# Bottling in champagne bottles



## RegBadgery (11/12/02)

With the festive season approaching there'll be loads of champagne and sparkling wine bottles in the recycling tubs. I like these as they're very sturdy and well suited to any highly carbonated brews.

If you have a bench capper with a removable capping bell you can make use of these bottles by purchasing a tirage bell. Though available at many homebrew stores, the best price I've found was via Grain and Grape in Victoria - around 6-7 dollars (as opposed to up to $18 at some other outlets). The crown seals cost a little more than regular.

cheers
reg


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## Boots (12/12/02)

I actually do this myself - I'm running out of longnecks, and hate cleaning twice as many stubbies :angry: I'm also yet to try plastic bottles.

Probably about a quarter of all the bottles I use now a champagne bottles, coz they're so easy to source. They also look good when you bring them out of the fridge.

Unfortunately I don't have a bench capper as in your suggestion RegBadgery, so I bought the larger Tirage (didn't know that's what it's called) bell, and screwed it onto some cut off broom stick (yeah I know - dodgey :unsure: ) like the old handle cappers. Because the bottles are so strong, I haven't had any problems with chipped bottles, and so no reason why I would.

I got my bell from the HBS on Payneham Rd (nth east homebrew i think it's called near the maid and magpie) for around $10-$12 i think, but that was a few years back.

Cheers


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## Kumamoto_Ken (2/1/15)

Necro bump.

I recently purchased a tirage bell and crown seals, and have been collecting a variety of sparkling wine bottles with a view to bottling some strong Belgian brews in them in the coming months.
Rightly or wrongly we (SWMBO mostly) seem to have acquired a number of empty Riccadonna bottles and if I can I'd like to use them. They're not a standard shape, they have a relatively long neck and I am wondering if that'll cause any problems with using the bottles. 

I was thinking it might impact the pour a bit. If I use a standard bottler and allow the usual ullage is there any reason not to use these?


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## spog (2/1/15)

I can't see any probs with using them, cap them correctly and your set like jelly.
I am guessing you want to use these bottles for presentation/ bung a nice label on them,or simply why waste them.
As for the pour,with a long neck on them a slow pour should sort that issue.


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## Milk-lizard84 (2/1/15)

I'm looking at doing more of this. Been saving the la sirene bottles I've been getting. They are just 375ml champagne bottles. They look nice and are good for well carbed saisons.


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## JDW81 (2/1/15)

Kumamoto_Ken said:


> Necro bump.
> 
> I recently purchased a tirage bell and crown seals, and have been collecting a variety of sparkling wine bottles with a view to bottling some strong Belgian brews in them in the coming months.
> Rightly or wrongly we (SWMBO mostly) seem to have acquired a number of empty Riccadonna bottles and if I can I'd like to use them. They're not a standard shape, they have a relatively long neck and I am wondering if that'll cause any problems with using the bottles.
> ...


Totally fine to use these. I've got a dozen of them with various brews in them.

I almost exclusively use champagne bottles for my beers.

JD


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## Kumamoto_Ken (2/1/15)

Good stuff, I'll use 'em. Thanks for the responses.


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## mje1980 (2/1/15)

I'm a champas bottle fan as well. Plastic corks and cages are so easy to use, and as someone mentioned they're great for highly carbed beers.


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## Tahoose (2/1/15)

Massive fan here also, most of my case swap beers were in champagne bottles as I generally find them easier to source. 

If you think about it you use less caps anyway than if you use stubbies, unless you have a solid longneck collection.


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## drtomc (3/1/15)

Me too. I also have a corker - for putting the champagne corks or Belgian corks in, which I'm happy to loan out for day loans to anyone local.

My 2c is to observe that there is significant variation in the height of champagne punts, and if like me, you stack boxes of bottles, then it's worth being slightly picky and getting bottles of matching heights so your boxes stack. If you're not too proud to scavenge from restaurant/bar recycling bins, they're easy to get hold of, and I've never had one explode.

T.


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## bigmacthepunker (3/1/15)

I'm savaging at the caravan park at the moment. Has anybody had any issues with cleaning due the hump at bottom?. I want to bottle my Saison when done.


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## crowmanz (3/1/15)

Hmm I might have to have a look at my 2 old school op shop cappers to see if I can modify them, I have a steady supply of champagne and sparkling bottles from the GFs folks who are big on the French stuff.


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## Adr_0 (3/1/15)

yeah I've done this for the first time with the saison I just did. worked absolutely great with the 29mm tirage caps vs the normall 22mm caps. I think I paid $10-15 for the bell but it has worked really well.

the only thing is if you're looking into the tirage bell + tirage caps, the caps didn't fit over the top of a few Belgian bottles (previously corked) e.g. L'oreffe, Du Bocq saison, and probably the Chimays. The l'Achouffe blond/golden bottles work great though as these are obviously capped already.


