Just generally bummed

[JosephN]

I've been racking my brain trying to figure out why the first several batches of beer came out great but here lately I've been getting a real inconsistency in carbonation rates and how the beer pours. I wasn't sure if I was adding enough or too much sugar, if I was getting it all mixed up good enough, if the bottles weren't cleaned as good as they should be or what. Well tonight I think I figured it out. I looked back to see what beers I've brewed and at what point did I start having issues. Once I looked at all of them in order I found that an infected batch was the dividing line. All the beers after the infection came out funky, not sour funky just not right. I'm still not sure if it is my spigot, which I just started removing after each use and cleaning and sanitizing over the course of several days, or my bottling wand. Either way they are cheaper than all the money I've spent on jacked up product. I'm just going to get a new bucket and all and see if that makes a difference. I haven't been able to really get too far along into the pale ale or the wheat and rye that I bottled a few weeks ago, but so far they seem okay, but still questionable. I also bottled a really tasty porter yesterday and I hope it's okay since I've been cleaning my spigot between batches. I'm really tired of giving people beer and not knowing if half the bottle was going to foam out before they could pour it or if it was going to take 10 mins to pour a beer without getting 3" of head. It's very frustrating coming from a guy that strives for perfection in any craft he takes on.

Thanks for letting me vent.

 

[iijakii]

Obligatory time to keg post. I feel your pain though, hate inconsistent bottles.

 

[slym2none]

Get rid of all your **** & start over.

*shrug*

 

[blizz81]

Obligatory time to keg post. I feel your pain though, hate inconsistent bottles.

Then he can move on to inconsistent kegs / keg pours! (Well, hopefully more consistent at least)


I'm making the jump to kegging after almost 9 years of bottling currently. Just want to jinx myself.


In those 9 years, I never trusted / used a bucket, bottling or otherwise, with a spigot. I know a lot of people have a lot of success with them but just something that always bugged me too much.

 

[iijakii]

So you mention just the pouring and carbonation -- is there any off tastes that develops, have you checked the FG of an older bottle (let the sample sit overnight and go flat) to see if it has dropped? I wouldnt be surprised if it's just priming issues. Make sure you measure the sugar by weight instead of volume, and try giving the beer a gentle stir.

 

[JosephN]

So you mention just the pouring and carbonation -- is there any off tastes that develops, have you checked the FG of an older bottle (let the sample sit overnight and go flat) to see if it has dropped? I wouldnt be surprised if it's just priming issues. Make sure you measure the sugar by weight instead of volume, and try giving the beer a gentle stir.

I have not tried checking the final gravity of one of the old bottles. I would think that I would get a different reading anyways considering adding priming sugar. It might not be much different but I would think that it would be a slight difference. I'm assuming whenever you say make sure I measure my sugar by weight and not by volume you mean to do it by ounces instead of by cups? If that's the case then that is how I do it, on a scale. I don't really tell any kind of taste difference that is extremely noticeable, but the batch that was infected didn't have a taste difference either, the bottles just literally exploded. As for priming being the issue I think the only way that would be so is if I haven't mixed up the priming sugar very well in the bottling bucket and that's my only issue or if bottling it cold makes the sugar drop out of suspension thus making it not a really good mixed up solution when I bottle it. As of my last two batches I made sure to really mix up the sugar in the finished beer before bottling and halfway through bottling I made sure to gently move the bucket around in a circular motion on a table to ensure it continued to mix. I'm still waiting on the results from the last two batches, one of them I did literally two days ago. I still think spending 20 or $30 on a new bottling bucket and set up will be Worth it even if that isn't the problem

 

[JosephN]

Get rid of all your **** & start over.

*shrug*

When you say get rid of everything are you suggesting glass carboys and all? I don't seem to have any issues until after bottling. If I leave the beer in the fermenter for a month then I have no at that point. I did already replace my auto siphon and hose that transfers my finished beer from the carboy to bottling bucket. I'm truly thinking it's my bottling wand more than anything. I remember some cocoa nibs getting stuck in there while bottling the infected batch, but $20-30 to replace the whole bottling set up is totally worth the piece of mind. What do you think? Any other areas that might case it?

