Carbonation problems

Hi,
I had a few all-grain batches that failed to carbonate even after a month wait.

With one of the batches I've uncapped a couple of bottles and added more priming sugar and yeast (directly into the botle). Two weeks later nothing had happened besides having sweet beer.

With another batch only ONE bottle nearly exploded on me while none of the other 30+ bottles had any CO2. Coincidence or not this was the last bottle to be filled and it had more sediment.

I've thought it might have been a sanitation problem. Let me explain:
I've washed the bottles with a starsan solution and I might not have drained the liquid completely or waited enough time. So I wonder wether starsan killed the yeast that went into the bottle?

I've brewed another batch where I was more careful with sanitation (not oversanitizing) and it came out a little better (wrt CO2) but not great.

I have a 20L batch in the making. It is been fermenting for 4 days and the bubbling is much slower now. I should leave it there for 2 weeks but I'm afraid of letting sit there for too long and not having enough yeast left to botlle.

Didn't have this problems with none of the previous batches made from extract kits.

In summary I have a lot of doubts:
- How do I know if enough yeast remains in the bottle to create C02?
- It is necessary to add more yeast at bottling time?
- Does the sanitation could be a problem (as described above)?
- Related to that, should I sanitize the caps (I've read somewhere I shouldn't).
- Does the time the beer is kept in the fermenter affects the production of CO2 in the bottle?
- Should I let sediment go into the bottles? Can I filter the beer when bottling?

Please advise as I'd like this next batch to come out fine. My relatives are already doubting my ability as a brewer. If this one fails it will be hard to justify with my wife taking over the kitchen to brew and all the mess she has to put up with on brewing days. ;-)

Thanks a lot in advance.

I recently bottled 2 beers. One was a christmas porter that sat in the fermentor for 5 weeks. The second was a pumpkin ale that was in primary for 2 weeks, and secondary for two weeks. Both beers have carbonated just fine.

Usually I cold crash for a few days and use gelatin. Even after that there's enough yeast in suspension.

What I'm getting at is that your problem isn't the yeast. Your problem is your bottling technique or processes.

If you tell us what bottling day looks like for you, step by step, we can give better advice as to how to proceed.

The yeast will be there for bottle carbonation, even after a couple of months in the primary at ale fermentation temperatures or cooler lagering temperatures.

Different causes for lack of carbonation:
Bottle conditioning cold.
Insufficient time for conditioning. Three weeks to eight weeks, or so, depending upon ABV. High ABV beers will take the longest.
Insufficient amount of priming sugar.
Loose crown caps, especially if using the twist off cap type bottles.
Dried out seals if using the swing top bottles.

The one bottle that nearly exploded may have been from infection. The Starsan solution is a sanitizer, not a cleaner. It is a no rinse sanitizer, and is only effective while the sanitized surface is still wet with the solution. Having some residual Starsan solution, when properly mixed, would not be part of the carbonation problem.

Use PBW or unscented Oxyclean to clean your bottles. Rinse these cleaners very well.

A little more detail on your bottling procedure would help.

I would certainly sanitize the caps. I would look at your capping technique. If you have sediment that leads me to think you had fermentation and should have carbonation.

- How do I know if enough yeast remains in the bottle to create C02?Under normal conditions, there should be enough.

- It is necessary to add more yeast at bottling time?
Not recommended. Adding yeast to priming sugar at bottling = bottle bombs.

- Does the sanitation could be a problem (as described above)?
StarSan is a no-rinse sanitizer. A trace of foam left in the bottle at bottling is actually beneficial to the yeast.

- Related to that, should I sanitize the caps (I've read somewhere I shouldn't).
Yes. But if they are oxygen-absorbing caps, they should not be sanitized until just before being used. Wetness activates the O-absorbing feature and once it's gone, it's gone.

- Does the time the beer is kept in the fermenter affects the production of CO2 in the bottle?Good question, but not really. The yeast in the fermenter will eat all the available sugar it can, producing CO2, but most of it will have escaped through your airlock. It is for that reason that priming sugar is added and the bottled sealed, not allowing the CO2 to escape, thereby driving the CO2 back into solution.

- Should I let sediment go into the bottles? Can I filter the beer when bottling?
Sediment in the bottles is harmless to the beer itself. That said, ingesting it along with the beer can have negative results on your system and it is therefore recommended to leave about a 1/4 inch of beer in the bottle when you pour.
I wouldn't attempt to filter it when bottling; in the process, you could create unwanted foaming/splash/oxygenation. It's better to learn to rack carefully from your fermenter to your bottling bucket, sucking up as little of the trub as possible.

Two other possibilities re: there not being CO2 in the bottles are:

1) yeast attenuation --- was the yeast good/expired? Did you aerate wort well? Did you rehydrate the yeast? Did you pitch too hot or too cold? Did you ferment at the right temp without any wide swings?

2) are your caps sealing well?

GHBWNY said:

Not recommended. Adding yeast to priming sugar at bottling = bottle bombs.

Click to expand...