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## slcmorro (3/1/15)

Kumamoto_Ken said:


> Necro bump.


Holy crap. A 13 year old necro bump! That's some kinda record.


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## hoppinmad (3/1/15)

slcmorro said:


> Holy crap. A 13 year old necro bump! That's some kinda record.



And 10 years since the op'er has visited the site!


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## spog (3/1/15)

HoppinMad said:


> And 10 years since the op'er has visited the site!


A Champagne cork from an over carbed bottle between the eyes maybe.


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## Adr_0 (3/1/15)

spog said:


> A Champagne cork from an over carbed bottle between the eyes maybe.


More likely the DMS/botulism double from no-chilling...

Before I moved house I had a bit of a bad experience with a wheat beer carbed to 3.5vol or so and some Burleigh bottles. I should have known better. They look amazing and contain great beer but I really can't recommend them for homebrew. Most other bottles are ok for the majority of styles but wheat beers and Belgians are best (if carbonated properly, i.e. pretty bloody high) in champagne bottles I'm starting to think. Will definitely be hoarding them from here on out for these styles.


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## mje1980 (3/1/15)

That's why the plastic corks are so easy to use. They allow for small variations in neck diameter no problems. They are nowhere near as fancy as real champagne corks though, that would be seriously ******* cool whipping out a brett porter in a corked champagne bottle.


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## mje1980 (3/1/15)

Adr_0 said:


> More likely the DMS/botulism double from no-chilling...
> 
> Before I moved house I had a bit of a bad experience with a wheat beer carbed to 3.5vol or so and some Burleigh bottles. I should have known better. They look amazing and contain great beer but I really can't recommend them for homebrew. Most other bottles are ok for the majority of styles but wheat beers and Belgians are best (if carbonated properly, i.e. pretty bloody high) in champagne bottles I'm starting to think. Will definitely be hoarding them from here on out for these styles.


My last 2 saisons I bottled into champagne bottles at 8g/litre. I was still a little worried about too much carb, but then I researched champagne carbonation levels and they add something like 16g per bottle. I don't stress now, even with funky beers that may continue to ferment over a long period.



I'm slowly replacing all my bottles with these. Need to hit up a restaurant or something. 

How cool are the 330ml champagne bottles? I've got a few boon Kriek ones. Sensational beer and you get a bottle too


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## mje1980 (3/1/15)

Wonder if there'd be any way to do an ahb bulk buy on the small champagne bottles?


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## Kumamoto_Ken (13/2/15)

Thanks again for all the positive advice gents...I went ahead and bottled my saison in a variety of sparkling wine bottles.
It's come up brilliantly...I won't look back!

Credit to SWMBO for emptying all the bottles of their original contents!


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## Adr_0 (13/2/15)

Beauty! Nice one!


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## Adr_0 (13/2/15)

As mje said, you can go to 3-4 volumes without a hint of drama, ie with a lot of headroom. Don't be shy.  maybe not 4 volumes for a porter though...


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## anthonyUK (14/2/15)

Nice one Ken.
You getting hooked on Saisons?


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## MaltyHops (14/2/15)

Adr_0 said:


> ... but wheat beers and Belgians are best (if carbonated properly, i.e. pretty bloody high) in champagne bottles I'm starting to think. ...


The major reason I bottle in sparkling wine bottles is their extra strength giving extra safety margin against bottle bombs for normal beers. The way I see it, if you then push the carbonation level higher because you have a stronger bottle, it could mean a potentially more powerful bottle bomb ... something to think about?


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## Kumamoto_Ken (15/2/15)

anthonyUK said:


> Nice one Ken.
> You getting hooked on Saisons?


Hi Anthony..hooked might be going a bit far, but it's a style I am enjoying, no doubt.

Made one last summer and was so unaware of how it was meant to taste I thought it might have been infected (didn't stop me drinking them all mind you).
Have made two more this summer and they're going down very nicely.

Hope all's well with you.


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## skb (25/11/15)

I am thinking of champagne plastic corks for my sour but worried about air ingress anybody know if there are issues


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## mje1980 (25/11/15)

I use plastic for all my funky/sour beers. Easy to use and no problems so far.


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## pajs (25/11/15)

I make sparkling wine and it is under crown seal. Not much of a fan of plastic corks for reliability of fit. Zork SPK closures the best of the plastic options. If you are dead keen on a cork seal option, I'd suggest Diam sparkling corks and a bench corker. But I'm happy with crown seals.

This thread has got me thinking though about using sparkling wine bottles for my beers. Not a bad idea. I'm about to do an American Wheat with a saison yest, so that could be a good candidate for a change of bottle type.


