Anyone have tips for mixing in priming sugar?

[Keith Adams]

Hi everyone, I am about to bottle up a brown ale and I am concerned with stirring in my priming sugar and mixing in the sediment at the bottom of my bottling bucket as well as the trub floating on the surface.

Does anyone have a method for avoiding making the brew cloudy before bottling? Thanks in advance.

 

[Jag75]

Hey man welcome to the forum. Not sure if I'm not understanding you but you should be adding the priming solution to a clean bottle bucket, not the fermenter. One with a spigot preferable because you can attach a bottling wand via short piece of tubing . You shouldn't be transferring any trub or sludge from the bottom of your fermenter. As you transfer let the racking cane tubing go to the bottom of the bucket so it's not splashing. You may need to prop your fermenter up as it gets low to get the rest of your beer , just dont be too greedy and suck up any crud. Hopefully you checked the gravity with a hydrometer to ensure it's done. Look up bottle bombs , they do exist lol. Your priming sugar amount and temp are important. Northernbrewer has a calculator for determining the amount of sugar to use to get you a desired co2 volume . Make sure your racking cane, bottle bucket and bottles are clean and sanitized. Leave bottles in a dark closet or box at 70f for a couple weeks . Some people fill one beer in a water bottle to see when its carbed up . After 2 weeks I'll put 1 in the fridge for a day or so then crack . If it's done I'll move a handful to the fridge and replace as they get drank. I've had some fully carbed in a week before but 2 weeks is the norm . Good luck and welcome to the hobby!

 

[kh54s10]

Siphon the beer from the fermenter to a bottling bucket. Be sure that you don't suck up the trub at the bottom of the fermenter.
Boil the correct amount of priming sugar for a few minutes in a cup or so of water to dissolve it.
Put the siphon tubing in an arc around the bottom of the bottling bucket.
Add the priming sugar without splashing.
The swirling will mix the sugar solution sufficiently.
If worried stir very gently with a sanitized spoon.
Proceed with bottling.

 

[Keith Adams]

Hey man welcome to the forum. Not sure if I'm not understanding you but you should be adding the priming solution to a clean bottle bucket, not the fermenter. One with a spigot preferable because you can attach a bottling wand via short piece of tubing . You shouldn't be transferring any trub or sludge from the bottom of your fermenter. As you transfer let the racking cane tubing go to the bottom of the bucket so it's not splashing. You may need to prop your fermenter up as it gets low to get the rest of your beer , just dont be too greedy and suck up any crud. Hopefully you checked the gravity with a hydrometer to ensure it's done. Look up bottle bombs , they do exist lol. Your priming sugar amount and temp are important. Northernbrewer has a calculator for determining the amount of sugar to use to get you a desired co2 volume . Make sure your racking cane, bottle bucket and bottles are clean and sanitized. Leave bottles in a dark closet or box at 70f for a couple weeks . Some people fill one beer in a water bottle to see when its carbed up . After 2 weeks I'll put 1 in the fridge for a day or so then crack . If it's done I'll move a handful to the fridge and replace as they get drank. I've had some fully carbed in a week before but 2 weeks is the norm . Good luck and welcome to the hobby!

Thanks for the info! Currently I am using 6 1/2 gallon bottling bucket as my fermenter. Pretty much doing a single stage kinda thing. I think that next time I’ll get another carboy that is solely for fermentation and keep the bottling bucket for what it should be used for.

Appreciate the help and the warm welcome. I’ve got a couple brews down at this point but I’m looking to really hone my skills and make better brews and not be winging it as much as before haha.

Aloha!

 

[Riley Henderson]

What I like to do is after the beer has been fermenting for a week or two I rack it into a carboy, after letting it condition in secondary for a few weeks depending on the brew I'm doing, I use gelatine and a cold crash to get any remaining solid particles to drop to the bottom of the carboy.

2 days later I rack it to yet another carboy this time keeping my siphon elevated from the resting at the bottom of the carboy as well as trying to keep it as still as possible as to not mix anything to avoid disturbing the sediment.

Another week or so and it bottling time where I would dissolve about a cup of dextrose in boiling water and stir till its clear as water, pour that into my bottling bucket, and then transfer my beer into it, while bottling I also give the bottling bucket a small stir every 5 or so bottles to mix up the priming solution to better my chances at getting even carbonation.

Its a few extra steps and typically need a extra set of hands to help but I have gotten really clear beers with minimal to no sediment at the bottom of the bottles.

 

[z-bob]

Hi everyone, I am about to bottle up a brown ale and I am concerned with stirring in my priming sugar and mixing in the sediment at the bottom of my bottling bucket as well as the trub floating on the surface.

Does anyone have a method for avoiding making the brew cloudy before bottling? Thanks in advance.

Two ways to do it:

• The most common is to siphon the beer to a clean sanitized bucket with the priming sugar in the bottom, then bottle from that.
• The other way is to add the sugar to each bottle; then you can bottle straight from the fermenter without going to a bucket first.

I add a measured amount of sugar to each bottle.

