Foam Volcano

[BlackHat]

Here's something that has been bothering me for a while: I made a batch of chocolate stout and a batch with a fair share of honey and every single one of the bottles erupts with foam when opened. Anywhere from a fifth to a half of the bottle is lost to these foam volcanoes and I was wondering what the cause of this was. I suspect it's simply overcarbonation as a result of the extra fermentable sugars, although they don't hiss much when I open them and they don't taste overly carbonated. The excess sugar theory makes me wonder why none of my fruit beers have every volcanoed.

 

[Aleforge]

Here's something that has been bothering me for a while: I made a batch of chocolate stout and a batch with a fair share of honey and every single one of the bottles erupts with foam when opened. Anywhere from a fifth to a half of the bottle is lost to these foam volcanoes and I was wondering what the cause of this was. I suspect it's simply overcarbonation as a result of the extra fermentable sugars, although they don't hiss much when I open them and they don't taste overly carbonated. The excess sugar theory makes me wonder why none of my fruit beers have every volcanoed.

Thats pretty much it. Only two possibilities, infection or over carbonation. If they taste fine, I would guess carbonation. How much sugar did you add before bottling?

I had one batch do exactly what yours is, and I found it was from to much sugar added before bottling.

 

[Lil' Sparky]

What was the FG when you bottled them? If the fermentation stalled and the FG was too high, then that can also cause overcarbonation in the bottles.

 

[cheezydemon]

Sounds like Gusher infection to me. It is harmless to ingest, so just decant them into something (like a pitcher) before drinking.

Overcarbonation of that magnitude would blow the bottle. That is my guess.

Soak all of those bottles in sanitizer really well before re-using.

 

[Boerderij_Kabouter]

Are you refrigerating these? If you have a high carbonation level, you may just need to get them really cold for a few days... that may fix it for you.

 

[NWernBrewer]

How long have they been aging - I have heard that some gushers are from incomplete conditioning and this is made with stout made with honey.

edit: sorry, it's multiple batches. It may be an infection.

 

[kinghellsfire_NZ]

i had this problem on one batch i made after 4 weeks in the bottle. i had no volcanos before 4 weeks but after another week or two they were fine. i think it is just that all of the CO2 hasn't absorbed into the beer.

 

[Revvy]

At how many weeks are you openning them? You can get non infection gushers with green beer, especially with a lot of fermentables, like kinghellsfire said, the co2 might still not have re-absorbed back into the beer.

Take a look at this post on bottle carbing and conditioning, especially at poindexter's video...he shows a "normal" gusher in the first couple of weeks, just because the CO2 hasn't been absorbed.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showpost.php?p=558191&postcount=101

If it's after four weeks and you're getting them...(more like 4-8 since you have a lot of fermentables) then possibly they are Gusher infections....Like Cheezy said, it's not poisonous...chill them down and drink them young...And then we have to re-visit you sanitization and bottling process, so it won't happen again...

But if you're opening them under 3 weeks, it's not likely an infection more likely you bottled too early, or didn't need as much priming sugar becasue of all the extra fermentables...

 

[david_42]

Stouts & porters can take a ridiculous amount of time to finish fermenting because of the caramel. Next time, consider bottling without any primer.

 

[BlackHat]

These were batches I did a while back so I can't say anything for certain about possible infection sources, although I make sure to sanitize everything that touches the beer, including letting the bottles soak in cleaner. I used Cooper carbonation drops to prime them so an excess of primer shouldn't be an issue - unless the sugar in the honey added to that. The honey beer only seemed to foam for about the first 6 weeks of its life in the bottle. The chocolate stout is almost 7 months old now and is still foaming over. I've done many batches since then without incident, but after a messy opening last night I decided it was time to figure out why.

Thanks

 

[Revvy]

These were batches I did a while back so I can't say anything for certain about possible infection sources, although I make sure to sanitize everything that touches the beer, including letting the bottles soak in cleaner. I used Cooper carbonation drops to prime them so an excess of primer shouldn't be an issue - unless the sugar in the honey added to that. The honey beer only seemed to foam for about the first 6 weeks of its life in the bottle. The chocolate stout is almost 7 months old now and is still foaming over. I've done many batches since then without incident, but after a messy opening last night I decided it was time to figure out why.

Thanks

Well probably back then when you were less experienced you picked up an infection...especially if subsequent batches turned out fine....

If you do reuse the bottles I would clean them throuroughly then use a bleach water soak to nuke anything in them...then a thorough rinse and then your normal sanitization practices...consider the bleach the napalm of the sanitization world....

 

[rychannel]

I have the gusher thing happen with all of my really dark beers only. (Pumpkin Spice Porter, Black IPA, Milk Stout) I sanitize everything the exact same way. With the Black IPA, I have a friend that brewed it and his also likes to be really foamy.