Barleywine not carbed. Add yeast to bottles?

Long story short, my barleywine isn't carbed and I'm thinking about rehydrating some champagne yeast and adding a very small amount to get it carbed.

For background, I brewed KingBrian's Fireside Barleywine (https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f74/fireside-barleywine-141062/) in late December. OG was 1.11, FG was 1.02. I bottled sometime in February with the intention of leaving it to age until next fall.
I cracked one the other day to see how it was coming along and it wasn't carbed at all. I know high gravity beers need longer to carb, but surely over 4 months there would have been some progress. The bottles were stored at around 70-75F since bottling.

Since the beer is almost 12%, I'm guessing Nottingham choked itself out and isn't going to work anymore. I've read that some people add champagne yeast at this point since it is a bit more feisty and can get the job done.

Does this seem like a good approach? My only concern is that if Nottingham couldn't ferment everything, the champagne would take care of that AND the priming sugar causing bottle bombs.

Should I go for it or no?

I'd say wait a little longer. My last Wee Heavy took 6-7 months to carb up.

Maybe you could give these a try. I have never used them but they seem to have good reviews.

for big beers 9% + I will just pitch some 1118 or CBC1 at bottling time. I would just mix some up and eye dropper some into each bottle and recap.

Thanks for the replies all.

JonM said:

I'd say wait a little longer. My last Wee Heavy took 6-7 months to carb up.

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Did you see any difference after 4 months? When I opened mine there was no carbonation at all. I'm a bit worried if I wait it out that it'll be too late to have carbed by fall/winter.

WayFrae said:

Maybe you could give these a try. I have never used them but they seem to have good reviews.

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I've seen those but I'm still not sure how they work. Do you have any experience with them? I've already added priming sugar so if this stuff has any more fermentables I'd be hesitant.

poptarts said:

for big beers 9% + I will just pitch some 1118 or CBC1 at bottling time. I would just mix some up and eye dropper some into each bottle and recap.

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This is the approach I've been leaning towards. Have you had any issues with the additional yeast fermenting the priming sugar AND any potential leftovers from the primary that the first yeast couldn't get to?

Cheesy_Goodness said:

This is the approach I've been leaning towards. Have you had any issues with the additional yeast fermenting the priming sugar AND any potential leftovers from the primary that the first yeast couldn't get to?

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I would think that would only be a factor if you used a yeast that was a stronger attenuator than what you fermented with. If you add priming sugar to the batch and pitch the same strain you should get carbed.

Ive never noticed additional fermentation past the priming sugar pitching a different strain. They are so stressed in there eating all the priming sugar is probably about all they can do.

So for example, if I pitched Nottingham, I should use Nottingham to reprime but it's probably ok to use something stronger since Nottingham probably got it all (except the priming sugar) the first time?

That would be my thought. I've always kegged though so take it with a grain of salt.

I have a US-05 imperial stout at 11.6% that's not carbing up after 2-mo. I bought some Belgian Strong Wyeast to re-yeast. I'm planning on dropping a couple drops into each bottle and recapping.

Cheesy_Goodness said:

So for example, if I pitched Nottingham, I should use Nottingham to reprime but it's probably ok to use something stronger since Nottingham probably got it all (except the priming sugar) the first time?

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Depends what you mean by "stronger." If you mean "tolerates high alcohol environments better," then yes, you can do that. But if you mean "tends to attenuate more," and one of the reasons is it ferments a larger percentage of trisaccharides, then you might be setting yourself up for failure.

Both sides are a concern when dealing with big beers and reyeasting, which is why a lot of people use cheap champagne yeast. A hearty ale yeast would probably be best, but many people seem to do fine with champagne.

It looks like champagne yeast's attenuation is in the same ballpark as Nottingham so I'll probably give that a try. I've got a few different packs of wine yeasts, so I'll need to look through and see what one would be best.

I'll probably only test it on a few bottles and let it sit for about a month to see what it'll do, then repeat if there are signs that it's working.

I'll try to remember to report back with results in case anyone else has a similar question.

What'd you end up using?

have a barleywine in secondary and looking to bottle condition and heard champagne yeast is a good one. Curious to get some feedback

Cheesy_Goodness said:

It looks like champagne yeast's attenuation is in the same ballpark as Nottingham so I'll probably give that a try. I've got a few different packs of wine yeasts, so I'll need to look through and see what one would be best.

I'll probably only test it on a few bottles and let it sit for about a month to see what it'll do, then repeat if there are signs that it's working.

I'll try to remember to report back with results in case anyone else has a similar question.

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Any news? I've got a barleywine waiting to bottle and I'm probably gonna head the ec 1118 route.

Sorry guys, forgot to report back to this thread.

Anyway, I had some Nottingham (which is what I used for the initial ferment) that I washed from a batch of Centennial Blonde (I think). Added a scoop of the cake to a sanitized mason jar and let it go in the fridge until it was settled. Decanted most of the liquid, shook it up, and added about a tsp of the yeast liquid to each bottle before recapping. It was easy to be consistent since the eyedropper I got was for children so amounts were noted.

I tried one bottle a week or two later (not expecting anything) and there was a slight amount of carbonation after that short amount of time. Happily, I put another one in the fridge earlier this week. Hoping to try it this weekend. It has been reprimed for approximately 2.5 months.