f....f......f.....f

[Plumeja]

i just tried to degass my mean that has been in the primary for three months and oaked for a couple of days. i had a huge lose cause it exploded. im such an idiot. i hope that this doesn,t wreck my batch. i have a gal of water with campedt tablets in it to top it off. please tell me i dint destroy a whole 5 gal batch.

i degassed it with a power drill spinner or what ever you would call it.... bummer bummer bummer

 

[Yooper]

i just tried to degass my mean that has been in the primary for three months and oaked for a couple of days. i had a huge lose cause it exploded. im such an idiot. i hope that this doesn,t wreck my batch. i have a gal of water with campedt tablets in it to top it off. please tell me i dint destroy a whole 5 gal batch.

Well, it is unusual that a mead would be so full of gas after three months. Maybe the oak created nucleation points, and the degassing caused it to explode?

Anyway, generally mead degassing is only done in the first few days of making the mead. If it's gassy now, that will get better each time it's racked. You shouldn't need to mechanically degas a mead after that point. If it's still in primary, it's about 2 months late for racking, so I'd do that rather then mess with degassing it.

Topping it up with a gallon of water seems excessive. How many gallons of mead do you have? I usually top up with no more than maybe a cup!

 

[Plumeja]

i lost about a gal or so i figure. i just didnt think you want a large head space. it tasted good when i tasted it before degassing it. so i hope that it is not ruined. So i should rack it and put a new piece of oak in it so that i can keep up the flavour part of it? i feel like i messed up..

 

[NZ-beekeeper]

it tasted good when i tasted it before degassing it. so i hope that it is not ruined.

Like they say, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it!". Look on the bright side, a 23L glass carboy didn't blow up in your face, and you still have 4 gallons left. That's a cheaper lesson learned than some of those I have learned in the past

 

[bernardsmith]

Rather than "top up" the headroom with water (that will dilute the flavors) if you can, why not rack the remaining mead into a 3 gallon carboy and a one gallon carboy. If there is still some headroom in the 1 gallon container then unless you are making a mead with a special varietal of honey why not simply make a pint or whatever of honey and water with the same gravity as your original 5 gallon batch and top the gallon batch with this. It will restart fermenting (or it should) so this will need to be aged a bit longer than the 3 gallon batch but come bottling time you can blend them both and bottle away.

 

[Plumeja]

This is what it looks like after about 24 hours

 

[Plumeja]

Picture 2

 

[Arpolis]

That still looks a bit cloudy. Have you taken gravity readings? Looks like it may still be fermenting. My meads are usually much clearer after 3 months but then that may just boil down to yeast choice.