Bottling from large conical fermenter

Ok, I feel like this is kind of a silly question, but it's troubling me. I'm using a 27 gal conical fermenter for the first time, and would like to bottle from it, mixing in priming sugar before bottling (not tablets.) so the question arises, how do I mix in the priming sugar without contaminating or oxidizing? Will just shaking the fermenter around mix the sugar fully? I'm scared to sanitize a spoon and stir. Anyone have experience with this? I don't want to take chances on 20 gal of beer! Help!

Envious!

So my thought is this: Even big breweries will transfer to a bright tank prior to bottling. That being said there is nothing to be afraid of in sanitizing a long stainless spoon and gently swirling the sugar syrup into the beer. I will assume you already dropped the yeast out so you wouldn't be agitating that back into the beer. Then you can siphon out of the fermenter and into the bottles. At 27 gallons you may have to stir a few times through the entire process to ensure the sugar stays mixed but I don't see a problem with dong this at all. The only other recommendation I could make would be to batch bottle by racking ionto a traditional bottling bucket with the reduced amount of sugar each time.

I would bottle 5 gallons at a time from a standard bottling bucket. That way you aren't committed to all 20 gallons at one time and you can move 5 gallons to a good work area much more easily.

rack to a bottling bucket first? obviously you couldn't do all 20 gallons at once unless you had the world's biggest bottling bucket, but you can do 5-6 gallons at a time.

i wouldn't want to stir directly in the conical. there is bound to still be some yeast in the bottom of that thing, unless you dumped a lot.

just in case you don't already know: use an online priming calculator to figure out how much sugar to add.

Do you have a racking tube? If not you could build one before your next batch - That fixes the yeast issue.

Stir it up. Just be gentle.

Everyone knows o2 is bad for beer. But it's not going to do jack to your brew in the time it takes you to bottle it off. Think about it - What's the difference between priming and stirring in your conical and in a 5 gallon bucket? It's the same or similar surface area exposed, and the same stirring.

Bottle away

Ok, thanks, this is all good stuff. I think I might try bottling direct from the fermenter after I drop off the yeast and stir with a spoon. I just want to know if it works, but if I run into any trouble, at least I'll know why. Thanks again!

You might try gently stirring, but stirring enough to create a whirlpool effect and force the remaining yeast that is clinging to the sides of the fermenter to go the bottom of the fermenter. After 30 minutes or so, dump the yeast, wait a day, dump it again, then gently stir in your sugar solution and bottle.

At this point the beer is fermented out and the risk of contamination is reduced, but still take good care with sanitizing the spoon.

I think this will significantly reduce the amount of residual yeast going into your bottles.

So, I just had one of those "duh" moments and realized the true flaw in my plan. I can pull off the sediment from below, but how do I introduce the syrup without disturbing the krausen? Answer? I don't. You all are right, the bottling bucket is the way to go. I don't suppose I'll lose too much sleep over it, but if I do, I can always have a homebrew or two to help me relax.