flat belgian dubbel

after four weeks in bottle, my belgian bubbel is pretty flat. i tried two bottles and both the same. i guess ill give it a few more weeks. i swirled and moved upstairs from basement(warmer). its 8.5% abv, does a high alcohol beer take longer to carb?

yeah with a higher alcohol and if you fermented for a long time there is a possibility that the yeast has gone dormant or is dead. Some brewer add new fresh yeast at bottling for just this reason.

it depends on a bunch of things

how much yeast you fermented it with and how viable that yeast was
and what the strain was

the temperature you are carbonating it at - 70s would help

how much priming sugar you used

and with bigger beers it takes longer...

more info and I bet the nice people on here will have a more educated guess

Yes, more info on your process would be helpful. If you waited many months to bottle you could have found yourself in a situation where there was little yeast that made it into bottles. If the bottles were in the basement for a while that could certainly stall things, and in general, bigger beers can take longer to carb up (in some cases well over a month).

I wouldn't be worried yet as it sounds like it's just a case of having a bigger beer too cold while initially bottling so it is going to take more time now t hat you've warmed them up.

thanks for the replies, my basement is about 58f, im pretty sure that is my problem, hopefully 70s will make all the dif. btw yeast is wyeast abbey ale, my total fermentation was about 4.5 weeks, and i think i used a cup and a half dme for priming. i talked to my local supplier and he said pretty much what all of you said. everyone saying the same thing makes me feel better. ill try another one in a month if i can wait that long. thanks again