Bottle carbonation problem...

[Duster]

Ive made a bunch of extract kit beers now and everything is working out great EXCEPT Im finding that sometimes when I bottle the recipes, some go through a timeline of 1 - first couple weeks the beer has no carbonation.....2 - the beer then becomes perfectly carbonated....3- the beer is wildly overcarbonated....

Yes, I do keg but I do like my 12oz bottle also....Im typically brewing NB kits with 4oz of sugar....

Maybe this is just the nature of the beast.....

Any suggestions on what to do with a great brew that falls into that category now of OVER-carbonated ? Sit in the frig a while after opening ? Add something to it ?

Thanks in advance....

 

[Chrisrapp0122]

Try using carbonation drops (there are a bunch of names for these things). Ever since I had a under-carbonated batch, I use these things and they seem to work great. Use 1 for 12 oz bottles and 2 for 22 oz bottles.

What's nice is that you do not have to transfer to a priming bucket to add sugar. I simply transfer the wort from my primary straight into the bottles since I can just throw some of these drops in there.

Here is a link for an example: http://www.morebeer.com/products/carbonation-drops.html

 

[Duster]

hmmm.... do these keep it from being OVER-carbonated ?

Im going to try it... the last batch I made I completely forgot the sugar and had to guess-timate the sugar by hand, not fun...

 

[kh54s10]

Northern Brewer has a priming calculator on their site. Make sure the solution is well mixed and you should have no problems. If anything, go light.

Over carbonated? If in a keg, release all the pressure and wait a while. In bottles you might have to uncap and recap a couple of times to lessen the carbonation.

 

[Duster]

Sounds good ... Ill check it out...

 

[Jim311]

Make sure your priming sugar is being mixed in well. I like to put it in the bottling bucket FIRST, and then siphon in my beer on top of it so it gets mixed well. Also make sure you're conditioning in a warm enough place with a consistent temperature.

 

[unionrdr]

The important point to make here is to dissolve the sugar in 2C of boiled water & cover to cool a bit before priming the beer as it goes into the bottling bucket. If using a beer gun or otherwise from the keg, drops would be easier & surer. The Cooper's style drops are good. They look like lozenges.

 

[Duster]

... The Cooper's style drops are good. They look like lozenges.

Yes Im going to try those on my next batch...