Champagne Crownies?

[wee stu]

Just a little thing that has been bugging me for ages.

I bottle a fair proportion of my brews into champagne bottles (needs a larger crown and a bigger bell for the capper, but bloody strong bottles and works well - "Wee Stu's Brury" label looks good on them too).

What I want to know is why do these corkers have a crown seal top??

PS - it's all right if you have to phone a friend b4 answering!

 

[RobW]

Maybe to give the wire something to grip onto - although I would have thought the lower ridge would do most of the work. Tradition?

 

[Wax]

I would think I has to do with the fact that most bottles, champagne or otherwise, are made for the mass production boys. If you've ever seen a bottling plant in action the bottles are often swung under the conveyor. They need a lip at the top to give the conveyor something to hold onto, not actually for crown seals.

 

[Asher]

Champaign is bottle conditioned with yeast. during this stage the bottle is capped with a crown seal as it it cheaper and discarded when yeast is removed from the bottle. They remove the yeast by turning the bottles upside down and once the yeast has settled they freeze the neck, remove the crown seal and pop the slug of frozen yeast/champaign out, top up the bottle and cork for sale/ageing......

Asher for now....

Dom Perignon bottles actually have a standard beer size crown seal and a smaller cork... there you go

 

[wee stu]

Asher, I'm impressed.

And now I can save money on the crown seals by just buying Dom Perignon.

 

[Guest Lurker]

Well done Asher, I've always wondered.

Many of my champagne bottles are not methode champaignois though, I'm pretty sure Passion Pop is not bottle fermented with the lees removed. I guess they use the crown top bottles anyway since they are readily available.

 

[Asher]

Yep If you make it look like the real thing....

I've got a mate who owns an upmarket restaurant, he sells a shite load of Champaign.... and to top it off he gets his dish pigs to de-label and clean them for me to!!!!!

Nothing like rocking up to a party with a couple of magnums of hefeweizen under the arm.....

Asher for now

 

[Boots]

if anyone's interested I have one of the Bell's to do this (screws onto any bench capper I belive) which I haven't used in ages (came across some normal bottles).

If someone wants it they can have it (if you live in adelaide, I'll swap it for a bottle of HomeBrew )

Let me know, I can probably post it if you're not in Adelaide......

Boots

 

[PostModern]

if anyone's interested I have one of the Bell's to do this (screws onto any bench capper I belive) which I haven't used in ages (came across some normal bottles).

If someone wants it they can have it (if you live in adelaide, I'll swap it for a bottle of HomeBrew )

Let me know, I can probably post it if you're not in Adelaide......

Boots

Boots, I'll take you up on that, if I may. Can pay you some $$ for postage if you like. Was going to buy one as I have been saving bubbly bottles for bottle aging Belgian Strong Ales.

PM me pls

 

[Boots]

Sold

 

[wee stu]

age article

We might even be seeing the emergence of the crownie on legit champagne. If nothing else it shows Ashers's definitive post was just that.....definitive.

 

[devilsaltarboy]

Champaign is bottle conditioned with yeast. during this stage the bottle is capped with a crown seal as it it cheaper and discarded when yeast is removed from the bottle. They remove the yeast by turning the bottles upside down and once the yeast has settled they freeze the neck, remove the crown seal and pop the slug of frozen yeast/champaign out, top up the bottle and cork for sale/ageing......

Asher for now....

Dom Perignon bottles actually have a standard beer size crown seal and a smaller cork... there you go

Now the question I would ask then is why do wine bottles not have this pseudo crown seal neck? Has anyone out there bottled beer in normal wine bottles with rubber or normal corks. I have a shit load of wine bottles and champagne bottles I want to use, so I get a champagne capper for those but what about the wine bottles.
Peter
PS if my msg doesnt appear in right place letme know since this is my first post

 

[Hoops]

devilsaltarboy

As I am not a wine/champagne drinking I can only guess, so anyone else please correct me.
Wine is conditioned in wooden casks not bottle conditioned so it is filled from the barrel and most of the yeast should be settled out or filtered when bottling, so there would be no need to use a cap in the process described by Asher.
I would think that the lip on the champagne bottle also serves as a point to secure the cork with wire so it cant pop off with the carbonation pressure, hence no need for the lip on wine bottles.
I also think that as wine is not carbonated the bottles are not designed to hold pressure so thay may not be the best idea. If you can find a way to secure the cork it may work though, worth a try if they're just going to be ditched.

Hoops

 

[Jesmol]

Easy answer in wine bottles are not pressure vessels. Most will explode once pressure gets to around 1.5~2 bar.

 

[wee stu]

Experimented once with a wine bottle with stelvin (screw top) lid. But I wasn't game to prime the bottle and wasn't bulk priming at the time. Given 4 to 6 weeks there was some gentle carbonation present, but don't plan to repeat the experiment for the reasons Jesmol gives.

 

[Rod]

You are completely correct Asher.
I use champange bottles for stout and ginger beer
You can buy the bigger caps at the HBS

Rod