Hi all,

Have brewed off and on for 20 years, but just got back into it after a long
layoff.

I recently "upgraded" from a hammer capper ( primitive but effective ) to
a 2 handled lever type capper.

This was bought second hand and has seen better days, but after it was
stripped down ,cleaned and lubricated it works fine.

It looks as though the three arms need to grip under the ring just below the
lip of the bottle, but each time I tried this they just sheared off the top
of the neck :-(

I can see that the wing nut at the top is used to adjust the height at which
the three arms grip the bottle's neck but as I've already managed to remove
the necks of four bottles, I'm obviously doing something wrong.

The capper is the brown handled one that was sold by Boots until they got
out of home brew in the UK some years ago.

Any advice welcomed.

Thanks in advance.

Cheers,

Nick.
Wales.

Are you using screw cap bottles? I know it has been mentioned several times
here(and I can see it myself comparing self-recycled screw cap bottles to
crown cap bottles I bought) that the glass on the twist cap bottle necks is
thinner, and more proneto breaking with one of htose two handle cappers.
Just a first guess there, coming from someone who still hasn't even bottled
his first batch yet. :)

Joel

"Nicholas Buckley" <nick_buckley@ntlworld.com> wrote in message
news:mRu4f.3560$6i4.602@newsfe7-gui.ntli.net...[color=blue]
> Hi all,
>
> Have brewed off and on for 20 years, but just got back into it after a
> long layoff.
>
> I recently "upgraded" from a hammer capper ( primitive but effective )
> to a 2 handled lever type capper.
>
> This was bought second hand and has seen better days, but after it was
> stripped down ,cleaned and lubricated it works fine.
>
> It looks as though the three arms need to grip under the ring just below
> the lip of the bottle, but each time I tried this they just sheared off
> the top of the neck :-(
>
> I can see that the wing nut at the top is used to adjust the height at
> which the three arms grip the bottle's neck but as I've already managed to
> remove the necks of four bottles, I'm obviously doing something wrong.
>
> The capper is the brown handled one that was sold by Boots until they got
> out of home brew in the UK some years ago.
>
> Any advice welcomed.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Nick.
> Wales.
>
>
>[/color]

Hi Joel,

No, I'm definitely using "proper" crown cap bottles.

Interesting point about glass thickness tho'.

I have been trying with small bottles, previously containing Belgian beer.

These do seem a bit on the thin side ( though those canny Belgians have
obviously worked out how to do it !! )

Here in the UK, beer bottles used by British brewers do seem to be made of
more substantial glass - maybe that's the answer ?

Cheers,

Nick

Is it a butterfly capper, or a stand-up capper?
I found the butterfly ones will break as many as
1 or 2 bottles per batch because often you don't
get it just perfectly perpendicular.

Hi Alan,

How would I know which one I've got ?

It's a hand held device, not one that's fixed to a bench.

Each arm operates a kind of lever arrangement and the cap is held by a
magnet on a kind of spring-loaded plunger.

After a few hours of imbibing, it could certainly resemble a butterfly ;-)

Cheers,

Nick.

"Alan McKay" <amckay@nospamsucka_neap.net> wrote in message
news:cxv4f.6590$5I2.24142@newscontent-01.sprint.ca...[color=blue]
> Is it a butterfly capper, or a stand-up capper?
> I found the butterfly ones will break as many as
> 1 or 2 bottles per batch because often you don't
> get it just perfectly perpendicular.[/color]

[email]nick_buckley@ntlworld.com[/email] wrote:
[color=blue]
> I'm obviously doing something wrong.[/color]

Most likely the trouble is that you're not kegging.

Bart

Alan McKay <amckay@nospamsucka_neap.net> writes:[color=blue]
> Is it a butterfly capper, or a stand-up capper?
> I found the butterfly ones will break as many as
> 1 or 2 bottles per batch because often you don't
> get it just perfectly perpendicular.[/color]

I'm always surprised by this, since I've *never* broken a bottle with
my butterfly capper (I usually don't use screw-caps, since I sometimes
get poor seals). Am I doing this differently than most folks?



--
Richard W Kaszeta
[email]rich@kaszeta.org[/email]
[url]http://www.kaszeta.org/rich[/url]

On 16 Oct 2005 14:08:30 -0500, Richard Kaszeta <rich@kaszeta.org>
wrote:
[color=blue]
>Alan McKay <amckay@nospamsucka_neap.net> writes:[color=green]
>> Is it a butterfly capper, or a stand-up capper?
>> I found the butterfly ones will break as many as
>> 1 or 2 bottles per batch because often you don't
>> get it just perfectly perpendicular.[/color]
>
>I'm always surprised by this, since I've *never* broken a bottle with
>my butterfly capper (I usually don't use screw-caps, since I sometimes
>get poor seals). Am I doing this differently than most folks?[/color]

I have been using the same red plastic butterfly capper that I got
with my original homebrewing kit. After nearly 150 batches, and
thousands of bottles, I don't think I ever broke a bottle putting a
cap on it.

Nick, I recommend that you buy yourself another capper. Maybe the one
you have is misaligned, or something.


Phil

======
visit the New York City Homebrewers Guild website:
[url]http://www.hbd.org/nychg[/url]

Phil wrote:[color=blue]
> I have been using the same red plastic butterfly capper that I got
> with my original homebrewing kit. After nearly 150 batches, and
> thousands of bottles, I don't think I ever broke a bottle putting a
> cap on it.[/color]

Wow! I only bottled for about 2 years but with the butterfly
I broke a bottle almost every batch, and once I bought the
bench capper after about a year I didn't break any.

But as Bart said the real problem is you aren't kegging ;-)

On Sun, 16 Oct 2005 17:48:54 -0400, Alan McKay
<amckay@nospamsucka_neap.net> wrote:
[color=blue]
>Phil wrote:[color=green]
>> I have been using the same red plastic butterfly capper that I got
>> with my original homebrewing kit. After nearly 150 batches, and
>> thousands of bottles, I don't think I ever broke a bottle putting a
>> cap on it.[/color]
>
>Wow! I only bottled for about 2 years but with the butterfly
>I broke a bottle almost every batch, and once I bought the
>bench capper after about a year I didn't break any.
>
>But as Bart said the real problem is you aren't kegging ;-)[/color]

I also keg, but most of my beer goes in bottles.

I'm hoping to put my bar together in the next day or two, with a two
line beer tower.

Life IS good.


Phil
======
visit the New York City Homebrewers Guild website:
[url]http://www.hbd.org/nychg[/url]