TastyBrew Priming Question

[inturnldemize]

This might sound like a weird question, but when you're calculating bottle priming on tastybrew.com, it asks you about the fermentation temperature. Now, is this the temperature that the fermentation occurred at or the temperature that my beer is currently at?

I know for the first 3 days (when vigorous fermentation was occurring, my temperature was 23-24 degrees celcius). Since then, so for the last 8-9 days, it's been at a constant 21 degrees. So i'm not sure what number I should be using.

Any help is appreicated! Thanks.

 

[Gregscsu]

You will want to enter the highest temp your beer reached during or after fermentation. The calculator uses this info to determine residual CO2.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

It's the highest temp the beer hit during fermentation. It accounts for the amount of co2 present due to fermentation, and since co2 releases faster at warmer temps, the warmest the brew got will tell you how much co2 is present at packaging. Hope that helps.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

You will want to enter the highest temp your beer reached during or after fermentation. The calculator uses this info to determine residual CO2.

Must be something in the water here in the cities!!

 

[inturnldemize]

How much Co2 pressure can a typical Heineken bottle withstand? I want my IPA to have a CO2 of 2.1-ish.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

2.1 is fine for any bottle, but you may want to rethink the idea of bottling an IPA (or any beer with hops in it) in green bottles. Green bottles let light in, which skunks the beer. That's why Heinie tastes like a skunk's heinie.

 

[inturnldemize]

Even if I leave them in a dark place? I keep them covered in a box.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

Well, yeah, the won't skunk in boxes, but what about the light in the fridge? It only takes a few mins of light exposure to skunk a beer. I've seen it happen in the glass sitting on my patio, if the sunlight hits the glass, skunk-y flavors/aromas appear.

 

[inturnldemize]

Hmmm, I have almost all green bottles this time around I gotta look into that next batch. Thanks for the heads up though!

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

Hmmm, I have almost all green bottles this time around I gotta look into that next batch. Thanks for the heads up though!

Yep. Just be careful to expose them to as little light as possible and you should be ok. Guys use green and even clear bottles all the time, it's just safer as far as light exposure to go with the darkest bottles you can. Pun totally intended.... Look on the bright side, now you have a d@mn good reason to drink 2 1/2 cases of beer!

 

[inturnldemize]

+1 to you good sir! lol

 

[weirdboy]

The highest temperature achieved during fermentation is not quite right.


This is because during fermentation, the yeast are still producing CO2, and that CO2 has an opportunity to dissolve in the beer. The whole point of that field in the calculator is that the lower the temperature, the more CO2 stays dissolved in your beer, and the less priming sugar you need to add to achieve the desired level of carbonation. However it is not an instantaneous process to change the carbonation level in beer. Even in a commercial brewery where they are forcing CO2 through a big diffusion stone at high pressure to rapidly carbonate, it takes some time.

If you start at, say 75F and then ramp down to 65F relatively early on (say, the first day or two) and then maintain that temp, you ought to be using 65F as your temperature.

Or, say your fermentation is done and your fermenter warms up to 72F for an hour or two before you notice and cool it back down. Again, I'd use 65F there as the dissolved CO2 hasn't really had a long enough time to naturally come out of solution.

 

[NordeastBrewer77]

The highest temperature achieved during fermentation is not quite right.

If you start at, say 75F and then ramp down to 65F relatively early on (say, the first day or two) and then maintain that temp, you ought to be using 65F as your temperature.

You're totally right there. A better way to put it would be the highest temp reached after fermentation begins. If you pitch at 75 degrees, and then immediately put the wort in a fermentation chamber at 66 degrees, you wouldn't put 75 degrees in as the temp. What I always do is put the highest temp my beer reached during fermentation, or after FG was reached, into the temp. I figure even if the beer only reached 68 during primary, yet I dry hop it at 72, that the time spent at 72 would release more co2 than at 68. And since the beer won't reabsorb co2 if it were to cool back to 68, the highest temp during, or after fermentation seems the prudent choice.