2 Questions Regarding Bottling/Priming Sugar

Hey all...Here are 2 questions that I have:

1- Since I'm only doing 1-gallon batches, when I use the online bottle priming calculator, should I make sure that I'm also accounting for the amount of yeast cake/trub/etc. that I'm leaving in my carboy? For example, instead of putting "total volume" as 1.0 gallons. Maybe I should be putting 0.8 gallons, etc? Because 1 gallon is such a small amount, being off a tenth of an ounce or so could actually make a large difference. Thoughts?

2- If you carbed your beers for the 3 week period, then put them in the fridge for a few days and found they were way overcarbed, can you simply take them back out of the fridge and allow them to settle at 70 degrees for another week or 2 without skunking your beer? Will doing this help? Or, once a bottle is overcarbed, it simply never goes away?

Thank you!

Anyone?

1) Yes, when calculating the amount of wort/beer you are carbing, you don't count trub. If it makes that big of a difference, you should subtract the trub amount, but for a typical batch, it shouldn't make that much of a difference that would lead to overcarbonated beer. On a 5 gallon batch, I default about 0.4 gallons for loss to trub, but I filter my boil hops out before fermentation, so your trub % may vary.

2) It is a real PITA to uncarb then recarb bottled beer. You would basically need to open every bottle at room temp to release the CO2 out of solution (just setting them out without popping the cap doesn't uncarb them!), add priming drops, recap, and recarb at 70F for another 3 weeks. This would also be a VERY inexact science, and there would be a pretty good chance you'd overcarb again because it's hard to tell that all of the CO2 is out of solution without letting them sit open for a long time, which would inevitably oxidate the beer.

You are best off just chalking this one up to experience, drinking it overcarbed, and getting it right on the next batch. Overcarbonation shouldn't make the beer undrinkable. At worst, it just adds a slight carbonic acid bite to the tail of the flavor profile.

TopherM said:

1) Yes, when calculating the amount of wort/beer you are carbing, you don't count trub. If it makes that big of a difference, you should subtract the trub amount, but for a typical batch, it shouldn't make that much of a difference. On a 5 gallon batch, I default about 0.4 gallons for loss to trub, but I filter my boil hops out before fermentation, so your trub % may vary.

2) It is a real PITA to uncarb then recarb bottled beer. You would basically need to open every bottle at room temp to release the CO2 out of solution (just setting them out without popping the cap doesn't uncarb them!), add priming drops, recap, and recarb at 70F for another 3 weeks. This would also be a VERY inexact science, and there would be a pretty good chance you'd overcarb again because it's hard to tell that all of the CO2 is out of solution without letting them sit open for a long time, which would inevitably oxidate the beer.

You are best off just chalking this one up to experience, drinking it overcarbed, and getting it right on the next batch.

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Thanks. That's what I'll do then. I'm just worried because I've already bottled 4 other batches that are currently conditioning at room temp. Since I've used the same calculator throughout, are all 4 of my subsequent batches going to be overcarbed too?

Bulk priming is the way to go! If rack your beer into a container that can accurately measure the beer volume then all you have to do is boil up the specific amount of sugar and water for the volume you have based on the amount of carbonation you want!

I always rack into my bottling bucket (which has good volume marks on it) then I calculate the volume of sugar I need.

Of course I always GENTLY stir for a few minutes to incorporate the sugar and water mixture to get an even carbonation!

Works great for me!

Are you leaving your beer in the fridge for a good THREE days before serving? Any less would lead to the illusion of overcarbonation, but it is really just all of the CO2 in the headspace of the bottle hasn't absorbed into the solution yet. That could be your issue.

What's the average amount of priming sugar you are adding to these one gallon batches? Should be something around 0.8-1.2 oz.

You should be able to add a good 20-30% more than that as well before you start getting ill effects from overcarbonation.

TopherM said:

What's the average amount of priming sugar you are adding to these one gallon batches? Should be something around 0.8-1.2 oz.

