Hello all, ive been reading homebrew talk for a while now but this is my first time posting. Ive just recently finished my fourth batch of homebrew and for my first time I tried to brew without a secondary as I have seen many debates on the subject. The beer is a black ale with coffee which I left in primary for 2 weeks then added a musline bag of coffee for 2 days before racking to my bottling bucket. OG 1.046 FG 1.010. The other day I had a bottle explode in my closet after 6 days of conditioning (reused widmers brothers bottle, which I hadnt used before, they have also been the only bottles my capper has shattered as well, I feel they may be weak bottles). Upon cleaning my closet and shelves I inspected the beers and have noticed a sediment (mold??) on top of the beers aside from some usual yeast settlement on bottom. I decided to open one early for further inspection and had the worst gusher i have seen. Curious if this is the "gusher infection" and if the beer is trash or if it will settled down a bit over time? The top sediment seems to be in all the bottles which I rinsed clean in the dishwasher and then sanitized and scrubbed prior to bottling. Thanks for any help! Hope its not ruined coz it tasted great prior to bottling!
Possible Mold and Bottle Bomb
- Thread starter AnthonyJC
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Yes I did sanitized the bag. Could the coffee itself have caused an infection? Or is what I am seeing on top possible krauzen? Now that the initial gusher calmed down I drank a few sips of it (fingers crossed it wasnt bacteria) and it tastes pretty good for only a week of conditioning. A little green but no off flavors that I can tell.
There a varying opinions about sanitizing coffee beans. Some people rinse them in something like vodka, many people just toss them in with the thought that the acid content will ward off infection. I personally like to sanitize everything with the exception of dry hopping. However, I rarely add anything but dry hops.
Is the beer moldy or does it look like normal krauzan? Did you take a FG or was that the recipe value? Was the FG stable?
Is the beer moldy or does it look like normal krauzan? Did you take a FG or was that the recipe value? Was the FG stable?
I also have to wonder about the fg being stable. I would also like to know how much priming sugar you used. The two could be a bottle fatal combo. If the yeast is still alive and hungry and you add to much sugar then cap. Kapow.......
flars
Well-Known Member
You said you sanitized then scrubbed the dish washer rinsed bottles or did you scrub then sanitize the bottles. Need some additional information on your sanitizer and the process before bottling.
Scrubbing after sanitizing may have negated the effectiveness of the sanitizer and introduced an infection in these bottles.
Scrubbing after sanitizing may have negated the effectiveness of the sanitizer and introduced an infection in these bottles.
I rinse all my bottles as I finish drinking from them and store them in a box until bottle day where I run them through the dishwasher then scrub with sani water and then rinse. Allow time to dry as I get set up and rack to my bottling bucket. I didnt santize the coffee beans because as you said many people mentioned it being unecessarg although I see now they should probably get a vodka soak. I believe that the particules on top may be sediment from either coffee beans or hop pellets as it looks kind of leaf like. As I mentioned this was my first time not doing a secondary and I feel it would have been benifical to have done so with this beer.
The OG and FG were my own readings. There was no airlock activity for several days and the FG reflected the recipes so I assumed it was good to bottle. I used 4.5 of priming sugar. I had thought it seemed like it could be a bit much but it is what the recipe called for, but the recipe didnt account for an additon of coffee that was my own modification. I am not sure if there are extra fermentable sugars in coffee?
As I have refrigerated bottles they are no longer exploding or gushing but for safty sake 3 days ago I was up to I believe 7 bottles that have exploded so I found advice on another blog post to open all the bottles and recap to release excess co2. I did so and lost about a quarter to a 3rd of each bottle but it is better then fearing for myself and my pets everytime I open the closet. I have drank 3 of the beers and they have not made me sixk nor do they seem to have any off flavors that I can recognize but I am a beginner and have never used this recipe before so I dont really know what id be looking for anyway.
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