Carbing In A Growler

I know this is an old thread, but I came across this link today,


Typically bottles are rated in volumes, a measure of density, while the tests are done with a given pressure. The conversion is not trivial.

Interestingly enough, I also came across a rating of 58psi for a "german growler"

Anyway, I have several growlers, but have not attempted bottle conditioning in them, but am always curious to see this topic revisited.

Wyrmwood said:

Interestingly enough, I also came across a rating of 58psi for a "german growler"

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which also indicated it was made for bottle conditioning.

Wyrmwood said:

I know this is an old thread, but I came across this link today,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IqU002ai9c

Typically bottles are rated in volumes, a measure of density, while the tests are done with a given pressure. The conversion is not trivial.

Interestingly enough, I also came across a rating of 58psi for a "german growler"

Anyway, I have several growlers, but have not attempted bottle conditioning in them, but am always curious to see this topic revisited.

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This guy has balls. He didn't waste any time relieving the pressure, though!

pretty sure they want you to go buy their beer instead of carbing your own.

curlyfat said:

This guy has balls. He didn't waste any time relieving the pressure, though!

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Yeah, notice the "shield" he puts on his chest "just in case.."

*shrug*

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/growler-condition-fail-237921/#post2812913

Revvy said:

*shrug*

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/growler-condition-fail-237921/#post2812913

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I'm not sure what bearing that thread has on natural carbing in growlers designed for beer. I'm a chemist and deal with the alcohol bottles that poster is describing on a daily basis and they're not the same as beer growlers.

I've used this one:

http://www.stompthemgrapes.com/Bottles-2_Liter_Glass_Handle_Growler.html

for natural carbing many times and have never had a problem. I've had plenty of bottle bombs before (when I used to bottle), but I've never had a growler bomb.

Edit: Not saying a growler bomb CAN'T happen of course, but if you're careful about measurements, just as you should be with bottles, you should be able to carb safely in both vessels.

moti_mo said:

I'm not sure what bearing that thread has on natural carbing in growlers designed for beer. I'm a chemist and deal with the alcohol bottles that poster is describing on a daily basis and they're not the same as beer growlers.

I've used this one:

http://www.stompthemgrapes.com/Bottles-2_Liter_Glass_Handle_Growler.html

for natural carbing many times and have never had a problem. I've had plenty of bottle bombs before (when I used to bottle), but I've never had a growler bomb.

Edit: Not saying a growler bomb CAN'T happen of course, but if you're careful about measurements, just as you should be with bottles, you should be able to carb safely in both vessels.

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I think that's the "german growler" that NB says can be used for bottle conditioning, and I found a spec that it can handle 58 psi. I don't think people are really arguing that point, rather, the traditional growler you get from your local brewery to take beer home in.

Is there a physicist/chemist/mathematician in the house that can give a reasonable translation from density to pressure? That is, if a growler is rated for a given volume (2 g/l density of CO2) what psi it would be capable of handling? It has been measured/ estimated psi goes to 40+ during bottle conditioning. That could probably go much higher depending on fermentable sugars, temperature, air pressure, et al.

For what it's worth if the goal is to use swingtop bottles for carbonating, I used to carbonate in the ceramic Belgian swingtop bottles that are actually for bottle conditioning from the brewery.

The issue I ran into with them (and growlers) is more of a logistics thing. Those bottles are kind of bulky and awkward and don't package as well as regular 12oz bottles or bombers. It's easy for me to move around 6 packs, 12 packs and cases of bottles but the growlers and swingtops don't fit in those boxes very well, and don't fit in my fridge as easily either.

weirdboy said:

For what it's worth if the goal is to use swingtop bottles for carbonating, I used to carbonate in the ceramic Belgian swingtop bottles that are actually for bottle conditioning from the brewery.

