Does alcohol % increase during bottle conditioning

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jlanier01

jlanier01

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I was discussing this with a buddy, and I decided to consult the Oracle (Homebrewtalk).

Does your beer gain any % increase of alcohol while conditioning in the bottle? Or is primary or secondary fermentation the only real place where you have a chance to affect the amount of alcohol in your beer?

Thanks,
J
 
you'll pretty much get an unmeasurable increase by bottle conditioning (using priming sugar).

Think about how much 5oz of sugar is compared to 640oz of beer in a 5-gallon batch.

I read somewhere that priming can increase your ABV by 0.25%, but I don't think it's that much
 
The by-products of yeast consuming sugar is CO2 and alcohol. So when yeast consumes priming sugar in the bottle ABV does increase, however, the amount is negligable. Basically all of the alcohol is produced during primary fermentation. Secondary fermentation is a misnomer. There is generally no actual fermentation taking place in secondary. It is used for bulk aging and for putting in additivies (dry-hop, oak, fruit, etc).
 
Maybe a very small amount due to the priming sugar, but were talking a fraction of a percent. If the alcohol content does increase a measurable amount in the bottle, your going to have bottle bombs.
 
The only place where you get an "alcohol increase" is in Primary. Nowhere else. Neither secondary or in bottle carbonation. Some folks might think there is some in bottle carbonation but it is such a trace amount to even matter.
 
Revvy said:
The only place where you get an "alcohol increase" is in Primary. Nowhere else. Neither secondary or in bottle carbonation. Some folks might think there is some in bottle carbonation but it is such a trace amount to even matter.
Click to expand...

unless - your fermentation isn't done yet when you bottle or secondary...
 
AZ_IPA said:
unless - your fermentation isn't done yet when you bottle or secondary...
Click to expand...

Exactly. I've seen a measurable drop in gravity during secondary a couple times. Technically you shouldn't rack until fermentation is complete, but to say primary is the only place you can possibly get an increase in alcohol isn't completely true.
 
jlanier01 said:
Does your beer gain any % increase of alcohol while conditioning in the bottle? Or is primary or secondary fermentation the only real place where you have a chance to affect the amount of alcohol in your beer?

Thanks,
J
Click to expand...

I'm taking this question to read INCREASE, meaning "additional to what the abv of the beer should be after fermentation is complete." Meaning do I get MORE in bottling (from the sugar) or the magical secondary fairies?:fro:

To which the answer is....NO

I think we're dealing with semantics that are not in the op's original questions.

I don't think he's looking for a debate about when to secondary or if you should secondary. I think he's looking at ADDITIONAL TO what is already produceable by the original recipe and the tenacity of the yeast.

That's why I answered what I answered and I'm sticking to it. :D
 
Without all of the conjecture about what the OP really means, here are the facts:

Dextrose has an extract potential of 40 - 46 points (in other words, one pound of corn sugar dissolved in one gallon of water will result in an SG of 1.040 - 1.046). Using 40 points as the basis, 5 oz of corn sugar in 5 gallons would result in a gravity increase of 0.0025 (0.3125 lbs / 5 gals * 0.040 SG = 0.0025). To get percent ABV, multiply the change in SG by 131. So, assuming dextrose is 100% fermentable, ABV increases by 0.33% (0.0025 * 131 = 0.3275% ABV).
 
1 oz of glucose would, if used entirely for fermentation, produce about half an ounce of alcohol (slightly more).

5 oz of glucose per 5 gallons beer then will produce about half an ounce of alcohol per gallon or half an ounce per 128 ounces or 1/256 abw which is about .39% abw, not exactly trivial.
 
Revvy said:
But if you are not racking unless fermentation is complete, then how is it NOT the truth?
Click to expand...

I was just responding to this statement:

Revvy said:
The only place where you get an "alcohol increase" is in Primary. Nowhere else. Neither secondary or in bottle carbonation.
Click to expand...

Fermentation can continue in secondary, therefore the alcohol content can increase. This isn't the proper way to brew, but it happens. Primary or even secondary fermentation has nothing to do with "additional to what the abv of the beer should be after fermentation is complete." Not trying to get off topic or instigate a debate here, just wanted to clarify my point.

:mug:
 
Can't we just measure the gravity after adding priming sugar, then take it again after bottle conditioning for the new alcohol produced?

Almost .4 ABV is not trivial! If it turns out to be that much. It might lend someone to use a higher carbonation if they wanted to push the alcohol, or achieve a missed abv they were trying to get but their brewhouse eff. was lower than they expected.
 
Just for clarification I was only trying to determine if alcohol will increase in the bottle during the next 3 weeks.
Assuming I added 4-5oz of priming sugar at bottling time to a 5 gal. bucket, mixed well.

Fermentation in the primary was 3 weeks and complete.
 
jlanier01 said:
Just for clarification I was only trying to determine if alcohol will increase in the bottle during the next 3 weeks.
Assuming I added 4-5oz of priming sugar at bottling time to a 5 gal. bucket, mixed well.
Click to expand...

Apparently it will, according to some of the previous posts. We all knew there would be a small increase, because yeast is consuming the priming sugar and producing carbonation and alcohol as a result, but I'm a bit surprised it is as much as it apparently is.
 
Next time I post I will try to add more complete information to minimize the debating! :confused:

I should have stated: Post-Fermentation, Amount of Sugar, Type of Sugar, Volume of Beer at bottling time, etc...

Thanks for the feedback.
 
I'm not sure how this got so off track.
Click to expand...

The usual, people sort-of read the post, make assumptions and answer the assumptions. A couple hours with an NORS board would make them a bit more attentive.
 
I ran a few numbers in BeerSmith (which doesn't have the same number of sig figs as Yuri's detailed post, but my findings confirm a change of ~.3% ABV. Not negligible, but I'm not gonna start adjusting my recipes to take this into consideration.
 
