Flat Beer after 3 1/2 weeks in bottle

I bottled 5.25 gallons - 41 12 oz bottles, 3 16 oz bottles on 3/25 - so over 3 1/2 weeks ago and it is pretty flat - it is barely carbonated but basically flat. My first 2 batches were over-carbonated so I tried to fix it this time. I used 4 oz. table sugar. First time I've used table sugar.
Can I do anything? How much sugar should I have used?

Room temp?

well the bottles have been in my garage - I'd say average temp low 50s.

That's too cold - it's no surprpise that they are flat.

Three weeks at 70 degrees is the rule of thumb for normal gravity beers. If you have a bigger beer or lower temps, it can take longer.

Temps in the low 50s likely have put your yeast to sleep, so they can't carb, even if they want to!

I made that mistake recently... you're going to want to carbonate at about room temperature.

can I just bring them inside or is is it too late?

doublehaul said:

can I just bring them inside or is is it too late?

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Bring them in.

Do I need to "roust" 'em? Tip the bottle upside down or anything?

Nah - just bring 'em in!

doublehaul said:

Do I need to "roust" 'em? Tip the bottle upside down or anything?

Click to expand...

It won't hurt, but the bggest thing is to get them back to fermentation temps.

This should be required reading:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/blogs/revvy/patience-bottle-conditioning-159/

Watch the video linked at the bottom if you want. It's worthwhile.

Thanks for the advice! It's funny, the batch before I used (too much) corn sugar, and it had to have conditioned at lower temps - it was winter - and had no issue. I had about 4.5 gallons and used 5 oz corn sugar in 475ml water and it was over-carbonated.

XXguy said:

This should be required reading:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/blogs/revvy/patience-bottle-conditioning-159/

Watch the video linked at the bottom if you want. It's worthwhile.

Click to expand...

good read!

glad someone beat me to the question, because after about two weeks now @ room temp my first batch is still pretty flat. I keep reading patience is a virtue when it comes to home brewing, but sometimes it helps to have someone remind me.

Guess I just have to suck it up and wait

Yeah I left a brew in a low temp area for 3 weeks and nothing. I moved then inside and 1 week later they were carbonated. Good stuff

I had a similar problem, living in the bay area in the winter the temp never get's much above 60 in my apartment, which I still found a bit too cold. I was raised in one of those "just put a sweater on" households in New England. I bought a 9x20 seedling propagation mat (heating pad) at the local garden store and put it in the bottom of one of those rubbermaid storage containers, then put my bottles in there and covered it, which produced a temp of 72. After 1 more week, they are perfectly carbonated.

update - this worked! brought em inside for 2 wks. Not super carbed, but it is probably at what I tried to hit for volumes of CO2 with the carbonation calc i used (2.2??). thanks all