Homemade Volcano...?

Question

So I think I have discovered a new equation:
Beer + Cigarette butt = homemade volcano
Why???

After drinking 2/3 of a miller highlife last night I threw my lit cigarette butt into the bottle. About thirty seconds later the bottle was overflowing. I was pretty intrigued so I tried it again and the same thing happened.

I've been thinking about it all day and can't come up with a good scientific explanation.... Can you?

Answer 1

Possibly the ash or tobacco particles or the fiberous filter of the ciggarette act to nucleate bubble formation in the beer, you could try some experiments to see what kinds of particulates added to beer cause loss of containment. Try ciggerette ashes alone, tobacco particles alone, only the filter part; maybe some other materials like confectionary sugar etc to see what catalyses bubble formation, but personally, I think it would be a waste of beer!

Answer 2

That's a new one on me....

How about this: reasonably fresh bottle of beer, still well-carbonated. Large amount of localized heat from ciggy butt gives rapid increase in temperature, resulting in reduced solubility of CO2 and hence rapid gas release. First thing that comes to mind.

An alternative might be pH change, so that dissolved bicarbonate is released by acidification... trouble is, most vegetable ash is basic - lye and all that.

Interesting science experiments you do! Not exactly bound for a book on kitchen science for kids, though... (Adult supervision most definitely required!).

Answer 3

Baking soda and vinegar. Add the vinegar to the baking soda and it will erupt. Look for other chemicals that do the same thing when added together.