5th batch over carbonated, cause?

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SurlyBrew

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I made a pale ale. It was very carbonated after 5 days in the bottle. Tried one tonight that sat in the fridge for 48 hours, and it had been bottled for 15 days and still over carbonated. But, the carbonation didn't go away, and it was continually bubbling like soda. This leads me to believe its a more serious issue. I also tried to open a warm one and it continually foamed out of the bottle. Now I have read Revy's post on this issue, and how its just part of the bottling process. Its early in the process and it should go away with time. But, also looking into what John Palmer had to say on the issues is it could be infected. If I don't stick em in the fridge now, it will continue to carbonate and get worse, potentially dangerous. The whole bubbling continually like soda seems more like my issue here, and not the issue of no bubbling and lots of head.

John Palmer:
Gusher Infection However, the sustained bubbling is often due to "gusher type" infection. These infections can occur at any time and are due to wild yeasts or bacteria that eat the higher order sugars, like dextrins. The result in the fermentor is a beer that keeps bubbling until all of the carbohydrates are fermented, leaving a beer that has no body and very little taste. If it occurs at bottling time, the beer will overcarbonate and will fizz like soda pop, fountaining out of the bottle.
Cure: Improve your sanitation next time.

Wild Yeast: A gusher bug has gotten into the beer. Gusher bugs and wild yeasts are a real problem as they will keep on fermenting the beer until there is nothing left but fizzy bitter alcoholic water. The real danger with overcarbonation is exploding bottles. Bottle grenades can be very dangerous both from flying glass and from glass slivers left in the carpet.
Cures: Refrigerate the bottles and drink them while there is still some flavor left.

Here are the specifics:

OG: 1.043
FG: 1.013

Primary: 11 days
Secondary: 14 days

5 Gallons
Measured out 5oz brewers best corn sugar

I'm going to let it sit for a while and see if this issue goes away. I may be jumping the gun, I hope at least. On the other hand, I really don't want to have to deal with any bottle bombs. So I am hoping its just the issue of newly bottled beer and not a gusher bug. Thoughts? Revy?

Cheers!
 
Taste it. If it tastes bad or sour, then it maybe infected. If it tastes like over carbonated beer, then you used to much priming sugar, or the priming sugar was not evenly stirred in. More then likely, you should RDWHAHB.
 
Taste it. If it tastes bad or sour, then it maybe infected. If it tastes like over carbonated beer, then you used to much priming sugar, or the priming sugar was not evenly stirred in. More then likely, you should RDWHAHB.

It tastes like neither of those, just pretty good beer!
 
I had batch 11 that had the first 4 bottles opened ( after 1 week in the fridge) foam just like that. The rest of the beer was severely UNDER carbed. I finally concluded that I had failed to mix the priming sugar sufficiently and the first 4 bottles (which were the last 4 capped) had received a disproportinate dose of priming sugar. No infection involved, since all the bottles smelled and tasted fine. Your nose will tell you if a batch is infected. That's why the creator put it just above your mouth.
 
It looks like it could have used another week in secondary. The yeast hadn't quite finished so when you added additional priming sugar you got over carbed beers.
 
I have a batch of black ipa that is overcarbed. I've done this too much to use too much sugar and, in fact, undercarbed this a bit. It tastes awesome but the bottles are foamy even after being in the fridge for days.
I have some in a keg that I'm going to purge before I tap but I still wonder what happened.
 
How do I make sure to not over carb a beer again? Do I follow the recipe? Do I follow beer smith? Is there another resource that someone reccomends using to make sure you've used enough priming sugar? I am bottling a batch of Surly Furious after work today and I don't want to make the same mistake twice.
 
One thing to consider, after the beer settles down - is it still carbed well? Or is it flat? With hoppy beers (especially dry hopped) you can get some hop particles in the bottles. The can cause excessive foaming, since the hops serve as CO2 nucleation points (like mentos in diet coke). This will leave you with semi-flat beer after the foaming dies down.

If you think this might be the case, chill down some for a good week and check them after you pour very carefully - this is usually long enough to get hop particles to settle into the cake.
 
We get thsi all the time from folks who open their bottles WAAAAAYYYYYYY early.

If you watch Poindexter's video on time lapsed carbonation, you will see that in many instances, before a beer is carbed it my gush, that's not from infection, or mixing of sugars, but because the co2 hasn't evened out- it hasn't been pulled fully into the beer. Think of it as there's a lot of co2 being generated and most of it is in the headspace, not in the beer, so there's still "over pressure" in the bottle, so it gushes when it is opened.

But when the beer is truly carbed it all evens out, across the bottles.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlBlnTfZ2iw]time lapse carbonation - YouTube[/ame]

The 3 weeks at 70 degrees, that we recommend is the minimum time it takes for average gravity beers to carbonate and condition. Higher grav beers take longer.

Stouts and porters have taken me between 6 and 8 weeks to carb up..I have a 1.090 Belgian strong that took three months to carb up.

And just because a beer is carbed doesn't mean it still doesn't taste like a$$ and need more time for the off flavors to condition out. You have green beer.

Temp and gravity are the two factors that contribute to the time it takes to carb beer. But if a beer's not ready yet, or seems low carbed, and you added the right amount of sugar to it, then it's not stalled, it's just not time yet.

Everything you need to know about carbing and conditioning, can be found here Of Patience and Bottle Conditioning. With emphasis on the word, "patience." ;)

Additionally once the three weeks or so has passed, chiling them down for a few days (not just a few hours or over night as most new brewers want to do ;)) will help the carbonation settle.
 
