Homebrewed Beer Opening Like "Champagne Bottles"? Help!

[ReneVH]

So I brewed up an IPA a few months ago and it was pretty nice, that is, the first time I tasted it a few weeks after bottling. There was a problem with it though, the bottles had a LOT of sediment. What's more, these bottle's started blowing up the second time I opened them, a couple of weeks later than the first one. They would instantly fizz up and spill foam everywhere, like champagne bottles. They also tasted much different than the first time around, instead tasting metallic and salty. I don't know if this might be related to the sediment, or the fact that I stored them in a really hot place. I'm imagining it's related to the yeast continuing fermentation inside the bottle, releasing too much C02.

 

[STMF]

You either:
1. Bottled to soon
2. Used too much sugar
3. Have a contamination
4. A mix of the above

My guess would be contamination.

 

[TwistedGray]

You either:
1. Bottled to soon
2. Used too much sugar
3. Have a contamination
4. A mix of the above

My guess would be contamination.

+1 - It's one of those things.

It's likely NOT because you stored it in a hotter-than-normal location.

 

[ReneVH]

You either:
1. Bottled to soon
2. Used too much sugar
3. Have a contamination
4. A mix of the above

My guess would be contamination.

Thanks a lot for the reply! Do you think it might have anything to do with the temperature it was stored in as well? The bottles took a lot of heat.

-Never mind, just saw twisted gray's response

 

[bigdawg86]

Temperature that's too warm may or UV exposure could "skunk" the beer, but that wouldn't be the source of your overcarbonation.

 

[TwistedGray]

Thanks a lot for the reply! Do you think it might have anything to do with the temperature it was stored in as well? The bottles took a lot of heat.

-Never mind, just saw twisted gray's response

The only thing heat is going to do is speed up the bottling carbing process, so that's not it. How did you carb each bottle? What was the process there?

 

[ReneVH]

The only thing heat is going to do is speed up the bottling carbing process, so that's not it. How did you carb each bottle? What was the process there?

Added 4oz priming sugar to the bottling bucket right before bottling. Everything was washed with StarSan so it's weird that it would be contamination.

The weirdest thing is that the beers were fine for the first month or so, but later on they started fizzing up horribly when opening.

 

[TallDan]

Are the bottles well chilled before opening? Having them in the fridge for at least 24 hours before opening will help with gushers. Of course, "will help" is not a fix. My guess is actually that you bottled too soon.

 

[TwistedGray]

Added 4oz priming sugar to the bottling bucket right before bottling. Everything was washed with StarSan so it's weird that it would be contamination.

The weirdest thing is that the beers were fine for the first month or so, but later on they started fizzing up horribly when opening.

Yeah, that's tricky.

Were the temperatures while they "were fine" much less than over the last however many days/weeks/months? Perhaps they were kept in cold temps causing a slow transformation of the added sugar. Or perhaps for whatever the batch size you had, you added too much priming sugar and it hadn't fully converted while you had some in the early stages.

Or it's an infection.

How did you bring over "a lot of sediment"? What's your bottling procedure?

 

[ReneVH]

Yeah, that's tricky.

Were the temperatures while they "were fine" much less than over the last however many days/weeks/months? Perhaps they were kept in cold temps causing a slow transformation of the added sugar. Or perhaps for whatever the batch size you had, you added too much priming sugar and it hadn't fully converted while you had some in the early stages.

Or it's an infection.


How did you bring over "a lot of sediment"? What's your bottling procedure?

Temperature was always constantly hot, so temp might not be it.

Perhaps we did add too much priming sugar, since we lost a lot of volume passing over from the fermenter to the bottling bucket.

Our bottling procedure is as follows:
1. Add priming sugar to bottling bucket
2. Siphon from carboy to bucket
3. Serve into bottle with a spigot right out of the bucket

 

[TwistedGray]

Temperature was always constantly hot, so temp might not be it.

Perhaps we did add too much priming sugar, since we lost a lot of volume passing over from the fermenter to the bottling bucket.

Our bottling procedure is as follows:
1. Add priming sugar to bottling bucket
2. Siphon from carboy to bucket
3. Serve into bottle with a spigot right out of the bucket

Yeah, it's not a temp. issue then.

So either:

1. Too much priming sugar
2. (as noted by a previous response) Bottled too early
3. Infection (shouldn't rule this out)

Note - You may consider, in the future, adding sugar directly to each bottle. Depending on your batch size, it's a PITA.

 

[bleme]

How long did it ferment before you bottled?

 

[RM-MN]

Added 4oz priming sugar to the bottling bucket right before bottling. Everything was washed with StarSan so it's weird that it would be contamination.

The weirdest thing is that the beers were fine for the first month or so, but later on they started fizzing up horribly when opening.

I think you are dealing with contamination from a wild yeast that is in your air. My solution when that happened was to buy an air filter with UVC light to kill off the wild yeast. I think I have it controlled now.

 

[flars]

What was the volume of beer bottled for the 4 ounces of priming sugar? Did you inspect each bottle to make sure it was clean before sanitizing. A dirty bottle cannot be sanitized.

I also suspect contamination if a bottle has been chilled for a couple of days and still gushes as soon as it is opened.

 

[hottpeper13]

Was this an all grain batch? If you mash with less then 50 ppms of calcium you could end up with gushing in bottles. The calcium mixes with phosphates in the mash to drop calcium oxalate out. If you don't do it in the mash it carries over into the packager causing nucleation sites which cause gushing.

 

[Sadu]

+1 for infection. Especially if the early bottles tasted good then got worse at the end, as it can take time for the infection to develop. Plus you say they taste nasty which is another vote for infection. Over primed bottles taste OK if you can get any in the glass (ironically they can taste flat after losing all their carbonation gushing out of the bottle).
Over priming or bottling too early seems unlikely. In a hot climate, bottle conditioning would be complete very quickly and you would have gushers happening within 1-2 weeks of bottling.
If the infection is caused by dirty bottles, you may find some bottles are good and others are nasty. If its an infection before bottling, then all the bottles will be nasty (noting that early ones might be OK since infections take several weeks to ferment).