Temperature and Bottle Bombs

[Showdown]

So I just did a search on bottle bombs and scared myself silly.

I'm getting a nice pipeline of bottled beer, and have started storing beer in a room rather than my freezer chest/fermentor. The room is air-conditioned but on weekends the air-conditioning is set very high, and the room has the potential to reach mid-80's (I live in AZ). How much does temperature affect potential for bottle bombs? Is there any milestone (number of days) that once you're past you are safe?

These batches were all primed accordingly and at solid FG numbers. So I'm probably scaring myself. I guess domestic bottles of beer don't explode when you get them hot.

 

[blizz81]

I would say for the most part, the yeast is going to eat through as much simple sugar (whatever you're using to prime) as you give it and nothing more, regardless of temp. There's a slight chance certain aggressive yeasts may attenuate further / munch on the remaining sugars, moreso if you're a bit impatient with letting your beer finish and / or if you're using a yeast that takes a long time to finish, but even then unless you happen to be in that situation AND aggressively carb, you'll probably be fine and might just end up with a beer that may be a bit overcarbed for the style.

 

[VonAle]

I'm in AZ too. I store my fresh brews in a spare bedroom that varies between 78-82 degrees for the first 10-14 days after I bottle them.

No bombs yet !

After I've tried several and determined they are "ready", then I'll move them all into my beer fridge.

 

[Sailingeric]

If you are afraid, store your beer in a rubbermaid tote.. If it goes off, the mess will be contained.

 

[flars]

Bottle bombs are only likely if you bottled before fermentation was finished or you drastically over primed. Once the yeast has consumed the available priming sugars, pressure increases for carbonation cease to increase.

If there was some crud left in a bottle an infection could cause increasing pressures, but this is still independent of storage temperatures.

 

[C-Rider]

Had my second ever bomb. I brewed 18 bottles of a coffee stout and I condition them in 6packs in a temp controlled mini fridge. THe other day after having sampled quite a few I opened the fridge and saw and smelled the stout. Looking I saw stout on the bottom of the fridge and found one bottle where the bottom just cracked pretty clean away from the rest of the bottle. The 6 pack cardboard helps to keep the glass from flying.

 

[olotti]

Bottle bombs are only likely if you bottled before fermentation was finished or you drastically over primed. Once the yeast has consumed the available priming sugars, pressure increases for carbonation cease to increase.

If there was some crud left in a bottle an infection could cause increasing pressures, but this is still independent of storage temperatures.

This

 

[dwhite60]

In summer my house stays 78-80F. Don't have room for a separate beer cooler.

I've had two bottle bombs after 25 years of beer and mead making. Heard one of these go in the middle of the night. Kind of wondered what the sound was. I smelled it in the closet the nest morning. That's when I found the shards from the other one. Both of these were the same batch of mead which I thought had finished fermenting, but had not. I started venting the remaining bottles every few days and didn't have any further issues.

Seems the main issue with bottle bombs is too much priming sugar. Measure accurately.

All the Best,
D. White

 

[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

As others have said, as long as fermentation finished, there's no infection and you carbed properly you don't have to worry about higher temps creating bottle bombs. However, I have heard of flavor effects from storing beer at high temps. Not sure what temp is too high but I try not to let mine get above 80F for any extended time.