I've also thought that it might be my bottle cleaning procedure. This is the way that I've always done my bottles. I'll soak them in Oxy clean and bleach for three days to a week, I wash the outside with a dedicated sponge, I use the high-pressure faucet mounted bottle washer and hot water to wash the inside of the bottles, I let them dry upside down for 24 hours, I then put a small piece of aluminum over the mouth of the bottle (this would be heavy duty aluminum foil used as a top to keep any dust or bacteria out), then I will bake in the oven from 350 to 400° for 1-2hrs, which in the research that I've done has shown me that this procedure will sterilize the bottles going even beyond the point of's sanitizing them.

 

[Pappers_]

When you say get rid of everything are you suggesting glass carboys and all? I don't seem to have any issues until after bottling. If I leave the beer in the fermenter for a month then I have no at that point. I did already replace my auto siphon and hose that transfers my finished beer from the carboy to bottling bucket. I'm truly thinking it's my bottling wand more than anything. I remember some cocoa nibs getting stuck in there while bottling the infected batch, but $20-30 to replace the whole bottling set up is totally worth the piece of mind. What do you think? Any other areas that might case it?

I've also thought that it might be my bottle cleaning procedure. This is the way that I've always done my bottles. I'll soak them in Oxy clean and bleach for three days to a week, I wash the outside with a dedicated sponge, I use the high-pressure faucet mounted bottle washer and hot water to wash the inside of the bottles, I let them dry upside down for 24 hours, I then put a small piece of aluminum over the mouth of the bottle (this would be heavy duty aluminum foil used as a top to keep any dust or bacteria out), then I will bake in the oven from 350 to 400° for 1-2hrs, which in the research that I've done has shown me that this procedure will sterilize the bottles going even beyond the point of's sanitizing them.

A couple of points:

1. You need to figure out whether your issue is over/under-carbonation or infection. If half the bottle is gushing, that's probably an infection. You can tell it by tasting, or having someone with an experiencd palate taste it. Two different issues and solutions.

2. If its an infection, you need to either replace or bleach bomb everything that would touch your beer post-boil. You may not be tasting the infection until after bottling, but that doesn't mean its not there - it takes time for wild yeast and bacteria to do their business.

3. For bottles, I clean them by rinsing them out with water after I use them, stick them in the dish drainer to drip dry, then put them in the box of empty bottles. On bottling day, immediately before bottling, I use a vinator and spray either Star San or Iodophor into each bottle to sanitize them. That's it. Your process seems complicated to me, and you don't do the critical piece - sanitize immediately before bottling - if I'm understanding correctly.

I hear your frustration and hope you get it resolved.

 

[flars]

I check for a poor mix of the priming solution by numbering the first six and last six bottles filled. Helps narrow down the possible causes for bottles being over or under carbonated.

 

[iijakii]

I have not tried checking the final gravity of one of the old bottles. I would think that I would get a different reading anyways considering adding priming sugar. It might not be much different but I would think that it would be a slight difference. I'm assuming whenever you say make sure I measure my sugar by weight and not by volume you mean to do it by ounces instead of by cups? If that's the case then that is how I do it, on a scale. I don't really tell any kind of taste difference that is extremely noticeable, but the batch that was infected didn't have a taste difference either, the bottles just literally exploded. As for priming being the issue I think the only way that would be so is if I haven't mixed up the priming sugar very well in the bottling bucket and that's my only issue or if bottling it cold makes the sugar drop out of suspension thus making it not a really good mixed up solution when I bottle it. As of my last two batches I made sure to really mix up the sugar in the finished beer before bottling and halfway through bottling I made sure to gently move the bucket around in a circular motion on a table to ensure it continued to mix. I'm still waiting on the results from the last two batches, one of them I did literally two days ago. I still think spending 20 or $30 on a new bottling bucket and set up will be Worth it even if that isn't the problem

Not enough priming sugar to throw the readings off. It's like .0002 points or something silly.

