Ginger Beer and Exploding Bottles

[laurence]

Had a nightmare week this week, a bottle of ginger beer exploded in the house , causing glass to embed in the walls and break a glass pane in a door luckily nobdy was injured. Need some real convincing to start brewing ginger beer again. Any advice on the type of bottles, have been using Magnier cider bottles and caping the bottles. Maybe it was something that I did wrong.

Cheers

Laurence

[Andy]

Whoa! Good to hear no-one was hurt!

Plastic bottles might be a better bet for short term storage ?

[DRB]

Go to T'''''o, buy some own brand soda water water or any other carbonated flavour you fancy ,drink and then you can use them and at a cost of 90 pence per 3 bottles.

[PieOPah]

Definately use PET bottles - they can withstand a lot more pressure than glass bottles..

Homemade GB is notorious for creating bottle bombs. I have only ever made it the once and I have never seen a plastic bottle baloon so much. Made a nice ping when you flicked it though (like flicking crystal). The bottles had stretched rather thin and couldn't be used again. t also took me about an hour to open (to avoid gushers) letting out a little CO2 at a time.

The next time I decide to make GB, I think that after bottling I will leave the lid loosely capped for the first 24 hours. This will hopefully mean that when I tighten it, the build up of CO2 won't be as much.

Also, I would advise putting in the fridge at least 12 hours before you plan on opening (this is so the CO2 is dissolved in the Ginger Beer more easily - results in less to explode out when you open it!)

[Frothy]

after bottling allow a couple of days for bottle carbonation then you can stick them in the fridge and the yeast will go dormant.

Those over-inflated PET bottles are great fun if you've got an air-rifle

Matt