Warning Regarding Big W PET Beer Bottles, and my Introduction to AHB

[pcqypcqy]

I've just had two PETs leak from the bottom, mess everywhere last night, and bottles near-empty but still pressurised. Which leads me to two questions:

After attending a few swaps, my stock of PETs is a mix. I bought Coopers ones initially, but how can I tell now the Coopers ones from the others? I think Coopers PETs have had more than one shape over the years. In other words - how can I tell which ones to ditch?

The immediate problem is that the two which failed yesterday leave me with just 22 for the Stanthorpe swap. When I bottled a month ago, I only had 24 caps, so bottled the remainder of the batch in glass tallies. Can I simply open the tallies, transfer the contents to good PETs and add 6g sugar to each? Or would I need to squirt in a bit more active yeast as well?

Geez I hate PETs!

Roger, did this happen to one of yours from the last swap as well?

Too late now for the upcoming swap but most of us in TooSOBA go fresh bottles for swaps. The Morgans ones at the shop have been ok I believe.

 

[evoo4u]

Roger, did this happen to one of yours from the last swap as well?

Yeah, I believe Earle had a bomb, but as far as I know, it was the only one of my 24 which failed. This leads me to believe it was just a one-off dud PET bottle and not a case of over-carbing. With my current batch for the swap, I've tried one of the glass tallies, and the level of carbonation is just right. For all my bottling I use a teaspoon of sugar (raw sugar) from a 1 tsp/5ml measuring spoon, which delivers 4.8g sugar into a tallie. So that's not an excessive amount.

Now in a previous thread, I posted a photo of two PETs, side by side, both filled to the normal level. One was (presumably) 740ml, the other weighed 150g less - so therefore probably only 600ml. But both my failed ones yesterday were the "full sized" ones.

So while Coopers say that their caps can be re-used, I'm swinging to the point of view that PET bottles are a one-use-only?

 

[TwoCrows]

I will PM you my address if you are only using PET bottles once, and their caps.

 

[Vini2ton]

The time and effort we spend creating our brews, in all our wonderous fashions and methods, surely warrants greater respect in packaging than PET bottles. They are the work of the devil and an aberation to our art I tell you. I'm amazed how we didn't all die by putting a teaspoon of white sugar in each big bottle to prime them and all without the surety of "calculatoooors"! The recycling bin is the best place for p,p,pet bottles.

 

[Bribie G]

Been using them for ten years, very few problems. Maybe six didn't gas up due to leaks out of many hundreds.

The big advantage of PET purpose made brewing bottles is that on bottling and priming, you hand-squeeze the beer right up to the rim, cap tightly, then as the secondary gas is produced it plumps out the bottle again to give you a pure CO2 headspace with no oxygen to stale the beer, apart from what got absorbed by the beer during the fill and hopefully consumed during bottle conditioning.

That's why I don't use glass anymore.

ed: the corollary to Vini2ton's comment is that nearly all the entrants in competitions, after applying advanced brewing skills then seem to throw all this under the bus and bottle in glass with a nice oxygen headspace then store away for months. Commercial breweries don't do this with glass, they flush and counter pressure fill so the bottle is oozing CO2 as they whack the cap on.

 

[wynnum1]

Are they PET i thought they had different plastic to stop oxygen penetration.

 

[Bribie G]

Yes. What I'm referring to is oxygen in the headspace, which is easily eliminated using PET but not glass.

 

[pcqypcqy]

Yeah, I believe Earle had a bomb, but as far as I know, it was the only one of my 24 which failed. This leads me to believe it was just a one-off dud PET bottle and not a case of over-carbing. With my current batch for the swap, I've tried one of the glass tallies, and the level of carbonation is just right. For all my bottling I use a teaspoon of sugar (raw sugar) from a 1 tsp/5ml measuring spoon, which delivers 4.8g sugar into a tallie. So that's not an excessive amount.

Now in a previous thread, I posted a photo of two PETs, side by side, both filled to the normal level. One was (presumably) 740ml, the other weighed 150g less - so therefore probably only 600ml. But both my failed ones yesterday were the "full sized" ones.

So while Coopers say that their caps can be re-used, I'm swinging to the point of view that PET bottles are a one-use-only?

I noticed with the July swap that more and more of the brands were getting cheaper and cheaper, where the base of the bottle was filling quite stiff/brittle compared to what PET should feel like, which is ductile and flexible. I think this is what happened with Earle's bottle of your beer, is that it couldnt' stretch with the pressure and just burst at the stiff point. It sounds like that might be what's happened to you again.

I've been leaning towards one use with PET's, and only using them for swaps / comp entries. The reason being that they are painful to clean (c.f. glass), and they seem to hold infections better as a result (tasting some of the swap beers from the last two swaps, and then again after I've tried to clean them and refill).

Totally with Bribie G though, so everything is in kegs for now. I plan to make up some custom bungs to allow me to counter pressure fill glass with my carb cap.

 

[Bribie G]

Wynnum, I believe they are laminated with a layer to prevent gases permeating.

 

[good4whatAlesU]

. . after applying advanced brewing skills then seem to throw all this under the bus and bottle in glass with a nice oxygen headspace then store away for months. Commercial breweries don't do this with glass, they flush and counter pressure fill so the bottle is oozing CO2 as they whack the cap on.

