beer gun carbing issues

Hi guys, I'm currently having problems bottling beer with my beer gun and it staying carbonated after the first day. Any suggestions? I've reduced the length of hose to 5 ft; tried to chill bottles to keg temp; purge with about 20psi and am only using about 3-5psi to dispense.
cheers!

Well, with the beer gun you will always loose some carbonation so it is good to slightly overcarbonate the beer.

I don't know why you shortened the length of the line. It suggests 10 feet and that is what I use. It works fine for me.

Another thought when I read your message was are you sure your capper is fully crimping the cap on? You may be losing your carbonation that way. If you crack a bottle open 10 minutes after bottling, is it fine? If so, then it is probably your capper.

I've had good results with the beer gun. Here's my procedure:

1 day prior to bottling, increase the PSI to an additional 2 PSI - I carbonate at around 10PSI, so I increase to 12 PSI. Put the sanitized bottles, covered, into the freezer.

Day of bottling: Vent the keg, then reduce PSI to about 8 PSI. This is the pressure I use for the beer gun.

I set the CO2 pressure (for the venting part of the beer gun) to 6-10 PSI (I have 2 CO2 tanks) but you could also leave it at 8 PSI as well. The venting CO2 pressure isn't too critical.

Vent the bottle with CO2, for about 3 seconds. The sound changes when the bottle is vented.

Fill with beer until a small amount of beer comes out (may be 1/8oz?). Remove beer gun, and cap immediately.

I hope this helps a bit.

MC

Thanks guys, yeah I'll try chilling my bottles ahead of time and see if that helps. I originally was using the recommended 10ft of line but thought maybe it was stripping too much CO2 as beer travelled to bottle. How much do people recommend over carbing? Currently I leave my keg sit on gas set to 12psi for a week. The beer is carbonated beautifully from my taps but just won't last in the bottle. My capper is relatively new and have tried shaking the bottles to see if try leak but all seems ok. I'm sure all of a sudden it will start working for me but its disappointing in the mean time.

Anxiousbrewer said:

Thanks guys, yeah I'll try chilling my bottles ahead of time and see if that helps. I originally was using the recommended 10ft of line but thought maybe it was stripping too much CO2 as beer travelled to bottle. How much do people recommend over carbing? Currently I leave my keg sit on gas set to 12psi for a week. The beer is carbonated beautifully from my taps but just won't last in the bottle. My capper is relatively new and have tried shaking the bottles to see if try leak but all seems ok. I'm sure all of a sudden it will start working for me but its disappointing in the mean time.

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Do you get much foaming when you fill the bottles? I get very little.

MC

Misplaces hit the main problem. The length of the beer line doesn't matter. A day or two before you bottle you need to up the psi a few points. This will help compensate for the head space you are leaving in the bottles. When you bottle your beer, the CO2 in the beer will equalize with the unpressurized head space. By slightly over carbing your brew, you can help this situation out. Also, try to leave as little head space as possible.