More Fizz

I am new to the forum and I am a novice brewer; just completed my second extract kit. I have been brewing saison style ale.

I have used two different kits, and have been very happy with the flavor profile, alcohol content, color etc. Fermenting temps and times as well as OG and TG have been in line. However, I am not happy with the level of carbonation and head.

I have reviewed various forums and based on my storage time 3 weeks + at 70 degrees + and priming sugar 4.5 oz per five gallon batch. The bottles doo hiss slightly upon uncapping but I feel I should be getting better results.

Also some forums suggest that sometimes the caps are not tight enough. ( I am using a low cost red two handed capper.) Considering the fact that I have had two different kits have the same problem I assume I am having a problem at the bottling stage.

I just recently had someone else's american ale home brew (in swing top bottles) with a super nice head and plenty of carbonation (they said they used a cuo of brown sugar.) I would like to have my brew be similar, can a quarter cup of sugar make that big a difference??

I would like to hear others with more experience thoughts comments or suggestions on the matter.

Use this handy tool next time you bottle: The Beer Recipator - Carbonation

Instead of using a generic 4.5 oz package of sugar, calculate how much sugar you need to add for the level of carbonation you want and the temperature of the beer at the time of bottling. Any brewing software and several free web-based calculators will be able to do that for you (search "priming sugar calculator", and I'm sure you'll be able to find something).

For instance, if you want a nicely carbonated ale at 2.6 volumes of CO2, and the beer is at 76 degrees, you need about 5.4 oz of priming sugar (at least using my equipment, which yields about 5.5 gallons of beer).

When I first started my beers seemed under carbonated as well. One of the contributing factors, that affected the appearance of carbonation was how I poured the beer. The instructions will say, pour carefully to avoid getting yeast in the glass. This can be taken too far. You can pour a beer so slowly that you get almost no head at all. I was letting the beer trickle down the side of the glass. You really want to pour the beer normally for about the first 2/3s of the bottle, then slow down at the end to avoid the yeast.

The other thing is that while 3 weeks at 70 degrees should be enough time for carbonation, it may not be quite done yet. I'd say give it a month or two before making a judgment. I use the standard amount of priming sugar for all batches regardless of style and other factors, and I've been pretty happy with the results. This is not to say that fine tuning your carbonation using various equations can't add anything, but IMO, it's not really necessary for a decently carbonated beer.

KayaBrew said:

Use this handy tool next time you bottle: The Beer Recipator - Carbonation

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Can you help me understand how I would know what the "Desired Volume of CO2" would be? Maybe that's somewhere on the forum or in the How to Brew book but I haven't come across it yet. Is it something that is in a table by beer type?

LarryC said:

Can you help me understand how I would know what the "Desired Volume of CO2" would be? Maybe that's somewhere on the forum or in the How to Brew book but I haven't come across it yet. Is it something that is in a table by beer type?

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There's a table available online, but I don't have time to look for it right now.

I guess I did have time.

Brew Your Own: The How-To Homebrew Beer Magazine - Carbonation Priming Chart

More info about priming and carbonation levels can be found at A Primer on Priming

Thanks for the responses. Going to roll the bottles around and give it two more week and see what happens. I am definitely be more careful to properly measure priming sugar bottling next time around.

mickchelski said:

Thanks for the responses. Going to roll the bottles around and give it two more week and see what happens. I am definitely be more careful to properly measure priming sugar bottling next time around.

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Also, it's better to weigh the priming sugar. Sometimes 3/4 cup of corn sugar is more packed down then 3/4 cup of a different brand of corn sugar. The only predictible way is to weigh it.

Great resources! I'll be bottling my first batch soon, and I was worried that it wouldn't be carbed enough, I tend to like my ales a bit more fizzy than most people. I think I'll be using some of these resources to help out my first batch. Assuming I don't add any more yeast, do I have to worry about bottle bombs if I exceed the kit instructions on the amount of sugar?

DRoyLenz said:

Great resources! I'll be bottling my first batch soon, and I was worried that it wouldn't be carbed enough, I tend to like my ales a bit more fizzy than most people. I think I'll be using some of these resources to help out my first batch. Assuming I don't add any more yeast, do I have to worry about bottle bombs if I exceed the kit instructions on the amount of sugar?

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Yes, but if you don't go overboard you should be ok. I'm not sure how high a beer bottle is rated, but it can take quite a bit of carbonation. If you don't go too much above 3.3 volumes, you should be fine.

Also, it helps the beer absorb the CO2 if you refrigerate it for at least 48hrs before you pop it open.

One thing to realize is that the 3 weeks at 70 we recommend is just a "rule of thumb" and just for normal gravity beers, the higher the gravity, the storage temp, the size of the bottles all play into when a beer will be carbonated...

The 4.5-5 ounce of priming sugar is pretty much the standard amount of sugar necessary to carb most styles of beer in the 2-2.5 volumes of co2....Belgian saisons should be carbed to between 3 and 3.5 volumes...

That too, reaching the desired range of carbonation, is another factor in the time it takes a beer to be cared...ALL beers will reach their level of carbonation eventually. In fact, it's possible (and proven by running the numbers in beersmith) to NOT add priming sugar and get minimal carbonation of a few volumes in time (in old brewing british brewing books they didn't add sugar to some ordinary bitters, and milds and relied on time and temp to do the work naturally.)

So if your beer is not ready at 3 weeks, and you carbed with the amount of sugar you were given with your kit or instructions, then it is not your bottles, it is not your caps, it is nothing that you did wrong, it is just that the beer is not ready yet.

Some beers take 4 weeks, some of mine have taken 6-8 weeks....my Belgian strong (1.090 og) took over 3 months to carb and condition.

I explain more about carbing, conditioning and the role of time here;
Revvy's Blog, Of Patience and Bottle Conditioning.

If your beers aren't carbed enough yet, roll each of them gently on a table to re-suspend the yeast, then put them back in the closet and check on them in another week or 2 and if it's not then, then wait another week or two...eventually you will reach the max carbonation (volume of co2) that was required and given to you by the amount of priming sugar you were given....like I said 4.5-5 ounces is average for most normal beers....

I have never, ever had a beer NOT come up to carbonation, eventually.