Bottle or Capper Issue

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rugbylad87

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Hope you guys can help, Purchased 500ml glass bottles and a bottle capper to bottle my beer (not from the same place). When the bottles arrived I noticed that they have almost a double lip on the head/neck. Tried the bottle capper on these bottles and I can't get seem to get a tight seal on them. Wonder if it was just a bad capper I purchased so tried that on a brew dog 330ml bottle and that caps perfectly.
So I'm wondering if I have purchased the wrong glass bottles or the wrong bottle capper, or a mixure of both. Hope the attached pics explain the bottle/neck issue
 

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There is nothing wrong with your capper. The BrewDog bottle has the perfect shape collar for hand capping. With those style of bottles you get that ring dent on the cap. That's the perfect seal. The other one you have will be a nightmare to cap. It is possible but you have to wiggle the capper and tilt from side to side to get the seal. It can be dangerous. I have snapped the neck off quite a few of those bottles. Do yourself a favour and get rid of them. However, if you decide to persist with them, make sure the bottle is anchored on a tea towel and be VERY cautious when capping. But in all honesty, it isn't worth the hassle.
 
Probably not the time to tell you, but there are two different sizes of cap!

The 26mm size is the most common but there is also a 29mm cap available.

The bell on the capper is designed to fit a certain size of cap on a certain size and type of bottle.

From the photographs, both bottle necks seem to be the same diameter (which you should confirm by using a calliper) and the one on the left (with the dent in the centre of the cap) is fitted perfectly. This is due to the design of your capper and the design of the bottle neck. The capper is designed to grab hold of the bottle at the elbow beneath the top and allow you to pull down the capper and set the cap.

The lack of this elbow on the other bottle (the one on the right) means that the capper has nothing to hold on to. As a result, there will be no "dent" on the top of the cap and you will get a very loose fit.

In synopsis, you have probably bought the wrong capper for the two different types of bottle. Assuming that the diameter of the necks are the same and that the caps are the correct size then both bottles could be properly capped with a bench capper, where the pressure to fit the cap comes from above.

Here's an example ...

https://www.selections.com/home-bre...MI_JqWrP7N4AIVyZ3tCh3yvQrTEAYYCCABEgJt0vD_BwE

This machine is for 26mm caps but some cappers are supplied with bells for both 26mm and 29mm caps.

Hope this helps!
 
It is difficult to tell from the photo if it is a 26 or a 29. But some of those tight, double lipped bottles are just so difficult to cap. An example is a Corona bottle. It's a 26mm but the shape of the neck gives you nothing to work with. I had to use one out of desperation and it was a right pain in the ****.
 
rugbylad87 said:
Hope you guys can help, Purchased 500ml glass bottles and a bottle capper to bottle my beer (not from the same place). When the bottles arrived I noticed that they have almost a double lip on the head/neck. Tried the bottle capper on these bottles and I can't get seem to get a tight seal on them. Wonder if it was just a bad capper I purchased so tried that on a brew dog 330ml bottle and that caps perfectly.
So I'm wondering if I have purchased the wrong glass bottles or the wrong bottle capper, or a mixure of both. Hope the attached pics explain the bottle/neck issue
Click to expand...

Phildo is right, I had the same problem and noticed when using lagunitas bottles that they wouldn’t take the cap, on inspection it’s because they have the same design as yours which prevents the hand capper from being able to grip properly. My other bottles are like the brew dog ones and cap easily. As dutto says, a bench style capper would probably solve the problem.
 
Dutto said:
Probably not the time to tell you, but there are two different sizes of cap!

The 26mm size is the most common but there is also a 29mm cap available.

The bell on the capper is designed to fit a certain size of cap on a certain size and type of bottle.

From the photographs, both bottle necks seem to be the same diameter (which you should confirm by using a calliper) and the one on the left (with the dent in the centre of the cap) is fitted perfectly. This is due to the design of your capper and the design of the bottle neck. The capper is designed to grab hold of the bottle at the elbow beneath the top and allow you to pull down the capper and set the cap.

The lack of this elbow on the other bottle (the one on the right) means that the capper has nothing to hold on to. As a result, there will be no "dent" on the top of the cap and you will get a very loose fit.

In synopsis, you have probably bought the wrong capper for the two different types of bottle. Assuming that the diameter of the necks are the same and that the caps are the correct size then both bottles could be properly capped with a bench capper, where the pressure to fit the cap comes from above.

Here's an example ...

https://www.selections.com/home-bre...MI_JqWrP7N4AIVyZ3tCh3yvQrTEAYYCCABEgJt0vD_BwE

This machine is for 26mm caps but some cappers are supplied with bells for both 26mm and 29mm caps.

Hope this helps!
Click to expand...
I capped a batch last night, find the capper a pain, have started buying Grolsch swing top beers, then use them for my homebrew. They are £1.50 at Asda or 2 quid for an empty swing top at my homebrew store. So opted for Grolsch despite it tasting like p...
 
Thanks very much for your input guys, I was leaning towards it being a problem with the bottles as they didn't look like 'normal' bottles when I pulled them out the packaging. Firstly I think i'll ditch the bottles then invest in a bench capper in a few months as I want to move to kegging before too long, thanks again guys athumb..
 
Your first mistake was buying bottles. I have never bought a single bottle. Go down your local and empty the waste glass bin for the type of bottles you want. I am lucky that my Dad's local sell Grolsch so I get plenty of swing tops bottles and crates.
 
Pick up an old school hammer-on capper for next to nothing. It's scary hammering caps on: do it on the floor and put the bottle on a block of wood to cushion the shock. I used this thousands of times in the seventies, before I could afford the kind of capper you show above, and I only ever broke two bottles. Then, as you build your collection of bottles from other sources, gradually get rid of the dodgy ones. Now I'll wait for the objections to pour in!
 
+1 for bench capper here too, i+I was breaking bottle necks and all sorts; as a side note I recently brought a box of 24 500ml PET plastic bottles for my "drink at home beers" they are surprisingly good, weigh much less to carry in bulk and I'm not worried about glass grenades :)
 
It's the capper. Loads of us cap those bottles by the hundred with this here capper here I've never broken a bottle and I'm basically a maniac and can do a strafing run with a row of bottles beneath my legs and do them under 2 seconds per cap.
 
Drunkula said:
It's the capper. Loads of us cap those bottles by the hundred with this here capper here I've never broken a bottle and I'm basically a maniac and can do a strafing run with a row of bottles beneath my legs and do them under 2 seconds per cap.
Click to expand...

Yep, I bottled a brew yesterday and noticed quite a few of those bottles (and some similarly odd ones). I have that capper and it dealt with them all without issue.
 
on the subject of bottles wychwood bottles are harder to cap and I use the italian metal capper with red handles but they are still a pain so I got rid of. It is always useful to have a spare capper but I bought 2 metal cappers hence the reason why my unused lakeland capper is been given away as a prize.
 

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