You should be able to add a good 20-30% more than that as well before you start getting ill effects from overcarbonation.

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I left my batch (bottle conditioned for 3 weeks at room temp) in the fridge for 6 days before opening one.

For the batch in question, I used .5 oz of priming sugar for an English Brown Ale. After 6 days in the fridge, I opened one up and it had so much carbonation it reminded me of champagne. There's no way it could've been infected, either. I'm just worried that since I'm using this calculator for all of my subsequent beers, I'm going to continue to have overcarbonation problems.

How long are you leaving your beers in primary fermentation? Do you have a hydrometer, and are you checking for a stable FG? You should be in primary fermentation at least 2 weeks, ideally 3 weeks on most average gravity beers.

0.5 oz of corn sugar/dextrose is not going to overcarbonate a 1 gallon batch in bottles. The only other thing I can think of is you are not reaching FG and there's residual sugar still left when you bottle, meaning there is more sugar for the yeast to carb with than you think. If you are doing a short primary, or bottling when the airlock stops or something like that, it would explain your carbonation issues.

TopherM said:

How long are you leaving your beers in primary fermentation? Do you have a hydrometer, and are you checking for a stable FG? You should be in primary fermentation at least 2 weeks, ideally 3 weeks on most average gravity beers.

0.5 oz of corn sugar/dextrose is not going to overcarbonate a 1 gallon batch in bottles. The only other thing I can think of is you are not reaching FG and there's residual sugar still left when you bottle, meaning there is more sugar for the yeast to carb with than you think. If you are doing a short primary, or bottling when the airlock stops or something like that, it would explain your carbonation issues.

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I left the batch in the primary for 3 weeks and then took 3 straight hydrometer readings (1.014 each day consecutively), then bottled.

I let it bottled condition for 3 weeks at room temp.

Then I put them in the fridge for 6 days before opening my first one. Each one has been just as overcarbed as the others.

If you hit your expected final gravity, and only added 0.5 oz of priming sugar to a 1 gallon batch, and don't have any wild yeast, and had adequate time in the fridge to allow the carb to dissolve into the solution, then it would be practically impossible to overcarb.

Sorry, I think you must be missing something among the variables above. There really isn't any other way to get your final result.

TopherM said:

If you hit your expected final gravity, and only added 0.5 oz of priming sugar to a 1 gallon batch, and don't have any wild yeast, and had adequate time in the fridge to allow the carb to dissolve into the solution, then it would be practically impossible to overcarb.

Sorry, I think you must be missing something among the variables above. There really isn't any other way to get your final result.

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The only thing that I can possibly think of is the fact that I returned my hydrometer samples back to the carboy (due to only having 1-gallon). I'm OCD when it comes to sanitizing, and I'm very calculated and planned out. I do everything slowly, and poured everything back into the carboy slowly, as to not disrupt everything and oxidize the beer.

This literally could be the only thing to potentially cause the overcarbing.

Still honestly wouldn't explain consistent overcarbination over 6 batches...the other explinations are far more probable.

TopherM said:

Still honestly wouldn't explain consistent overcarbination over 6 batches...the other explinations are far more probable.

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It hasn't happened to my other 5 batches...yet. The one I opened this past weekend was my first ever batch. But I'm worried because all of the other batches I have done the same way. 3 weeks in primary, check FG readings, cold crash, bottle (using calculator), 3 weeks at room temp, and 6 days or so in fridge. I'm just worried that they're going to come out the same way.

Maybe this is just an anomaly with the first batch? It WAS a kit, and all of the other batches I've been doing have been recipes that I've found online and gone to the LHBS for my grain bills/hops/etc.

I should probably just RDWHAHB...But damn, the carbonation! Hahah

Do you have a carbonic acid bite to the beers? That would be characteristic of true overcarbination. Or do they just seem a bit out of style and highly carbonated?

For this batch, when you are ready to drink, just open the beer, pour it into a cold glass and put that glass in the fridge for about 5 minutes and you'll have about 25% less carb in the solution right there.

