Oxidation Help - Process & Bottling Wand

I've been brewing for about 5 years now and recently I've hit a streak of oxidized IPAs when bottling. Everything tastes great at bottling day but after 3 or so weeks in the bottle, my hoppy masterpieces turn into purple/brownish messes that have lost their spark.

After the last oxidized batch, I kegged one instead with much better results. However, I'm in the midst of helping a friend brew for his wedding and his venue will allow bottles but not kegs. I did the same thing for my wedding, so I don't mind the chore of bottling a ton of beers. We did an initial test batch and while the first bottle I had tasted/looked good, after 2 more weeks, it darkened considerably and took on the purple hue.

Given all of this, I can pretty much pinpoint that something is going on during the bottling process and not during the transferring to the bottling bucket since I used the same siphon/hosing to transfer the kegged batch. When I bottle, I attach a spring-loaded bottling wand to the bucket's spigot using about 2 inches of tubing. So, a couple of questions:

• 
  When I bottle, I often find that once the beer has reached the top of the bottle, there are bubbles.Should there be none at all?

• Also, should the top of the bottling wand be flush against the end of the spigot, or should there be any bit of hosing between the two? Does that matter?

The picture below is a side-by-side of my kegged batch (left) and the oxidized one (right). Any thoughts on ways to troubleshoot this? Very disheartening and I need to sort this issue out before I bottle upwards of 200 oxidized beers!

There are a couple of pointer in this thread that may help you out.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=591434

I am having some of the same issues as well. I recently did a split batch the US-05 is still great while the WLP007 is murky & brown with little aroma. I don't think the yeast made a difference but somewhere in the racking and bottling was.

How are you adding the priming sugar? That is one key difference between your kegging and bottling procedures, even if you're using the same bucket.

Priming sugar solution goes into the bucket first and then I hold the tubing against the side/bottom of the bucket to create a whirlpool so that it integrates

I've had this same exact problem with my last two batches of IPA. I brew 3 gallons and bottle directly from the fermented (big mouth bubbler). I pour my priming solution in from a few inches high then very slowly stir with a sanitized spoon.

inkman15,

You might try bottling from a keg with a bottling gun. Go ahead and keg and force carb your IPAs. Then use a bottling gun to fill bottles. The bottling gun lets you flush the bottles with CO2 before you start filling with beer. It doesn't eliminate O2 exposure, but it does reduce it significantly.

Good luck,
Pliny

I've dealt with similar issues for 2 years. I finally have bottled some delicious ipa's that have lasted 2 months in the bottle with great aroma and taste. Bottling wand tube length I feel is irrelevant. I simply keep track of the first bottle because of the rush of liquid, obviously you'll get oxidation in that one,from them on, I tilt the bottle where I can see the tip slowly release liquid in a puddle gradually at the bottom, instead of a possible rush of liquid you can hear for the first few milliliters. Then I finish the bottle to the top. But then I again tilt the bottle to very gently add more to fill the bottle nearly 1/2" from the rim of the bottle. Then I place the cap, without capping, for 20-30min. Then cap. Oh and of course extremely gentle racking to bottling bucket to begin with. Gentle gentle gentle with every step. And eliminate as much oxygen out of the bottle prior to capping by filling higher and letting co2 production flush some o2 out. Doing all these things has done wonders for me. That and not dry hopping after primary, and not cold crashing anymore. Too much chance for oxygen unless its a closed system somehow.