First infected batch, after bottling

[mcleanmj]

After years of brewing, I've got my first fully infected batch. What a buzzkill. Its a 6 gallon batch of ESB I was really excited about. I bottled it two weeks ago and the hydrometer sample at the time tasted excellent. However, I've discovered every bottle has floating particles and a neck ring. I opened a few up, and sure enough they are all gushers. So, it would appear my autosiphon or bottling bucket were the issue. The bucket and siphon hose are in the trash and the siphon is soaking in diluted bleach.

Anyone had similar experience? Really bummed about that one...

 

[MaxStout]

Yup, had that happen in the same way. Hydro sample tasted good, bottles spotlessly clean and sanitized. Three weeks later I had 50-plus gushers of some vile liquid that smelled like vinegar. It was painful popping the tops on those bottles and pouring them down the drain one by one.

I narrowed it down to the drain valve on the bottling bucket, and likely the bucket itself. (The bucket did have some scratches inside.) I replaced the bucket, valve and the attaching tubing. Now after use, I remove the plastic valve from the bucket and store it in a jar of StarSan. Never had another problem with those items.

 

[mcleanmj]

Man, I really appreciate your reply. Misery loves company as they say. I am pretty sure my issue was the bucket itself, which also has some scratched. I let the valve soak in star san for a while before bottling, so I don't think that was it. However, I am going to take your advice and store the valve in a jar of star san from now on.

Very sad to see this batch go down the drain...especially because I haven't got a good stock of beers at the moment. Oh well, lesson learned.

 

[mcleanmj]

I've now drank 2 of the bottles. I wanted to give them a try before I dumped them. Honestly, it's not that bad. Severely over carbonated and has a weird bitterness, but its drinkable. I'll hold onto them for now and see what happens.

 

[Oldskewl]

I had a run of stouts and porters that all ended up over-carbing. Beers tasted good, just dryer than expected and over-carbed. I think it was the STA-1 gene found in certain yeasts like Saisons. I fought it for about 3 or 4 batches before I did a diluted bleach soak on everything cold side. Things are all good again.

 

[ncbrewer]

I've now drank 2 of the bottles. I wanted to give them a try before I dumped them. Honestly, it's not that bad. Severely over carbonated and has a weird bitterness, but its drinkable. I'll hold onto them for now and see what happens.

If the infection continues, the bottles could go from gushers to bombs - be careful.

 

[mcleanmj]

I had a run of stouts and porters that all ended up over-carbing. Beers tasted good, just dryer than expected and over-carbed. I think it was the STA-1 gene found in certain yeasts like Saisons. I fought it for about 3 or 4 batches before I did a diluted bleach soak on everything cold side. Things are all good again.

Thanks for sharing. I am doing the same thing with my equipment. Also picked up a new PET carboy and some other equipment.

 

[mcleanmj]

If the infection continues, the bottles could go from gushers to bombs - be careful.

Good call! I vented the pressure on all the bottles by lifting the caps, letting out the pressure, and recapping (or opening and closing for swing tops). Will do that a couple more times.

 

[RufusBrewer]

I had one bottle go bad on me. It was early on in my brewing history. I was in the living room, it sounded like somebody took a bottle of beer and threw it down in my pantry. Fortunately my wife was out of town and I did have to explain to her what happened.

Since then, I have been meticulous with bottling. Every bottle gets a soak in PBW (not Oxy clean) and a good spray of StarSan. The bottling bucket gets exposed to straight bleach, A good rinse of tap water then a washing with StarSan.

Over kill? Probably. So what? I baby 5 gallons for a few weeks to get ready for bottles. I am not going to risk that to save a couple bucks or save a few minutes.

 

[ncbrewer]

The bottling bucket gets exposed to straight bleach, A good rinse of tap water then a washing with StarSan.

I suggest not being too heavy handed with the bleach on the bottling bucket. It can soak into the plastic and cause problems.

In my experience, beer doesn't stay in contact with the bottling bucket long enough to set in good and create a biofilm. I don't know if that is theoretically correct, but it's what I found with my one experience with an infection. ymmv

 

[IslandLizard]

I suggest not being too heavy handed with the bleach on the bottling bucket. It can soak into the plastic and cause problems.

Exactly, no need to go over the top with the bleach concentration.

First, clean with some hot PBW. Mopping or brushing all surfaces. That removes biofilm. Don't forget the lid.

Rinse well and give it the bleach treatment, making sure all surfaces get well mopped down with it, and have ample contact time. Then after giving it a good rinse out, leave the bucket out in bright sunlight, outdoors. Prop up the bucket pointing the opening toward the sun. Turn it from time to time to give the inside a good and thorough exposure. UV is an excellent sterilizer, and will also break down the bleach and dissipate it.

 

[RufusBrewer]

I suggest not being too heavy handed with the bleach on the bottling bucket. It can soak into the plastic and cause problems.

In my experience, beer doesn't stay in contact with the bottling bucket long enough to set in good and create a biofilm. I don't know if that is theoretically correct, but it's what I found with my one experience with an infection. ymmv

Exactly, no need to go over the top with the bleach concentration.

First, clean with some hot PBW. Mopping or brushing all surfaces. That removes biofilm. Don't forget the lid.

Rinse well and give it the bleach treatment, making sure all surfaces get well mopped down with it, and have ample contact time. Then after giving it a good rinse out, leave the bucket out in bright sunlight, outdoors. Prop up the bucket pointing the opening toward the sun. Turn it from time to time to give the inside a good and thorough exposure. UV is an excellent sterilizer, and will also break down the bleach and dissipate it.

As always, you have to get things mechanically clean before the application of any sanatizer style solution. I am a fan of PBW.

When I say exposed, I am taking about a pouring some bleach into the bucket, swirl around to get everything wet and the push some through the spigot and what ever tubing and bottling wand I might have in place. I consider bleach to be an on contact sanitizer. Rinse well with tap water.

I do not trust tap water to be sanitary. Then I use something to sanitize what ever might have come along with your tap/rise your tap/rinse water. I trust StarSan to be up to the job. Iodophore is better still because of the wider spectrum of what it kills.

 

[bwible]

Happened to me with a chocolate beer I made for my wife and myself for Valentine’s Day back at the beginning of the year. That one had 5 kinds of chocolate in it. When it was young and just carbonated it was great. After a couple more weeks it went all chloroseptic and band-aid with overcarbonation and gushers. Real disappointment because I hadn’t entered a homebrew competition in ages and I really wanted to enter that one. I’m suspecting it was possibly the chocolate syrup added at bottling. To be safe, I did as op and replaced tubing and pulled bottling bucket apart.