Major Canning Issues - Help Needed!

[scottst34]

I really need some advice on how to fix my foaming issues because I’m out of ideas.

I’m using a SS Brewtech 20-gallon brewmaster edition bright tank to carbonate seltzer style products made with 6%-11% fruit juice. I’m able to fill the first 20-25 cans, but then the amount of foam increases dramatically to the point cans are almost entirely foam.

Here is my process: Mix and chill the ingredients to about 33-34 and pressurize to roughly 12-14 psi in the headspace for about 2 days until the pressure stabilizes. I then connect to my xpressfill 2200 filler.

During the time that I am filling, I turn up the CO2 through the carb stone to backfill pressure in the tank and prevent CO2 breakout as I am filling the cans. I have tried using both a 5ft 3/8" filling tube and a 25ft. 3/8" filling tube with no significant difference. I also check the temperature of the liquid once it reaches the can, and it is still around 33 degrees.

The surprising thing is that after this major foaming begins, I test the liquid from the sampling port. It will come out as straight foam as well. This makes me assume that the source of the issue is inside the tank and not from my filling process.

Last time this happened I decided to shut the butterfly valve and let the liquid sit for a day before testing the liquid from the sampling port again. A day later, it was still just straight foam despite the sampling port being below the level of the liquid.

I am making 19-gallon batches and end up with 3-4 gallons max of usable product. Any thoughts or recommendations on how to fix this issue?

 

[BAF]

The carbstone jumps out at me as problematic. Why are you using one? If your seltzer is carbonated, then it's not going to de-carbonate if you hold the tank at a constant pressure. By pushing your makeup CO2 through a stone, you're just over-carbonating, so it doesn't surprise me that it gradually gets more foamy.

 

[Golddiggie]

When I fill cans off of conical (fully carbonated via a stone as well), I remove the stone from the setup and use the gas inlet port in the lid to maintain pressure inside conical while extracting. I also use a counter pressure can filler, with about a 2psi pressure difference between the can and conical. I found that works best and reduces excess foaming when filling cans. Going with a larger pressure difference resulted in MORE foam in the cans.

Since it doesn't look like your filler is counter pressure, stop putting CO2 through the stone when you're filling cans. You could also try getting a single station counter pressure filler to see if that solves the rest of your issues. I'm using the Tapcooler setup for my system (current version, with mounting hardware I had to fabricate since they abandoned people wanting a true stand alone option).

 

[Bobby_M]

Inserting small CO2 bubbles into the tank via the stone while filling is completely wrong. Small bubbles act as nucleation points to break more CO2 out of solution (it's not from overcarbonation). You should be adding makeup CO2 through the lid port. The stone is specifically for achieving the initial carbonation.

12-14 psi into the headspace (not through the stone) for 2 days will not really achieve any significant carbonation. If you do put it through the stone, you'll get to about 2.8 volumes of CO2 but that is nowhere near what seltzer is usually carbed to. The user manual for that filler suggests using 2-4psi for the filling operation. I suspect that's a little low, but that's what the manufacturer recommends.