Looks like you have a good system in place for mixing, but I'd be interested to see the last two results before you think they're infected. You also might just be carbonating too much? And are you letting them sit in the fridge for at least a full day before opening?

 

[JosephN]

A couple of points:



1. You need to figure out whether your issue is over/under-carbonation or infection. If half the bottle is gushing, that's probably an infection. You can tell it by tasting, or having someone with an experiencd palate taste it. Two different issues and solutions.



2. If its an infection, you need to either replace or bleach bomb everything that would touch your beer post-boil. You may not be tasting the infection until after bottling, but that doesn't mean its not there - it takes time for wild yeast and bacteria to do their business.



3. For bottles, I clean them by rinsing them out with water after I use them, stick them in the dish drainer to drip dry, then put them in the box of empty bottles. On bottling day, immediately before bottling, I use a vinator and spray either Star San or Iodophor into each bottle to sanitize them. That's it. Your process seems complicated to me, and you don't do the critical piece - sanitize immediately before bottling - if I'm understanding correctly.



I hear your frustration and hope you get it resolved.

I would say that half of them act fine and half have a range of gushing from super slowly to rather quick. I can tell there is a slightly taste difference. It has a similar taste as my infected batch. Let me know what you think, but the "infection" seems to show up as little as 5 days after bottling. I also have noticed a few bottles with a sort of krausen or film at the top above the liquid line after a few weeks. I'm assuming this was the infection doing its thing in the bottles. Also as I think about it, I had one batch that originally got infected, it was fermenting in one container but all of the beers effected have not fermented in that vessel which makes me think it's localized to bottling. That seems to be the only common denominator. What are your thoughts?

 

[Pappers_]

I would say that half of them act fine and half have a range of gushing from super slowly to rather quick. I can tell there is a slightly taste difference. It has a similar taste as my infected batch. Let me know what you think, but the "infection" seems to show up as little as 5 days after bottling. I also have noticed a few bottles with a sort of krausen or film at the top above the liquid line after a few weeks. I'm assuming this was the infection doing its thing in the bottles. Also as I think about it, I had one batch that originally got infected, it was fermenting in one container but all of the beers effected have not fermented in that vessel which makes me think it's localized to bottling. That seems to be the only common denominator. What are your thoughts?

Trust your palate - if it tastes sour/tart/acidic/horsey etc., its a wild yeast or bacteria inoculation (someone recently told me that we should stop calling it an infection, but its just such a habit with me).

Your bottling equipment could be where the bugs are lurking, but I would bleach bomb everything that touches your beer post-boil. Fermenters, tubing, autosiphon, spoon, airlocks, stoppers, funnels, bottling wand, whatever.

Also, theoretically, baking your bottles and then capping them should work, and it does work for some people, I still think the best practice is 1) clean immediately after use and 2) sanitize immediately before use. So, that would mean sanitizing your bottles immediately before you fill them. At the least, it might not hurt to give it a try, as you work to correct whatever is leading to the innoculation.

Do you have a vinator? It makes sanitizing bottles easy.

 

[Rhetorik]

+1 on vinator. They're ~$20 and make sanitizing quick and easy.

 

[HomebrewSupply]

In terms of adding your priming sugar to the beer, do you dissolve it first before adding it? If not, that could potentially cause some differences in how much sugar ends up in each bottle.

I generally dissolve the priming sugar (measured by weight, like you do) into 1-1.5 cups of distilled water, cool it down a little and add it to the bottling bucket. Then siphon the beer on top of it, which mixes it up well, and then bottle from there.

Hope this helps - I know how frustrating it can be!

 

[JosephN]

Trust your palate - if it tastes sour/tart/acidic/horsey etc., its a wild yeast or bacteria inoculation (someone recently told me that we should stop calling it an infection, but its just such a habit with me).



