I pushed my stopper all the way into a glass carboy. any ideas how to get it out? Someone said a coat hanger but it just bends. Can’t get a good knife in either.
Aside from breaking the carboy…I think you’ll need to somehow cut the stopper into pieces. Not an easy task. Good Luck
get it near the opening and hold it there with either a coat hanger through the center hole or needle nose pliers. then use long suture scissors or even wire cutters to start cutting it in to small pieces :-[
I’ve also seen discussions of a trick using a dishtowel. Basically, you feed a long thin strip of cloth into the carboy, turn it upside down until the stopper is on the cloth, and then pull the cloth out which supposedly brings the stopper with it. If you google something like “remove stopper from carboy”, it’ll show you a bunch of these discussions (and even some videos of the procedure).
If you can bend a tiny hook in a metal coat hanger so you can get the hook through the hole in the stopper, then lube the carboy spout (start with water and work your way up to sanitizer, pbw, etc… all the way to dish soap if you have to). It should come out. If you make it to dish soap, make sure you clean and rinse the carboy extremely well.
You can try the cork out of the inside of a wine bottle trick…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uL1ovAYtKuQ
I had this happen two weeks ago (and it’s not even the first time). This time I pushed through a cork with its airlock in it.
First, to loosen things up, I put in a couple cups of very hot water and a little Oxiclean, let the cork sit in it for five minutes, then after pouring off the liquid, jiggled the airlock into the neck of the carboy and eased out the airlock with pliers (the airlock is trashed, but so what). Then I took a coathanger, unbent it, doubled the end with pliers, eased it through the cork, let the looped-over section catch on the cork, and gently tugged until the cork came through.
I should add it took a few minutes, but I had already considered replacing the carboy, and after pricing shipping and handling (it’s a 3-gallon Better Bottle and I couldn’t find one at an LHBS), decided patience and thriftiness would win the day. Next time, I’m going to calibrate my wrists before pushing the cork into the carboy…
. .and when you finally get it out, let me make a humble suggestion.
The wine bottle trick
AND
THIS
Frustrating ain’t it. I think many folks have done this at some point. When it happened to me it was right after pitching yeast. So I did not want to mess with it and possibly contaminate. Just had to leave it in there until it was done. No problems flavor wise…
As to getting it out. After emptying it I turned the carboy upside down to get the stopper in the neck. I then took a stainless shish-kabob skewer and inserted the pointy end into the hole in the stopper. I turned the whole thing over and dropped it all in there. Finagled it so the sharp end of the skewer came back out through the carboy hole. I now had the stopper with the skewer handle (a ring in the end) on the other side. So, by pulling the skewer out the stopper came with it.
You could probably use a coat hanger as suggested or a thicker wire as long as you can bend a loop in the end.
Make any sense?
That is a pretty good idea. I have also heard of peopke using the thin cheap plastic grocery bags. You insert it so half the opening is in the carboy and jockey the carboy around until the stopper is in the opening of the bag and then pull out.
Update
I just tried the Cork in the wine bottle idea posted above. worked very nicely. I used no water no soap etc.
The hard part was getting the bag in the opening and the stopper in the right position (small end down) Blew in some air tipped carboy up right sat in a chair wrapped my legs around it and pulled with both hands. The stopper flew out and hit the ceiling.
This is the best site on the web. now I have room to move my IPA to the secondary ;D