The issue I ran into with them (and growlers) is more of a logistics thing. Those bottles are kind of bulky and awkward and don't package as well as regular 12oz bottles or bombers. It's easy for me to move around 6 packs, 12 packs and cases of bottles but the growlers and swingtops don't fit in those boxes very well, and don't fit in my fridge as easily either.

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i think people are after less bottling time/fewer bottles.

Revvy said:

*slams head against the wall*

I don't read his letter as saying it can be used to carb beer up, I read it as saying it can hold 2.4 volumes of carbonated beer. That has nothing to do with the amount of pressure created during carbonation.

I think he danced around actually answering your question actually. He didn't come out unequvicably yes. He ONLY told you how many Volumes the growler is rated for.

Hand filled at the bar tap means the beer was already carbed at the time it was put it the growler.

Carbed beer and carbonating beer are 2 seperate things, I don't get why people can't grasp that simple fact.

To carb a beer whether or not is is done naturally or with co2 you are forcing the gas into the solution. The pressure builds up, then there's a point where either the bottle fails or the co2, seeking the path of least resistance, forces itself into solution. You could call it a peak point, where there is a lot of pressure in the bottle, both already in solution and in the headspace trying to go into the solution, eventually it balances out and the beer is carbed.

Beer bottles, champagne bottles and kegs are rated with a higher psi/volume of co2 than wine bottles and growlers.

Already carbed and kegged beer is at a stable volume of co2 which is below the volume that growlers and winebottles are rated at. The FORCING of the co2 already happened. Why do you think kegs are made of metal and very very strong? To handle the pressure.

Our Buddy Rukus





I think it goes down to this.....is it worth playing Russian Roulette with your money and the time you spent bringing your brew along from grain to bottling day???

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Revvy, that's not at all accurate. Saying that the pressure in the headspace is going to peak before the gas goes into solution is wrong, wrong, wrong. In the experiment you're linking, the pressure fell after it went into the fridge due to well-understood laws of thermodynamics. The temperature of the system fell, thus the partial pressures of the gasses present fell.
Google up Henry's law, partial pressures and vapor pressures.

maskednegator said:

Revvy, that's not at all accurate. Saying that the pressure in the headspace is going to peak before the gas goes into solution is wrong, wrong, wrong. In the experiment you're linking, the pressure fell after it went into the fridge due to well-understood laws of thermodynamics. The temperature of the system fell, thus the partial pressures of the gasses present fell.
Google up Henry's law, partial pressures and vapor pressures.

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I am wondering if you even looked at the data he presented. This has nothing to do with putting bottles in the fridge. Everyone knows how that works. This is about natural carbonation at room temperatures.

I did, and I read the following:
"When we bottle condition beer, we are really simulating force carbing like the keg folks do. We cause a ferment by adding sugar. This creates a high pressure in the bottle. CO2 doesn't like to dissolve in a warm liquid. We then put some bottles in the fridge. The temperature of the liquid drops and the CO2 then begins to dissolve in the liquid."
This is runs completely contrary to everything I learned in the three thermo classes I've taken - that partial pressures vary dynamically with the temperature and partial volumes of the relevant gases such that they maintain equilibrium. This runs contrary to the guidelines SCUBA divers follow to avoid dying.
I also read the following:
"Why do you think kegs are made of metal and very very strong? To handle the pressure."
This is also interesting, because kegs are filled with beer that has already been carbonated from the bright tank. So carbed beer is ok to put in wine bottles and growlers, but kegs must be made out of metal so that they are strong enough for the carbed beer? What?

Some amount of CO2 dissolves in the beer. The amount that will dissolve in any particular volume of beer is dependent upon both pressure and temperature. Solubility increases as pressure rises, but decreases as temperature rises.


When you are naturally carbonating at room temperatures, you are just increasing the pressure since the temperature is fairly constant. The yeast ferments and creates CO2 which initially just goes into the headspace of the container, building up pressure ala Boyle's Law. As the pressure increases this CO2 then slowly dissolves back into the beer until it reaches a steady state.

