Bottling Question

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NorsemenRugby58

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I've never had any trouble with bottling before, its kegging that has given me tremendous difficulty. Recent;y (3 weeks ago) I bottled an IIPA. It didn't carbonate at all. I've successfully bottled many times, mixed and boiled the dextrose then added....any thoughts on what could have gone wrong? I evenly mixed it as well....

Thx
 
I assume that the bottles were warmish and that you had a tight seal.

Maybe you got your alcohol content up high enough to kill the yeast or you somehow didn't transfer yeast cells to the bottles?

Try opening a bottle and putting in a little yeast. Then seal again and wait a couple of weeks pray?

Also did remember to leave headspace? I found in the past that If I leave very little headspace then they dont carb up correctly.

Any other ideas?
 
head space was good, theyre not carbed at all so temp is out. the alcohol content could not possibly have gone that high.... maybe just no yeast.... I'll try the yeast option
 
As long as your opening them, try one, is it sweet?

I guess if its sweet as hell you can rule out the not enough fermentable sugers for the secondary fermentation.

FYI, id wait a little bit before you take any action, Im a real newb compared to the guys bouncing around these forums, Im sure they have some awesome suggestions.
 
You just need more patience. There's nothing wrong.

The 3 weeks at 70 degrees, that 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.

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." ;)

If a beer isn't carbed by "x number of weeks" you just have to give them ore time. If you added your sugar, then the beer will carb up eventually, it's really a foolroof process. All beers will carb up eventually. A lot of new brewers think they have to "troubleshoot" a bottling issue, when there really is none, the beer knows how to carb itself. In fact if you run beersmiths carbing calculator, some lower grav beers don't even require additional sugar to reach their minimum level of carbonation. Just time.

You are dealing with, I'm assuming, a big beer here. Big beer needs more time.

Lazy Llama came up with a handy dandy chart to determine how long something takes in brewing, whether it's fermentation, carbonation, bottle conditioning....

chart.jpg


So forget about this beer for awhile. It will be fine.
 
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