I’ve read in a few places on the board here that bottling in growlers is a risky proposition. I presume this is due to the nature of the capping mechanism.
I’me new to all of this, but have bottled at least a portion of all of the extract batches that I’ve brewed in growlers w/o issue.
Can some folks provide some commentary…pros/cons, etc. of using growlers to bottle?
Thanks all,
Bob
I asked this same question a week or so ago. You will have people say no, you will also say people say that they have had no problem. I even had someone say that the growler broke on them. In the end i decided to play it safe and put my beer in 22s.
I have done it - but I think the biggest concern others put forth the other day was that they aren’t rated for the pressure and you are risking the possibility of a “bottle bomb” exploding amongst your stash of beer - or worse.
Like I said, I have done it, probably won’t do it in the future.
Thanks for the commentary.
The skeptic in me is inclined to continue to do it anyway…I wonder how many people have actually had one blow up on them vs. just repeat the warning and end up with an overblown sense of risk?
I think of it this way… The local microbrewerys that sell growlers put carbonated beer in them (obviously) and the carbonation stays in there until the container is opened…thus, isn’t the contents under pressure and thus, couldn’t one fairly conclude that they are indeed “rated” for pressure?
What am I missing? Is there something about the slowly building pressure that comes from bottle conditioning that somehow makes it different?
Their beer is already bottle conditioned and then bottled. The pressure their growlers see will not see the same pressure that your bottle conditioned beer will see. This is what I have gathered.
I mean it is already carbonated.
Also - their beer is definitely “finished.” Every homebrewer has ended up with “overcarbonated” beer at one point or another. Could be because of a little to much sugar, uneven distribution of carbonating sugar, the beer still had a few more points of gravity to go when it was bottled, infection, etc. If that would happen in a growler . . . . that would increase the likelihood that you could have one blow up.
A microbrewery putting carbonated beer in a growler and putting the cap on is not the same thing as a fermenting beer under pressure that is putting the CO2 into solution as it finishes fermenting.
Sounds good. Thanks guys.
[quote=“HaleBrewer”]I wonder how many people have actually had one blow up on them vs. just repeat the warning and end up with an overblown sense of risk?
What am I missing? Is there something about the slowly building pressure that comes from bottle conditioning that somehow makes it different?/quote]
I’ve had one explode. They’re rated for 15 or 20 psi (I can’t remember exactly, but it’s on the side of the cases). Cold, carbonated beer will be less than that. Carbonating a beer at room temperature requires about 25-35 psi.
