beer can question

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sww35

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when we bottle a beer, we keep extra space so the beer can have space to carb up. What is the process for beer cans that your standard beer makers use to carb up in cans?
 
Cans are generally filled with a counterpressure canning line with already carbonated beer.

I don't recall seeing a can conditioned beer, ever.
 
Sierra Nevada has recently started canning their pale ale (at least it's recently arrived in Arkansas). It clearly says "Canned Conditioned" on the can. Seems a little odd though since you'd have to get it perfect to keep from bulging the can I'd think.
 
Fat Tire in cans is also "Can conditioned". They just pre-mix yeast before canning. Just like they over carbonate the beer before bottling (to compensate for the headspace in the bottle), they have the formula down pat. That's why they pay their people the 'big buxs'. :D
 
I was only asking cause if we can get this down, mason jars would seem to work for bottling beer.
 
sww35 said:
I was only asking cause if we can get this down, mason jars would seem to work for bottling beer.

Do you want to do this just because you can or do you see some benefit in it?

[EDIT]: and by "can" I mean the physical ability to do so...not as in canning vegetables. Haha no pun intended...
 
The benefit would be that mason jars are easier to keep clean and also cheaper when buying them new compared to new bottles.
 
sww35 said:
The benefit would be that mason jars are easier to keep clean and also cheaper when buying them new compared to new bottles.

Yeah I suppose. But after you get the label off the first time you basically get a free bottle AND the beer that came with it. Also don't you have to replace the mason jar lid every time? I imagine that'd be more expensive than caps.
 
There's a flaw in your thinking. Cans are more like kegs in that they hold pressure, Mason jars are meant to hold a vaccum, not the outward pressure of carbonation pressing on the screw ring.

Drink out of them, but don't bottle in them.

They work by creating a vacuum when you can under pressure... When you put your food in the jar, seal the jar and stick it inside the boiling water bath, as it cools the vacuum draws the seal downward or inward that's why the dimple on a can is supposed to be pushed inward, and if you ever come a cross a can where it is bulging outward you are in trouble...

When you bottle, the gas builds up til it maxes out the head room (held in place by the crimped cap or the cork with wire or the gasket on a grolh bottle.....The co2 hits the barrier, maxes it and then goes back into solution/

With a mason jar you would either blow the seal and all the co2 would escape or if you were lucky enough that the seal held, more than likely the glass of the jar would explode and you would have a nice bottle grenade....

The tops for a mason jar typically is a thin metal lid with a rubberized "grommet" attached to is, really just a silicon band around the edge of the lid, and a retaining ring.

Mason-jar-lids.jpg

canning.jpg


When you can, the cooling of the once heated container and it's goodies creates a vaccuum, it sucks inward. It pulls the flat tightly Downward.

In fact many of the lids actually has a small indentation in the center of it, that when the vacuum occurs it is pulled inward on the top and leaves a little dimple. That's a sign that there is a vacuum pulling the lid down and keeping the veggies or jam sealed up nicely and protected from infection.

And usually after you remove the retaining ring, if everything is OK with the jar, you usually can feel/hear the the vaccum break, with a little *POP*

However any of you who have ACTUALLY canned before, probably knows that one of the ways you can tell if your food in the can spoiled is if the little dimple is pushed outword. In jars without the dimple it is really hard, usually the lid might feel loose or there might actually be wetness around the lid when you unscrew the retaining

Because usually the rotting food give of a gas which expands to push up the dimple OR it breaks the seal where the little lid gasket meets the rim of the glass.

There is considerably MORE pressure in the carbonation process of beer, often enough pressure to cause a BOTTLE BOMB, in bottles specifically made to handle the OUTWARD pressure of carbonation.

Now if you managed to find one of these older style, thick walled jars with big gaskets and flip tops...We MIGHT be having a different discussion.

mason-jar.jpg


But your typical jars from the grocery store...NOT.

A crown bottles cap is designed to contain the Outward and upward pressure of a beer bottle, we crimp it down, we don't create a vacuum that seats it on the bottle.
 
Revvy, that was a VERY thorough explanation. Which only leads me to wonder... what are you drinking now?
 
Well i still see no reason, NOT to try it? as far as pressure/vacuum goes, some of those suckers (pun inteded) place just as much pressure on the glass as it would been with internal pressure? (pressure tanks and vacuum tanks, in general, have the same design) the only concern would be the top leaking, but, the advantage there is that you can always just try and screw it MORE tight?
 
DannyD said:
as far as pressure/vacuum goes, some of those suckers (pun inteded) place just as much pressure on the glass as it would been with internal pressure? (pressure tanks and vacuum tanks, in general, have the same design)

You are very wrong in this statement. You cannot just take a tank designed to code to contain a certain pressure and them pull a vacuum on it or vice versa. That would end in disaster.
 
You are very wrong in this statement. You cannot just take a tank designed to code to contain a certain pressure and them pull a vacuum on it or vice versa. That would end in disaster.

Im not saying put a penning pump on it?! (in general) how does a "tank" look? tubelar body with dome ends?
And its a can-fruit bottle! no more of a risk of bottle bomb then any other bottle
 
DannyD said:
Im not saying put a penning pump on it?! (in general) how does a "tank" look? tubelar body with dome ends?
And its a can-fruit bottle! no more of a risk of bottle bomb then any other bottle

Just because something looks like something else doesn't mean it will work the same. Canning jars are designed for vacuum and not intended for pressure. I highly doubt they can hold the same pressure as a beer bottle even if you can seal it.
 
Has anyone ever tried to use mason jars for bottling things that don't require carbonation? Say Edwort's Apfelwein, would it even last that long if you didn't properly seal it like you do canned food?
 
Just because something looks like something else doesn't mean it will work the same. Canning jars are designed for vacuum and not intended for pressure. I highly doubt they can hold the same pressure as a beer bottle even if you can seal it.

:) Challenge accepted!!!

botteling a lager in 2 weeks, will through in a few jars
1X mayo jar
1x "can fruit" jar (as we know them aroung here)

(well actualy the mayo jar will not even have to be done, i always put my yeast slurry in them and I once forgot to NOT screw the lid on tight and i had well carbed yeast slurry............all over the floor)
 
Haha alright. Make sure and report back! Don't leave us in suspense like that stupid banana fosters thread a few months ago!

Will do, I will put the normal "charge" of priming suger in the can fruit jar and over charge the mayo bottle.
 
There is not yeast sediment in either Fat Tire or Sierra Nevada cans, so I think the "can conditioned" is a marketing term for aging the beer, not physically carbing and conditioning in the can like homebrewers do.

There's even several threads on HBT of brewers trying to harvest yeast from Fat Tire cans and bottles and finding that yeast are virtually non-existant.

I'm calling bunk on this one!
 
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