Bottle conditioning a ridiculously attenuated barleywine

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Kenmoron

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I brewed a barleywine (english-ish) back in November using 24 lbs Maris Otter, 1 lb Biscuit Malt
6 oz Special B, and used Sterling and EKG hops. I wanted it to be fairly attenuated so I mashed at 149 F. However, this was my first time doing an overnight mash, so it went from 149 to 147 over a period of 10 hrs. Starting OG was 1.107 and I pitched 1 full packet each of Bry-97 and Lallemand Abbaye to encourage some fun ester production. After ~2 weeks of primary I transferred to a 5 gal freshly dumped whiskey barrel. I took a refractometer reading at that point which calculated out to be ~1.011 (I expected ~1.025)! I didn't worry about it too much as I know a refract can be off, especially the higher the OG.

So after 1 month of aging in the barrel I primed, bottled, and grabbed my hydrometer sample. Hydrometer showed a FG of 1.009...91% attenuation! So I bottled a ~14.2% ABV beer. After 3 weeks at room temp I threw a bottle in the fridge...no carbonation. I am going to let them sit for about another 3 weeks or so to see if anything changes. If not, I may try to pop them open, drop in some champagne yeast, and recap. However, will typical bottling yeast even work at this ABV? I've heard you can get champagne yeasts up to roughly 18% ABV with primary, but only about 14% tolerance when using to bottle condition. Anyone have any luck/tips/advice on bottle conditioning beers >14-15%?
 
I've always used champagne yeast for super-big beers. It's always taken way longer to carbonate than regular beers. I'd wait at least a month or two before trying one.
 
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I just agitated/re-suspended the sediment and pushed it closer to a heating vent. Will agitate every few days and test again in another 3-4 wks.
 
I just bottled a variant of a barrel aged stout. I re-yeasted both the plain and the coffee variant with CBC-1. The plain batch carbonated fine in 3 weeks, the coffee variant is taking longer. Hopefully I didn't forget the sugar!
 
I also brewed a Barleywine back in November. Mine started at 1.104 and ended at 1.014 so about 11.8%. I used dry yeast(2pks of Nottingham) for the first time. I soaked on med oak cubes for 1 month and bottled with 3 oz of table sugar. Sunday I will be at 3 weeks. I plan to try my first bottle at 4 weeks. I realize I am a bit lower on ABV, but I will report back. Nottingham appeared to be a beast on the initial fermentation. I'm hoping it still had enough stuff to prime the bottles.
 
Well after another two weeks (5 weeks total) where I moved them close to a heating vent and have been agitating them pretty much every other day, I popped one in the fridge...and no change in carbonation...still pretty much just flat. So I'm going to have to get creative with some bottling yeast.

Is there a particular strain of bottling/champagne yeast that is especially high in alcohol tolerance or are they pretty much the same...and just go with what's most available (CBC-1)? Should I try to just drop a granule into each bottle? Make a starter and add a drop of active yeast? Or maybe try to ferment out a starter by adding more and more DME/sugar to get the ABV pretty close to what's in my bottles (14.5%ish)...and adding a drop of that yeast?
 
Probably hard to find conditioning strains that do much better than CBC-1.

Whatever you're going to do, considering what's likely ahead, I recommend you include a screw-top plastic soda bottle in the mix, so rather than prematurely opening bottles to check carbonation, you can simply give the plastic bottle a squeeze every so often. Once it has become almost too hard to squeeze you'll know the bottles are ready...

Cheers!
 
I also cracked open a bottle of my Barleywine at 4 weeks in the bottle. Mine was still flat also. My ABV is around 11.8%. I thought Nottingham at 3 weeks primary and 4 weeks secondary would still be able to carbonate my bottles. I roused the yeast last night and am moving to a slightly warmer part of the house. But If I don't see some change in a few weeks, I will plan to introduce some new yeast. I never had this happen even with a big stout. Keep us posted!
 
If you're going to go with the reopening route, use CBC-1, but rehydrate it first, then use a medicine dropper or pipette to add 1-2 ml per bottle. I recently did this with a 14.5% tripel and it worked great. At the first bottling, I had added enough sugar to bring it up to 3.5 vols of CO2. At 3 weeks in the bottle, it's doing great, and I'm getting a lot of positive feedback on it.
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After 8 weeks in the bottle I put a bottle in the fridge. I cracked a bottle open tonight and it is finally carbonated. Looks like it just may take longer than 4 weeks to carb. I plan to keep it in the warm closet upstairs for a couple more weeks, then take it back downstairs to cellar for a few months.
 

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