Am I over anxious?

[beytaFish]

This is my first brew and I feel like it's my first child. I have followed every instruction I could find on the internet. I made sure to keep everything sanitary and keep temperature. I am now worried something went wrong. I have my Milk Chocolate Stout in the carboy and it has been about 5 days. Everything has seemed to settle to the bottom and I have almost no activity in the airlock or the carboy. Did I do something wrong? How do I know it's working? How much longer until I put it in bottles?

 

[wilconrad]

Everything is fine, just breathe

Let it go for another week or so, then check you SG to see how fermentation is progressing.

Once SG levels off (hasn't changed in 3+ days), prime and bottle.

 

[Britinusa]

I cant tell from the picture but that may just be trub in the bottom of the fermenter, We always say not to go by airlock for fermentation signs.
As wilconrad said wait another week or so the take a reading.

 

[brewkinger]

Everything is fine, just breathe

Let it go for another week or so, then check you SG to see how fermentation is progressing.

A little something you will see on here a lot....
RDWHAHB

Translation: Relax, Don't Worry; Have a Home Brew

Most yeasts will get the primary main portion of fermentation (70-80%) in about a week. Then they go back and get all the sugars they missed the first time and then they go back and finish up eating ANYTHING that they can find, including some of their own by-products.
This means that MINIMUM 2 weeks in the fermenter
(bigger and darker beers I usually leave for closer to 3 weeks)

Then check and record gravity and repeat in 2 days. If they are the same then bottle or keg and prepare for deliciousness.

 

[BxBrewer]

I wouldn't start checking the FG until week 3. It looks good.

 

[JeffD1]

Looks great. Agreed RDWHAHB! With experience along comes reduced anxiety. I forgot where I read this, but one of my favorite homebrewing quotes is "beer wants to become beer" and very little you can do will ruin it.

In regard to the stuff on the bottom, that is simply yeast settling out (as well as hop material and other sediment). That is what you want to see, and it is normal for airlock activity to stop somewhere between 2 and 5 days. Another thing people say on here a lot is not to use airlock activity as a guide. It is almost meaningless.

 

[beytaFish]

Ok, so now that I have calmed down, how do I prime my beer to bottle it? And what is the best process to bottle?

 

[IvanTheTerribrew]

Ok, so now that I have calmed down, how do I prime my beer to bottle it? And what is the best process to bottle?

My process is sanitize everything you will go anywhere bear the beer, make sure you have clean bottles, sanitize bottles.

Boil up about 1-2 cups of water with the priming sugar dissolved (4.5 oz is a safe middle amount of priming sugar if you don't have a calculator) then let that solution cool a little bit and put it in the bottom of your bottling bucket. Make sure the spigot is closed.

Then rack the beer onto the sugar water and make sure that it mixes well. This can be done easily by just making sure the racking tube flows the beer in a whirlpool motion. Once it's all racked, cover the top, move the bottling bucket to a table or counter.

The easy way I find to connect your bottling want is to take a 1" piece of transfer tubing, cut it off, attach it to your spigot, and then connect the bottling wand to the 1" piece. This way the bottle wand is hanging off the edge and all you need to do to fill a bottle is to lift the bottle onto the wand and when it's done, just lower the bottle. Easy.
Then sanitize the caps and bottle them. Let them condition at roughly the same temp the beer fermented for about 2-3 weeks. Then chill one bottle for about 3+ days and try it and see if it's carbonated. If not, let the rest of the bottles condition longer. If it is, enjoy!

 

[william_shakes_beer]

Can't tell you how many times I racked into the bottling bucket with an open spigot. Even after more than 20 batches!!! Practice with water until you can look at the valve dry and tell whether it's open of closed.

 

[beergolf]

Ok, so now that I have calmed down, how do I prime my beer to bottle it? And what is the best process to bottle?

Here read this. Lots of good bottling tips

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/bottling-tips-homebrewer-94812/

 

[jCOSbrew]

While you are waiting patiently to try your first beer, pick up a copy of Palmer's "How to Brew"
It will explain what is going on in that carboy.

 

[Epimetheus]

Congratulations!
Let's see... you first posted on 1/4 and it has been in the fermenter since 12/31 or so. if you leave it go the full 14 days to 1/14/14, the trub may settle more and it may be easier to rack off clear wort.

I have done a dozen or so batches and used to be understandably eager. When I let it go 14 days or more, the wort was much more clear. (The more experienced brewers were right again.) YMMV. Everyone has slightly different experiences.

 

[bobby4]

There is only one good cure for anxiety - brew more. When you have a few batches in the fridge and a few planned, you worry about each less. Now that I think about it, I worried about my first kid a lot less after 2 and 3 came along...

 

[beytaFish]

How do I make my priming sugar I'm using bottles that I get from work that I clean and sanitize. Is table sugar good to use?

 

[madnetter1]

How do I make my priming sugar I'm using bottles that I get from work that I clean and sanitize. Is table sugar good to use?

Not really a big deal if that's all you have in a pinch. Use a priming calculator though because the weights are a little different in table sugar versus corn sugar.

 

[JeffD1]

How do I make my priming sugar I'm using bottles that I get from work that I clean and sanitize. Is table sugar good to use?

Absolutely does not matter provided you use the correct amounts (and the differences in weeight needed are also pretty trivial). I'm convinced that the reason most people use corn sugar is so the LHBS increase their sales and convince people to buy sugar when they have plenty at home. I always use table sugar to prime.