Your bottling equipment could be where the bugs are lurking, but I would bleach bomb everything that touches your beer post-boil. Fermenters, tubing, autosiphon, spoon, airlocks, stoppers, funnels, bottling wand, whatever.



Also, theoretically, baking your bottles and then capping them should work, and it does work for some people, I still think the best practice is 1) clean immediately after use and 2) sanitize immediately before use. So, that would mean sanitizing your bottles immediately before you fill them. At the least, it might not hurt to give it a try, as you work to correct whatever is leading to the innoculation.



Do you have a vinator? It makes sanitizing bottles easy.

I would say more acidic and sometimes slightly, and I mean not very often at all, soapy. From what I read baking my bottles is like using an auto clave which is used in the medical field to Sterilize equipment. I have been baking them since the beginning and out of the 17 batches the first 11 never had an issue, but 12th and on have. I may try your method to see, but I don't care to have star San residue in my bottles. To me that stuff is very acidic.

How would you suggest trying the bleach bomb? Ratio and time frame to leave my equipment in the solution?

I also agree that we should stop using the term infection. I know it freaks my friends out when I tell them they might be drinking an infected beer.

 

[JosephN]

In terms of adding your priming sugar to the beer, do you dissolve it first before adding it? If not, that could potentially cause some differences in how much sugar ends up in each bottle.

I generally dissolve the priming sugar (measured by weight, like you do) into 1-1.5 cups of distilled water, cool it down a little and add it to the bottling bucket. Then siphon the beer on top of it, which mixes it up well, and then bottle from there.

Hope this helps - I know how frustrating it can be!

Ever since I started brewing I have dissolved my priming sugar in boiling water. I have not been using distilled water, just cold tap water. I usually let it boil for 10-15 mins, mostly for 15 mins. I also pour it in the bottling bucket and siphon the beer on top of the sugar water aka simple syrup here in the south. I have started mixing it up a bit more due to my recent issue, just to see if it makes a difference.

 

[iijakii]

Make sure to report back on how the recent, stirred batches do.

 

[HomebrewSupply]

Ever since I started brewing I have dissolved my priming sugar in boiling water. I have not been using distilled water, just cold tap water. I usually let it boil for 10-15 mins, mostly for 15 mins. I also pour it in the bottling bucket and siphon the beer on top of the sugar water aka simple syrup here in the south. I have started mixing it up a bit more due to my recent issue, just to see if it makes a difference.

Ugh, that's frustrating. I was really hoping it was something simple like this, but it sounds like there are other factors at play. Sorry man, good luck isolating the problem. Sounds like you've got some great advice for things to try from others in the thread.

 

[GHBWNY]

A couple of points:

1. You need to figure out whether your issue is over/under-carbonation or infection. If half the bottle is gushing, that's probably an infection. You can tell it by tasting, or having someone with an experiencd palate taste it. Two different issues and solutions.

2. If its an infection, you need to either replace or bleach bomb everything that would touch your beer post-boil. You may not be tasting the infection until after bottling, but that doesn't mean its not there - it takes time for wild yeast and bacteria to do their business.

3. For bottles, I clean them by rinsing them out with water after I use them, stick them in the dish drainer to drip dry, then put them in the box of empty bottles. On bottling day, immediately before bottling, I use a vinator and spray either Star San or Iodophor into each bottle to sanitize them. That's it. Your process seems complicated to me, and you don't do the critical piece - sanitize immediately before bottling - if I'm understanding correctly.

I hear your frustration and hope you get it resolved.

This^ absolutely.

 

[martyjhuebs]

Heres my two cents from sanitizing to bottling...

Simple solution for bottles... when you finish drinking a bottle, drop it into a bucket full of Oxy Clean. If it has paper labels the will come off on their own. if theres any sort of gunk in the bottle, the oxy will get it. When your bucket gets full, empty it and rinse the bottles and store until you are ready to bottle next. At this point, fill one side of the kitchen sink with water and one with your sanitizing solution. Rinse in the water and then sanitize. This will get you label free and gunk free bottles.

