High gravity bottles not naturally carbing - HELP!

So after about 100 brews, I finally brewed a truly high gravity beer (recipe was basically Jamil’s 2006 NHC gold medal winning Belgian Dark Strong on Ezymurgy/AHA website). 1.1 OG to 1.02 – 10.5 ABV. 90 min mash at 152. 90 min boil. Two week fermentation – (2 packs of new, rehydrated Safbrew Abbaye – bulk of primary was at 66*, then ramped up to 72* for the last few days). Then I bottled it (I used 4 carb tabs per 12 oz bottle – these little guys work great and are worth the effort – previously never had an over- or under-carbed beer since using them: http://labelpeelers.com/brewers-bes...nYsehkAE6sFfRMR7kRPGcKH4OPbSmTp8MQaAuLb8P8HAQ) After bottling: two weeks at 70* and then 4 days in the fridge later – absolutely no carbonation whatsoever.

The RDWHAHB part of me hopes that these bottles are just taking longer than normal to carb, and will be fine. But the ‘freak out, do worry’ part of me thinks that these bottle aren’t ever going to carb without further intervention.

So my questions are:
1) Will these ever carb without further intervention?
2) If the answer to the above is ‘no’ – what should I do? (do I need to add more sugar AND more yeast to each bottle? Or just more yeast? Or is this just too alcoholic to naturally carb, and I need to pour them into a keg and force carb them using CO2?)

Thanks for the help!

Just wanted to add: I’m an advanced homebrewer that skips absolutely no steps (I have all of the bells and whistles, constantly read homebrewing science books/articles, attended NHC, and so on).* I mention this, because I know a lot of new brewers post problems on here that either aren’t actually problems in the first place (re: “my fermenting beer has foam on it – is it infected?”) or post about problems they are having which are actually symptoms of a larger problem.
*Well I guess I may have skipped a step this time though. D’oh!

With it being such a high gravity beer, is it possible your original yeast pitch is completely spent? It's often suggested to add yeast during priming for bottling high gravity beers, as the beer may not have enough viable yeast cells to adequately consume the priming charge and carbonate. Just my 2₵ worth...

I give anything over 8% a minimum of 8 weeks.

Safbrew Abbaye's max ABV is listed at 11%, so you are pushing its upper limit.

I think it is likely that they will develop some carbonation eventually. It will probably never be as much as you hopped for.

I agree with Beernik... had the same issue you have a couple of years ago and found that just giving it more time did the trick. Like 6-8 weeks for something at 9-10%. Be patient... and brew something else meanwhile!

My last high-grav brew took three months to carb up. Just wait.

ACSlater said:

With it being such a high gravity beer, is it possible your original yeast pitch is completely spent? It's often suggested to add yeast during priming for bottling high gravity beers, as the beer may not have enough viable yeast cells to adequately consume the priming charge and carbonate. Just my 2₵ worth...

Click to expand...

I did that for my last year christmas/holiday ale (10% abv). The only issue I had is that the new yeast was able to attenuate the beer a bit more than anticipated because I did not aerate the wort properly when pitching before primary fermentation. It took ~2 weeks to be fully carbonated.. a bit too much carbonated, but it was OK to me.

Time is now your best friend... hide this one and forget it. Brew something light and enjoy the strongest [much] later!

cheers!

thanks so much yall - I will report back in a couple months and let you know if carbonation has improved