 

[bkboiler]

I add the measured amount of sugar to each bottle if it's a small enough batch and I'm packaging in bombers...otherwise it's too hard to be precise...
Some people get a pipette in that case and dispense the sugar water by volume into each bottle...
For big batches in small bottles, I would use a bottling bucket.

 

[z-bob]

I add the measured amount of sugar to each bottle if it's a small enough batch and I'm packaging in bombers...otherwise it's too hard to be precise...
Some people get a pipette in that case and dispense the sugar water by volume into each bottle...
For big batches in small bottles, I would use a bottling bucket.

For most bottles, I use sugar cubes; for 11 or 12 oz bottles I use a Domino Dots small cube. For 16 or 17 oz bottles, I use a larger C&H sugar cube. (I don't remember how many grams each of those is, but I can figure it out if you want) For bombers I use 2 D-Dots. I don't do many bombers. For 1L bottles I use 2 C&H's.

For weird in-between bottles like 750ml, I calculate how much granulated sugar to use, and use a gram scale and whiskey flask funnel to add it. That's faster than you might expect, but it would be a pain for 12 oz bottles.

I've been doing most of my bottling with 17 oz plastic bottles lately.

 

[kh54s10]

What I like to do is after the beer has been fermenting for a week or two I rack it into a carboy, after letting it condition in secondary for a few weeks depending on the brew I'm doing, I use gelatine and a cold crash to get any remaining solid particles to drop to the bottom of the carboy.

2 days later I rack it to yet another carboy this time keeping my siphon elevated from the resting at the bottom of the carboy as well as trying to keep it as still as possible as to not mix anything to avoid disturbing the sediment.

Another week or so and it bottling time where I would dissolve about a cup of dextrose in boiling water and stir till its clear as water, pour that into my bottling bucket, and then transfer my beer into it, while bottling I also give the bottling bucket a small stir every 5 or so bottles to mix up the priming solution to better my chances at getting even carbonation.

Its a few extra steps and typically need a extra set of hands to help but I have gotten really clear beers with minimal to no sediment at the bottom of the bottles.

I would suggest that you move the beer as little as possible. Each time you transfer you increase the risk of infection and oxidation, for a very little additional clearing. I ferment for 2 weeks. If the beer is still cloudy I wait longer. Then I prime the same as you but rarely do any additional stirring. NO secondary. I make sure the siphon tube is along the outside of the bucket so there is a good vortex created. That stirs in the priming solution well.

 

[McKnuckle]

Definitely try the Domino Dots sugar cubes in standard 12 oz. bottles. This is the simplest way to evenly dose priming sugar, and to do so without any stirring or extra transfer stage.

Under no circumstance should you attempt to stir sugar into a primary fermenter containing trub.

If you won't or can't try the sugar cube approach, then follow @kh54s10 's guidance on this thread.

 

[kh54s10]

Definitely try the Domino Dots sugar cubes in standard 12 oz. bottles. This is the simplest way to evenly dose priming sugar, and to do so without any stirring or extra transfer stage.

Under no circumstance should you attempt to stir sugar into a primary fermenter containing trub.

If you won't or can't try the sugar cube approach, then follow @kh54s10 's guidance on this thread.

To each his own but I used priming tabs once. What a PITA. And you have to be careful that you don't put 2 in one bottle and miss another. So much easier to just mix in the solution then just fill all the bottles. IMO.

 

[estricklin]

Welcome to the hobby, and this forum.

I typically add the priming sugar to the bottling bucket, and then stir after all the beer has been transferred. Stirring may not be necessary, but I'm very proud of my consistently well carbonated home brews, knock on wood.

I've tried the carbonation tablets, DME, corn sugar and table sugar; I prefer table sugar as it's cheaper and I always have it around the house.

I understand using the bottling bucket as a fermenter, sometimes you just have to do stuff like that in homebrewing, obviously get another bucket as soon as you can.

Good luck!

 

[balrog]

Good points above, all covered well. I have a question about "disturbing the trub floating on the top". If it is krausen, and it hasn't fallen, perhaps it is a bit soon to bottle? Have you determined that the SG is not dropping still, measuring with hydrometer and again 3 days later?

 

[kh54s10]

Good points above, all covered well. I have a question about "disturbing the trub floating on the top". If it is krausen, and it hasn't fallen, perhaps it is a bit soon to bottle? Have you determined that the SG is not dropping still, measuring with hydrometer and again 3 days later?

I wonder if the OP hasn't already bottled said batch since his post was on February 22nd?

 

[balrog]

it's always the danged details.
he's proly already finished the batch by now.

 

[Keith Adams]

Bottled about 2 weeks ago. Being very excited I opened one up last night. Definitely not carb’d up to the right level just yet but I couldn’t help myself. Also the flavor has not come together yet.

I ended up creating a priming sugar solution and gently stirring it in. Not the most ideal but it worked in a pinch. I bought another bottling bucket so I will now be transferring into there and then bottling. I have a blonde ale going into bottles this a Saturday!

Thanks everyone!