Home brewers can do this too with a counter pressure bottle filler. Cost $99 from memory.

Flush with CO2, fill from the bottom and cap on foam. It's a slightly messy process, but seems to work well.

 

[kaiserben]

I re-use PET indefinitely (will only chuck out once they are visibly a lot crappier than the rest of the bottles, or there has been infected beer in the bottle)

I've never had a leaker ... (I've had a few bottles out of many hundreds that didn't carb up at all due to, I assume, CO2 escaping somewhere around the cap).

But I do try my best to avoid the Big W bottles because - and I clean by filling each bottle with hot tap water and perc - hot tap water has made the necks of the Big W ones distort out of shape.

The Mangrove Jacks PET bottles are great.

 

[Bribie G]

Home brewers can do this too with a counter pressure bottle filler. Cost $99 from memory.

Flush with CO2, fill from the bottom and cap on foam. It's a slightly messy process, but seems to work well.

Along with numerous brewers on the forum I bought a CPBF during the CPBF craze of around 8 years ago. Never hear about them nowadays, they were a complete PITA and the tap mounted version wasn't much better. Maybe still a couple around.
Owned by brewers who have three arms.
Hobart maybe.

 

[Yuz]

I'm a noob and have started with PET's - 30 of Mangroves (750ml) and 30 of Coopers (740ml).

No issues with them so far, but instead of going to Glass, I went straight to kegging. Weighing up the cost of Glass + Capper + Washer / Dryer + caps + Time etc and it was a no brainer - two reconditioned kegs added up to about $160. Co2 gear I had to get anyway for the 'Saurus.

PET's are still in use but I only bottle 23L batches. 21L batches are for kegging. Works so far I'll keep using PETs long term, I think they're great. If only there were diff colour caps available.

 

[good4whatAlesU]

Along with numerous brewers on the forum I bought a CPBF during the CPBF craze of around 8 years ago. Never hear about them nowadays, they were a complete PITA and the tap mounted version wasn't much better. Maybe still a couple around.
Owned by brewers who have three arms.
Hobart maybe.

Agreed they are a PITA - but I seem to get mine to work pretty well. . got to be patient, hold the mouth right.

I do come from a very small town though .. 3 kids in my class (guaranteed a ribbon on sports day). That could have something to do with it.

 

[SnailAle]

I noticed you chucked the little trade mark symbol on your IPA attempt, planning on taking her commercial?

 

[manticle]

Along with numerous brewers on the forum I bought a CPBF during the CPBF craze of around 8 years ago. Never hear about them nowadays, they were a complete PITA and the tap mounted version wasn't much better. Maybe still a couple around.
Owned by brewers who have three arms.
Hobart maybe.

Oi.




Two arms, two heads, just like everybody else.

 

[evoo4u]

Update:

I compared my two failed PETS with a reputable one at my LHBS. My two duds were not Morgans or Mangrove Jacks, and I don't think they were the cheapy ones from BigW either.

So I've sorted my stock of empties. 17 Morgans, and 40 also-rans. So 40 to the tip, another new carton of Morgans to make up the numbers, and another brew-day tomorrow to brew another Smoked Porter for the swap.

Who said this homebrewing lark was relaxing?

 

[GregMeady]

I have a couple of boxes of Morgans PET bottles. I usually have been bottling in glass, But every batch I like to sneak in a pet bottle or two at a couple of points through bottling. This gives to two samples, to squeeze to make sure its carbing and also as testers so I know 'when it feels about right' hahaha - then that batch is ready for

. Some take longer, some shorter period of time, hence the PET bottle samplers. Thats about the extent of my PET bottle usage, but I will say that having done this since a friend put me onto it, the beer in the PET bottle kinda performs differently from the same batch in glass. Just my observations, but hey...I'm a newbie and still trying to learn.

Whatever works for you & you feel comfortable with is good enough. Afterall it's your beer.

 

[Brewnicorn]

Update:

... So 40 to the tip...

Who said this homebrewing lark was relaxing?

That’s a **** deal man - sorry to hear it. I was about to get a bunch of new bottles for sharing with some Mates and storage so you’ve probably saved me some grief. I’d buy you a beer just for that!

 

[Hermies]

Alright, so Grass Clippings (Summer Ale) is almost finished fermentation. I Dry Hopped 20g of Cascade last night, and I'm aiming for Wednesday night to bottle. Here's my next question, I used 2 separate programs to calculate the quantity of Dextrose I would need to prime 21.5L (my estimation of total volume, possibly even 22L).
Brewers Friend Calculator (http://www.brewersfriend.com/beer-priming-calculator/) says that at a volume of 21.5L and CO2 of 2.5 and temp of 22°C I should be aiming for 213.1g of Dextrose.
Wort (Brewing App from Google Play store) says that with the same figures I should be putting in 264.2g of dextrose.

That's a significant difference, either being 24% too much, or being 19% less than I need.

How do I be more conclusive about priming dextrose quantities?

No wonder your bottles are splitting with that amount of priming sugar. Max amount I do is around 138gm per 22 - 23 lt for a fermentation temp of 18*C and for lagers around 145gm per 23lt at 12*C