After that I would boil your sugar solution to remove some oxygen from the water, chill and add to the carboy or better yet, a keg. hit it with CO2, purge, hit with CO2. Roll the keg to disperse the sugar, pop the top and bottle.

 

[MaxStout]

A few years ago I had a couple infected batches in a row. It really messed with my confidence and I was discouraged for a while.

I replaced the bottling bucket and spigot. Those items had a lot of miles on them and they needed to go. No more problems after that. BTW, those plastic spigots are difficult to clean. After each use I remove it from the bucket, rinse it well and store it in a jar filled with Starsan until next use. From time to time replace the plastic tubing used on siphons, etc.

And +1 on sanitizing right before bottling. The Vinator is the best 20 bucks you'll spend for bottling.

 

[JosephN]

REPORT: 2 bottles of a cider I bottled 12 days ago had blown up today while I was at work. I'm assuming one of them actually blew up causing the other to break. This assumption is based on how the bottles where broken. One of them is still half full while the other has an obvious crack that could have started at the cap. This doesn't hold well to the thought of simply stirring up the priming sugar solution right before bottling.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1450822438.864152.jpg

 

[JosephN]

REPORT: I just got finished breaking down my spigot. I found that I was able to break it down further than I have in the past. After I broke it down I noticed some white crusty stuff between the translucent plastic and the red Open and closed valve. This crusty stuff might be the cause of my issues. In the past I have noticed a few air pockets visible between the translucent plastic an the red open and close valve and have wondered about stuff hiding in there. Below you will see a picture of the air pockets and a potential spot for wild bacteria to hide. Below that you will see a picture of my recent discovery of how far the spigots do breakdown for cleaning. From now on I will start breaking them down after every bottling session and soaking them in a cleaner and sanitizer until need it again.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1450824511.249284.jpg

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1450824523.933620.jpg

 

[JosephN]

A few years ago I had a couple infected batches in a row. It really messed with my confidence and I was discouraged for a while.

I replaced the bottling bucket and spigot. Those items had a lot of miles on them and they needed to go. No more problems after that. BTW, those plastic spigots are difficult to clean. After each use I remove it from the bucket, rinse it well and store it in a jar filled with Starsan until next use. From time to time replace the plastic tubing used on siphons, etc.

And +1 on sanitizing right before bottling. The Vinator is the best 20 bucks you'll spend for bottling.

Yeah I have been feeling really bad about anyone even trying any of my beer. I'm kind of a perfectionist, like I'm sure many of us home brewers can be, and subpar beer is not acceptable to get to others.

Check out the picture above and I'm wondering if you break your spigots down this far? I just now noticed this was possible. It might make it a lot easier later on when we go to clean them.

I'm gonna have to look into that Vinator

 

[MaxStout]

Yeah I have been feeling really bad about anyone even trying any of my beer. I'm kind of a perfectionist, like I'm sure many of us home brewers can be, and subpar beer is not acceptable to get to others.

Check out the picture above and I'm wondering if you break your spigots down this far? I just now noticed this was possible. It might make it a lot easier later on when we go to clean them.

I'm gonna have to look into that Vinator

Yep, that's what I do.

Hope this ends your infection problem!

 

[JosephN]

Update: I haven't had any issues since I started stirring the beer and priming sugar together very well, and since I got a new spigot and bottling wand. I also took your suggestions of trying to just clean my bottles as normal and skip my previous step of baking them. I got one of those spring loaded bottle washers that shoot sanitizer into the bottle right before filling my bottles. That method takes a bit longer during bottling but it ensures that my bottles are sanitized as they get filled and it has cut down on my overall time and electric bill. Thanks for your help and I'll check back with a longer term update for those that are interested.

Ps I'm now breaking my spigot all the way down and always soaking it in sanitizer until it's time to use it.

 

[iijakii]

Awesome, glad to hear that you're having nicely carbonated brews! Thanks for reporting back.