Ha, thanks Revy! Saw this exact post on another thread. I'm 99% sure this is the case, and I am glad I watched the video last night, not as wrorried anymore. But, the one thing that is different between pointdexter's beer in the video is his beer had little to no carbonation and bubbles in his beer after two weeks, and it all was all head. In my case, my beer had a lot of head and a lot of bubbles in the beer after two weeks. I checked with a priming calc and I had over primed by around an oz. Either way, I think from now on I will use a priming calculator, and drink a nice homebrew when I get home and relax. Happy Friday everyone, cheers!
 
After watching that video I think I'm going to just wait at least 3 weeks before I even crack open a beer. If you check them to much you'll end up with a 6 pack left when they are finally ready. Im new to brewing and I'm at 2 weeks into bottling of a amber ale. I tryed it last night and it had good carb actually, small head that fades but brew itself is carbed. But the beer taste kind of sour on the after taste. Im going to wait at least 1 more week befor opening another.
 
When I started brewing I remember all of the kits calling for 2 weeks in the bottle and the beer would be ready. I quickly learned 4 weeks is better to even start testing. 2 weeks and the beer just is not ready yet.
 
After watching that video I think I'm going to just wait at least 3 weeks before I even crack open a beer. If you check them to much you'll end up with a 6 pack left when they are finally ready. Im new to brewing and I'm at 2 weeks into bottling of a amber ale. I tryed it last night and it had good carb actually, small head that fades but brew itself is carbed. But the beer taste kind of sour on the after taste. Im going to wait at least 1 more week befor opening another.

CO2 not fully in solution often freaks new brewers into thinksing something's wrong. But in reality co2 has a sour tang to it.

We don't say "three weeks @ 70" to yank new brewer's chains, to prevent them from not getting what they want....We say it because, that's usually the minimum time it takes.

We're not in control of most of this process. The yeast are.
 
The funny thing about it is the varrying results you get from batch to batch, week to week. I always open a beer at 1,2,3 weeks in to see how it was developing. Some had no carbonation, while others had a decent amount and others with too much. I think this is where people begin to freak out, myself included. Every batch is different, and you never know what to expect. I know what I get myself into when opening a green beer. I've learned to not let it change my expectations, and take it for what it really is. A new beer that isn't ready. But I will admit, its a nice treat, but patience is key!
 
Well this batch is definitely over carbed. Itz been 4 weeks and hasn't gotten any beteer. Its too over carbed to even drink. I am going to throw them in a fridge for a few days and pop off the caps and recap them. Hopefully this works.
 
Well this batch is definitely over carbed. Itz been 4 weeks and hasn't gotten any beteer. Its too over carbed to even drink. I am going to throw them in a fridge for a few days and pop off the caps and recap them. Hopefully this works.
Resurrecting an old thread here -- Did that end up working for you?

I've got a barleywine that overcarbed. I'm not sure what happened, but after two bottle bombs I put the rest of them in the fridge. They've been there for a few months now and are still waaay overcarbed. Once I finally get it into the glass though it tastes great, which kind of breaks your heart! haha.

Think I could recap them all, wait another month, and see?
 
Resurrected indeed!

It did not end well unfortunately... I tried recaping a bunch of the bottles for different lengths of time, and it didn't really help. It fixed one problem and created another. After venting them for a while, it kind of screwed up the carbonation from there on out and it tasted pretty bad. I hate to say it, but I ended up dumping it. I didn't have any bottle bombs, but the beer was so carbed it was like soda. Also, the longer I waited, the worse it got. Sticking them in the fridge did help a bit though.

It's worth venting and recapping. Good luck with your barley wine.

Resurrecting an old thread here -- Did that end up working for you?

I've got a barleywine that overcarbed. I'm not sure what happened, but after two bottle bombs I put the rest of them in the fridge. They've been there for a few months now and are still waaay overcarbed. Once I finally get it into the glass though it tastes great, which kind of breaks your heart! haha.

Think I could recap them all, wait another month, and see?
 
To the OP: do you cold crash your beer prior to bottling?
 
OK - colder beer will keep more of the CO2 that was created during fermentation. The lower the beer temperature at bottling time, the more CO2 will already be in beer when you add your priming sugar. The two volumes of CO2 "stack" - what was in the beer and that added as the yeast munches on the priming sugar. Whatever calculation method (for amount of priming sugar) you use needs to account for the beer temperature at bottling time.
 
I had a black IPA that was overcarbed. What I would do is pop one open and let it sit in the fridge with a napkin under it for about 30 minutes or so. That would release some of the carbonation and let me actually enjoy the beer. Though the wait can suck so be aware of that one! :)
 
At the time I was adding the 5oz of sugar no matter what the factors were. Now, I use either northern brewers priming calculator or tasty brew's. This was part of my problem, as well as it not attenuating as much as I would have liked.

OK - colder beer will keep more of the CO2 that was created during fermentation. The lower the beer temperature at bottling time, the more CO2 will already be in beer when you add your priming sugar. The two volumes of CO2 "stack" - what was in the beer and that added as the yeast munches on the priming sugar. Whatever calculation method (for amount of priming sugar) you use needs to account for the beer temperature at bottling time.
 
OK - colder beer will keep more of the CO2 that was created during fermentation. The lower the beer temperature at bottling time, the more CO2 will already be in beer when you add your priming sugar. The two volumes of CO2 "stack" - what was in the beer and that added as the yeast munches on the priming sugar. Whatever calculation method (for amount of priming sugar) you use needs to account for the beer temperature at bottling time.

Ha - no. What if I cold crash the beer first - will it magically carbonate?


3oz of dextrose for 5 gallons will nearly always be about perfect for most ales.
 
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