bell?

 

[bknifefight]

At this point it is hard to tell if it is uneven carbonation or over carbonation or an infection.

Consider this a lesson learned. Some people have difficulty evenly distributing corn sugar into their beer when bottling, leading to uneven carbonation, I imagine that honey is 100 times harder. Use corn sugar from now on. Using honey is a waste of money.

 

[WoodlandBrew]

Just checking the math on the amount of honey it seems that you were aiming for about 3 volumes of CO2? That's the top end of carbonating in bottles. If you aren't giving them a full week in the fridge you will probably get gushers. I actually think syrup is easier to work with than corn sugar for dissolving, but either way, you do have to make sure the sugar is fully dissolved, preferably before you add it to the bottling bucket, and before you rack the beer into the bucket.

 

[automatauntaun]

I accidentlt posted this twice so I had no idea you guys were responding to this! A: I added the honey straight to the batch and stirred it well but never diluted it with hot water or anything. What should I have done?
B: I opened many bottles to burp them and all were gushers but yes, I only cooled them. I will put some aside and see what happens. I just didn't want bottle bombs.
C:this is my first batch so I asked on the forum about a good ratio for unprocessed wild flower honey. I also asked at the local home brew supply and the concensus seems to be around 4.5-4.7 oz.

Thanks do much guys! If you have any more advice please leave it here

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/help-primed-local-honey-did-i-make-bottle-bombs-365733/index3.html
As I said I somehow in my hurried state posted this twice. This is the oi I to where a much longer Discusion concerning this same topic is going on. I would appriceated and and all input as its my first batch and want to learn as much as I can about what happened here.

 

[TopherM]

1) Definitely dissolve it in a few quarts of hot water first next time, then cool and add to your wort, stirring SLIGHTLY. Honey would be tough to completely dissolve into fermented wort without stirring pretty well, and you DON'T want to stir pretty well post-ferementation, as that will oxydize your beer.

2) Once you put the beers into the fridge, yeast activity/carbonation stops, so if you are afraid of bottle bombs, just throw them all into the fridge once you think they are relatively carbed. You can make an educated guess instead of opening up all of the beers like you did. If you added the right amount of honey and mixed it well into the solution, there is ZERO fear of bottle bombs. I suspect you didn't get a consistent mix, so some bottles have too much sugar and some have not enough. The 4.5-4.7 ounces of honey would not have caused bottle bombs if mixed consistently so it was uniformly distributed througout the solution.

3) Use priming sugar next time. It's easier. If you want honey flavor, use honey malt, or at the very least add honey at flameout after your boil. You basically just spent 5X the money to prime your beer than you needed to on a primer that's harder to work with than dextrose/corn sugar.

Just learn a lesson from this and it'll make your beers better going forward.

 

[automatauntaun]

Lesson learned. Thanks! Been one week in the fridge so we will see.