Not true. Adding more yeast won't create any more co2 than the yeast that are already in the beer. Unless one was adding champagne yeast or something that would ferment out the beer further than the primary strain used.

Two things cause bottle bombs. 1) Adding too much priming sugar. 2) Getting an infection.

Hello and thanks for your comments and hints.

The bottling day starts with washing and scrubbing the bottles. I rinse them thoroughly I think. I prepare a solution of starsan in a bucket where I sink the bottles for a couple of minutes and then put them upside down to drain. What I was mentioning about starsan in the post is that the first times I've bottled there was still foam inside and when filling in with beer it created more foam. Now I let them drain longer.
I clean and sanitize a bucket just like the one I use for fermenting (from brewferm).
In parallel I boil half a cup of water, let it cool and mix non-refined table sugar (the yellowish kind, not the white crystal one). I usually use 6g per Liter as I've learned one should not go above 8g/L.
I drop this sugar solution into the sanitized bucket and transfer the beer from the fermenter to the bucket. I use a tube that sits on the bottom of the bucket in a way that when the beers comes out it starts swirling in the bucket to mix the sugar.
There's usually some beer and sediment that is left in the fermenter. Usually I tilt the fermenter gently to get this beer into the bucket and avoiding the least sediment as possible to be transferred.
When the bucket is filled I attach this bottling spigot (not sure how it is called) and start filling the bottles. I pass them to my cousin who puts the caps with a capper just like this one:
http://mountainhomebrew.com/ProductImages/equipment/512.jpg

It is true that we had problems before with some bottles being very difficult to cap (we use commercial beer reused bottles) but we had the same carbonation problem with Grölsch bottles.

Am I priming to few sugar? Is there a way to estimate the time needed to carbonate the beer or knowing when it is ready?

joshesmusica said:

Not true. Adding more yeast won't create any more co2 than the yeast that are already in the beer. Unless one was adding champagne yeast or something that would ferment out the beer further than the primary strain used.

Two things cause bottle bombs. 1) Adding too much priming sugar. 2) Getting an infection.

Click to expand...

I stand corrected. Thanks.

It seems your procedures are good. I am not sure what is meant by, "non-refined table sugar". If you used this same sugar for bottle carbonating other beers, and they carbonated, then it isn't the source of the problem.

Dissolving your priming sugar in one-half cup water could possibly be part of the problem. Could form a syrup if cooled to much, and remain at the bottom of the bottling bucket. The one bottle that blew on you could have had most of the priming sugar in it. Have you always dissolved the priming sugar in one-half cup water?

It isn't unusual for the bell in a hand capper to wear and not give a good seal, but you say the fliptops, used for bottling the same batch of beer, also did not have carbonation. It would be unusual for the hand capper to be worn out and the flip top seals to not seal properly at the same time, unless these were old bottles.

Are all the bottles you reuse the pry off cap type, or are they the twist off cap type?

I'm going to throw my 2 cents out here.

The sugar should b boiled with the water and not added after boiled and cooled for a few reasons.
- This will help disolve the sugar
-This will sanitize the sugar
-This will invert the sugar. (Easier for the yeast to eat)

U should not have grains of sugar going into the bottling bucket but a syrup u have prepared.

I missed the part about letting the priming sugar water cool before adding the sugar. Yes, the sugar should be added to the boiling water to dissolve completely. It doesn't need to be boiled after adding, but not added to cool water.

Yes I think part of your problem might be adding the sugar to cold water, especially if you had one bottle bomb, that means it's likely all the sugar is ending up in the last bottle to be filled.

I use the same capper and it's a pain in the ass to cap the short stubby bottles with it. I find if you just go slow and the twist the capper back and forth and side to side then it will get a good seal.

Lastly you should search for online priming sugar calculators, I use the one from northern Brewer, in order to figure out how much sugar to use based on the style and temperature of the beer.

Thanks once more for all the help and tips.
I believe that the first batches, that came out right, I just threw the sugar into the bucket.
Only recently I've started to dissolve the sugar in hot water. Mostly because I was afraid of infecting the beer with some bug from the sugar. Maybe I'll go back to that if the risk of contaminating the beer is low.
By the way, I let the mixture cool down. I do not add the sugar to cold water.
So, what's preferable, to boil the sugar with water and add it to the beer albeit a bit warm or simply add the sugar to the beer and let it dissolve?
The sugar I'm using is this:
http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2772/4020/1600/PICT1285.0.jpg

Bring your water to a boil, I usually use ~200ml or so. After it starts to steam, I stir in the sugar using my thermometer. Once it comes to a boil, turn it off, and chill it in the sink, stirring it with the thermometer. I usually cool down to ~40C as this won't kill any yeast it comes into contact with (not really a big issue of it's a bit too warm, just a precaution I take), yet still warm enough to easily dissolve into the beer.

remember to stir lightly but thoroughly the beer after you add the priming sugar. Since this will make sure its evenly distributed. If this is not done then you will get some part of the beer getting sugar to carb with and others with less. This causes differing amounts of carbonation.