If you then put that beer into the fridge, the pressure decreases in the headspace (again, ala Boyle's Law) BUT the solubility of the CO2 also increases so more CO2 again slowly dissolves into the beer until it reaches a steady state.

Wyrmwood said:

I think that's the "german growler" that NB says can be used for bottle conditioning, and I found a spec that it can handle 58 psi. I don't think people are really arguing that point, rather, the traditional growler you get from your local brewery to take beer home in.

Is there a physicist/chemist/mathematician in the house that can give a reasonable translation from density to pressure? That is, if a growler is rated for a given volume (2 g/l density of CO2) what psi it would be capable of handling? It has been measured/ estimated psi goes to 40+ during bottle conditioning. That could probably go much higher depending on fermentable sugars, temperature, air pressure, et al.

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- 1 Volume of CO2 means that if you removed the CO2 from 1 L of beer, that CO2 would occupy 1 L at standard temperature and pressure (1 atm, 293 K)

- Assume you're carbing a beer that benefits from a rather high carbonation rate, so you're carbing to 3 Volumes

- Assume you're carbing your beer up in a 1/2 gallon growler. 1/2 gallon is 1.9 L. So carbing up to 3 Volumes means you're putting 5.7 liters of CO2 into your beer.

- Use PV=nRT to calculate that you'll ultimately have 0.233 moles of CO2 that will occupy both the beer and the headspace above the beer.

- Use Henry's Law to calculate the concentration of gas in the headspace above the beer. The easiest Henry's Law constant to use here is the dimensionless constant, 0.8317, which is equal to the ratio of the molar concentrations of CO2 in the beer divided by the concentration of CO2 in the head space (0.8317 = C(aq)/C(gas) at STP)

- Assume that you've filled your beer up to a normal level in your growler. Eyeballing this on one of my growlers says that I can estimate the volume of that headspace by a cylinder of ~3 inches height by 1 inch diameter. This gives a volume of about 40 ml.

- Using the dimensionless Henry's Law constant, you can calculate that that 0.233 moles of CO2 divides itself up so that 0.227 moles are in solution, while the other 0.006 moles are in the headspace. Using PV=nRT, you can calculate that the 40 ml headspace has 3.7 atm of CO2 in it. This equates to 54 psi of CO2 in the headspace at room temperature.

That's a rough calculation, so people can check my math, but it affords a good estimate of an upper limit of what pressure you should expect to see in that headspace if you're going for a heavily carbonated beer. The biggest estimate is the heaspace volume, but the exact volume doesn't change things too much - if you change it to 100 ml, it will drop the pressure to 49 psi. If you're carbing a beer to 2 volumes, the pressure drops to ~30 - 36 psi.

Wow, throw a calculation in there and no posts for the whole day.

moti_mo said:

Wow, throw a calculation in there and no posts for the whole day.

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Many thanks. It was nice to see how that works. Now, what if instead of standard atm, you are at .74 and ~60F?

moti_mo said:

Wow, throw a calculation in there and no posts for the whole day.

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Winning!

During my recent visit to NB I was told there would be no issue carbing in their growlers and 1 gallon jugs (not listed on the site apparently) as long as I used the polycarbonate caps, and didnt crank them down hard enough to split them. Next time Im in the store Im going to pick up 3 more 1 gal jugs for summer session beers.
This is the jug:



BUT. I havent tried yet, so Im just going by someone elses word here.

that looks like the jug my apple juice comes in lol

anyone have any experience with carbing in growlers or jugs from AHS? i think they have 1/2 gal jugs as well...

EDIT: on the subject of jugs, anyone else get the urge for a hoe-down everytime you see a jug? hoo. hoo. hoo.

moti_mo said:

This equates to 54 psi of CO2 in the headspace at room temperature.

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If the "German" growler that is "safe to bottle condition in" is only rated at 58 psi, and a "normal" growler is 54 psi, that doesn't really seem like much difference. That seems to imply this issue is grossly blown out of proportion. Right?