TopherM said:

Do you have a carbonic acid bite to the beers? That would be characteristic of true overcarbination. Or do they just seem a bit out of style and highly carbonated?

For this batch, when you are ready to drink, just open the beer, pour it into a cold glass and put that glass in the fridge for about 5 minutes and you'll have about 25% less carb in the solution right there.

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I'm not sure what you mean by the carbonic acid bite, but I can tell you that it tasted very...clean? It's a Brown Ale, but had this clean/bitey finish to it. When I'd burp, I actually got a weird aftertaste from it. As it warmed up, the maltiness of the Brown Ale came out more, but it still had that clean/biting finish to it.

When you say "For this batch..." You mean my current overcarbed Brown Ale? I only have about 4 left, so I'm not overly worried about it. I just don't want it to happen to the rest of my pipeline that I'm building.

You would know if it had a carbonic acid bite, so that one may not be technically overcarbed, just high carbonation for the style.

Carbonic Acid is very sour on the tail end of the flavor profile. Almost like a sour lemon-lime taste.

So that's actually probably good news, you didn't really overcarb, you are just slightly out of style or you personally perfer a lower carbonation. If you find the rest of your beers are not carbed to your liking, you may want to try bumping the suggested priming sugar down about 10-15% on your subsequent brews.

TopherM said:

You would know if it had a carbonic acid bite, so that one may not be technically overcarbed, just high carbonation for the style.

Carbonic Acid is very sour on the tail end of the flavor profile. Almost like a sour lemon-lime taste.

So that's actually probably good news, you didn't really overcarb, you are just slightly out of style or you personally perfer a lower carbonation. If you find the rest of your beers are not carbed to your liking, you may want to try bumping the suggested priming sugar down about 10-15% on your subsequent brews.

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Thanks man. I really appreciate your time and expertise. If everything I open is "too carbed" for my tastes, I'll just scale it back as you suggested.

To me, the Brown Ale I'm currently drinking is carbed almost like a Lambic. Way too much for the style. Not sure why a priming sugar calculator would recommend that though?

I use the TastyBrew carbonation calculator:

http://www.tastybrew.com/calculators/priming.html

For your numbers, it actually suggests about 0.6 oz priming sugar for the dead middle of the Brown Ale carbonation style, 0.4 oz to be on the low end, which I why I think maybe it's just a preference on your part to be closer to the low end of the style.

JeffoC6 said:

cold crash, bottle (using calculator)

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Just noticed this.... If you use the tasty brew calculator to figure the amount of priming sugar, and plug in 1.9 for you CO2 volume, 1 gallon for your batch size and only change the temperature variable....

70 degrees = .6 oz of corn sugar
40 degrees = .2 oz of corn sugar

are you accounting for temperature correctly when figuring the amount of priming sugar?

A brown ale yeast wouldn't have carbonated at all at 40 degrees, so that question doesn't really apply. At any reasonable carbing temp, the OP was within style guides with the 0.5 oz of priming sugar he added for his 1 gallon batch.

TopherM said:

A brown ale yeast wouldn't have carbonated at all at 40 degrees, so that question doesn't really apply. At any reasonable carbing temp, the OP was within style guides with the 0.5 oz of priming sugar he added for his 1 gallon batch.

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my bad. For some reason I was thinking that if his beer was sitting at 40 degrees after cold crashing and he was using the calculation for 70 degrees... he would be adding too much and the trapped CO2 from the cold crash was contributing to the excess carbonation.

Hey guys, I'm not sure what you mean. I did cold crash down below 40 degrees, and when I bottled, the beer was definitely still "cold." But I was told that when I use the tastybrew priming calculator, I should use the temperature that my beer fermented at in the field where it says "____ degrees fahrenheit." I was also told that the beer didn't need to "warm back up to room temp" before adding priming sugar/etc.

Since the vigorous fermentation during the first 3 days of this fermentation was at or around 65 degrees, that's the temp I input into that field.

Is this correct?