I had such a hard time capping with my red capper. I’ve bottled a bunch with it but this time it has a PITA. It kept getting stuck on the bottle after it crimped and I had to pull the handles up to get it to pop off. Never noticed this before. It also is leaving dents on the cap. It doesn’t help that the magnet isn’t flush with the plastic in the center of the bell. Am I doing something wrong or should I look for a new capper? I’m using plain gold caps for NB and Sam Adams bottles. Never had an issue before.
I just bottled my 3ed batch with the red capper a week ago today. My 1st batch seem to have capped pretty good - but my 2ed batch seem to have more caps which were off set on the bottle and some didn’t take much effort to remove from the bottle when opening them. I read somewhere about soaking the capper in Star San before capping and I tried it on my 3ed try - Things seem to go better than the last time - But the capper still locked onto some bottles more than others - But so far the caps seem to have locked on better than the last time I used the capper - I guess only time will tell.
Check the two metal jaws that fit under the lip of the bottle. One of the jaws may have moved out of position or is bent. The Super Agata bench capper works well on all bottles. Cheap variations are being advertised as the Super Agata though. The real one has the button for adjusting the mechanism to different height bottles.
Yeah I’m looking at picking up a bench capper. I noticed NB had a special price on the red twin capper though for $5.03. Regular price is $16.99. I wonder why the low price. I got mine with the essential brewing starter kit a while ago. I did look at the metal plates and didn’t notice any issues. Also noticed you can flip them around and buy a 29mm bell to crimp 29mm caps. I’ve only bottled 6 - 5 gallon batches with it.
Just remembered from a message on a forum, don’t remember which one. There had been a bad batch of red cappers on the market. A return may be possible if you haven’t had it very long.
One thing you might check is that the “silver bell” is screwed on tightly. Mine tends to loosen over time causing similar issues to what you’re describing (i.e. doesn’t want to release and leaves an indention on the cap.)
I’ll second that - I checked my capper before my last batch and it was a little loose - So I screwed it on till it was tight and soaked it in Star San for a while and this last batch capped better than before.