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## skb (25/11/15)

The only reason I am concerned with crown is I understand there corrode over time


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## pajs (25/11/15)

skb said:


> The only reason I am concerned with crown is I understand there corrode over time


Champagne bottle crown seals are pretty much inert and spend long times in direct contact with high-acid wine during the aging process. The standard approach with champagne process has the bottled wine under crown seal all the way until being disgorged, topped, labelled and released. So only sees a cork at the end of the process.


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## klangers (25/11/15)

MaltyHops said:


> The way I see it, if you then push the carbonation level higher because you have a stronger bottle, it could mean a potentially more powerful bottle bomb ... something to think about?


Completely correct. There will be a higher amount of stored strain energy in the bottle which gets released when/if it eventually explodes.

Incidentally, the bump at the bottom of the bottle is to provide additional strength under pressure.


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## fraser_john (25/11/15)

Just remember that for VicBrew 2015 there was a "no champagne bottles" rule ... not sure if it will apply to 2016 and beyond.

Aside from that, big fan of using champagne bottles.


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## Batz (25/11/15)

skb said:


> The only reason I am concerned with crown is I understand there corrode over time


Dip them in bottle wax, looks cool as well.


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## mje1980 (25/11/15)

MaltyHops said:


> The major reason I bottle in sparkling wine bottles is their extra strength giving extra safety margin against bottle bombs for normal beers. The way I see it, if you then push the carbonation level higher because you have a stronger bottle, it could mean a potentially more powerful bottle bomb ... something to think about?


As mentioned before, home brewers of champagne add roughly 15g to each champagne bottle. Im quite comfortable carbing beers on the higher side in champagne bottles


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## pajs (25/11/15)

Worth keeping in mind that not all sparkling wine bottles are designed to take the same pressures. Rough rule of thumb is heavier glass for higher pressures. The medium weight bottles I use for sparkles are rated to 5 g/v but heavier ones can give you a 7 volumes rating. These are 750ml.


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## Mr B (25/11/15)

I thought the bottles were designed so that the bottoms blow out rather then the whole bottle exploding and taking out adjacent bottles in the stack.

I saw it on a show once (one time at band camp)


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## skb (25/11/15)

fraser_john said:


> Just remember that for VicBrew 2015 there was a "no champagne bottles" rule ... not sure if it will apply to 2016 and beyond.
> 
> Aside from that, big fan of using champagne bottles.


Wow what a stupid rule somebody from a big corporate is on that organising committee


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## Mardoo (25/11/15)

Interesting deduction.


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## Blind Dog (25/11/15)

skb said:


> Wow what a stupid rule somebody from a big corporate is on that organising committee


No it isn't. They don't fit in standard crates which makes them much harder to store, move and sort. With 600+ entries anything to save a little time and effort is vital to get the comp done and dusted in 2 days.

And no I'm not on the committee, just stewarded and hugely grateful that the bottles were sorted and ordered in crates on the day


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## pajs (26/11/15)

Could use milk crates, perhaps?


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## skb (26/11/15)

Blind Dog said:


> No it isn't. They don't fit in standard crates which makes them much harder to store, move and sort. With 600+ entries anything to save a little time and effort is vital to get the comp done and dusted in 2 days.
> 
> And no I'm not on the committee, just stewarded and hugely grateful that the bottles were sorted and ordered in crates on the day


 I hate to admit it but it sounds like my comment was uninformed so I there is a logical reason. For sours however it would be good to have an exception


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## fraser_john (26/11/15)

skb said:


> <snip> I there is a logical reason. For sours however it would be good to have an exception


 There is whole discussion on the VicBrew 2015 thread somewhere about it. One reason I had no entries for this year as I like champagne bottles, but, now having run a comp myself (with others in Geelong Craft Brewers Top 5 Shootout), I can somewhat understand the concerns about crates, if they have already a bulk of crates purchased and available, why go buy a bunch of new ones to fit the odd % of people using champagne bottles, it is both an expense and a hassle.

Comps are a massive undertaking, usually by a limited number of people, to organise. They want to make it easier on themselves whilst catering for the majority. Fair enough.


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## kaiserben (26/11/15)

So if you wanted to bottle a big, highly carbonated beer for a comp what other options are there? 

I was looking at Leffe Blonde bottles, but they look incredibly thin.


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## contrarian (26/11/15)

There's always plastic. Should hold the higher carb and not a complete disaster if it doesn't. Lacks the romance of a champagne bottle though...


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## Matplat (26/11/15)

I'm living on the edge, I just bottled some hefe in no-refill twist top bottles to approx 3 vols. :super:


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## mje1980 (26/11/15)

Hefe is fine, as it should carb to what you've calcd and no more. Probably drink it fairly soon as well. With a sour/Brett beer, it will be in that bottle for a long time, and you never quite know how far it will carbonate.


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