Ok I added 5oz dextrose to a recipe in my calculator It took the recipe from a 4.9 ABV to 5.3ABV this was added as a fermentable but wouldnt it be the same even if it was added after primary fermintation is done?
 
sub-zero said:
Ok I added 5oz dextrose to a recipe in my calculator It took the recipe from a 4.9 ABV to 5.3ABV this was added as a fermentable but wouldnt it be the same even if it was added after primary fermintation is done?
Click to expand...

That seems to jive with Yuri's calculations.

Yuri_Rage said:
(0.0025 * 131 = 0.3275% ABV).
Click to expand...

So it looks like priming sugar actually adds around .3-.4% ABV, which is more than I would have assumed, and definitely worth considering when formulating recipes.
 
HOOTER said:
I was just responding to this statement:



Fermentation can continue in secondary, therefore the alcohol content can increase. This isn't the proper way to brew, but it happens. Primary or even secondary fermentation has nothing to do with "additional to what the abv of the beer should be after fermentation is complete." Not trying to get off topic or instigate a debate here, just wanted to clarify my point.

:mug:
Click to expand...

Evidently I was correct that the OP's original intent to find out how much the abv was increased by priming sugar. Or about any additional increase.

Going back to this off topic discussion, think about about primary/ secondary it this way....If everythig is going ok (plenty of healthy yeast, right temp, plenty of fermentatbles, not a stuck fermentation) your beer is going to attenuate normally to 1.008...It will more than likely attenuate to 1.008 regardless of whether you allow fermentation to finish in a long primary OR if you did a premature racking to secondary, and it finishes there. If the maximum yeast attenuation of this beer is to 1.008, and everything is ideal.... It's not going to magically be able to go to 1.002 because it was racked to secondary. In an ideal fermentation should go to 1.008 regardless of which vessel it was in.

 (of course adding sugar or beano is a deifferent story)

That's ALL I was trying to get at...Not any LOWER than the final gravity capable of being in the ideal situation...not any more, as the Op asked increase in abv from it. Like I said I wasn't trying to get into a semantic debate about the "proper" way to secondary of primary, nor did I think the OP was looking for that.

:mug:
 
Revvy said:
It will more than likely attenuate to 1.008 regardless of whether you allow fermentation to finish in a long primary OR if you did a premature racking to secondary, and it finishes there.[/i] If the maximum yeast attenuation of this beer is to 1.008, and everything is ideal.... It's not going to magically be able to go to 1.002 because it was racked to secondary. In an ideal fermentation should go to 1.008 regardless of which vessel it was in.

That's ALL I was trying to get at...Not any LOWER than the final gravity capable of being in the ideal situation...not any more
Click to expand...


I can dig what your saying. Once fermentation is done, it's done. Once terminal gravity is reached, fermentation is over. That's why it's referred to as "terminal" gravity. Your referring to an alcohol increase as a beer somehow magically exceeding it's terminal gravity, thus producing more alcohol than intended. Of course that's clearly not what the OP, nor anyone else, was suggesting. This sort of "alcohol increase" just isn't possible. The real question here is whether or not the addition of fermentables (priming sugar) at bottling increases ABV, which has a clear and definitive answer. It absolutely does. I'm actually glad this topic came up, because I never really thought about it until now. You learn something new every day. :)
 
I will take complete blame for the direction this thread took. We all answered the OP's question - I just questioned part of Revvy's response in which we were both right.

my bad.

Yuri - thanks for posting the math....

:mug:
 
AZ_IPA said:
I will take complete blame for the direction this thread took. We all answered the OP's question - I just questioned part of Revvy's response in which we were both right.

my bad.

Yuri - thanks for posting the math....

:mug:
Click to expand...

Yeah...it's prolly more confusing for a new brewer when we go sidetracking to what was nothing but semantics here, on what was a real simple question. :D


Especially since he WAS asking about ADDITIONAL BOOST to abv from the corn sugar and/or secondarying.
 
david_42 said:
The usual, people sort-of read the post, make assumptions and answer the assumptions. A couple hours with an NORS board would make them a bit more attentive.
Click to expand...

OK, what's a NORS board? Not saying I need to have a better attention span, but....OOHHH, PRETTY!!!
 
Revvy said:
Yeah...it's prolly more confusing for a new brewer when we go sidetracking to what was nothing but semantics here, on what was a real simple question.
Click to expand...
Though I sense a bit of sarcasm, this hits the nail on the head. The answer was simple. The Beginner's Forum can really suffer when there's a ton of debate and 10,000 word diatribes. Sometimes less is more.
 
Yuri_Rage said:
Though I sense a bit of sarcasm, this hits the nail on the head. The answer was simple. The Beginner's Forum can really suffer when there's a ton of debate and 10,000 word diatribes. Sometimes less is more.
Click to expand...

I wasn't trying to be sacrstic, I thought I originally gave a clear answer to what I perceived as the OP's intended question. That's why I tried NOT origianlly to bring in the issue of when to secondary or not.

Oh well.

:mug:
 
AZ_IPA said:
good answer BierMuncher, and like I said, I'm sorry for dragging this into other realms......
Click to expand...

No worries. :cross:

I'm a firm believer that less is more. :rockin:

Ever been to a public occasion where the speaker just keeps on droning on and on and everyone keeps looking at their watch?

I don't ever want to be that person on the podium.

Always leave em wanting more baby...:ban:
 
Say you have a beer that started at 1.060 and finished at 1.013. You primed with 4 oz of cane sugar, the real OG would have been 1.062. Without the priming sugar it would be 6.157% ABV with the priming sugar it goes up to 6.419 (maybe even higher if the final gravity went down noticeably.)
 

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