bottle priming help

[cabo]

Hi guys. I want to prime my bottles individually with granulated white sugar. I've always batch primed with corn sugar in the past, but want to try this old technique to satisfy my curiosity as to what is easier. Can someone tell me how many teaspoons of granulated table sugar(or how much of one) to add to each bottle to achieve roughly 2.4 volumes. FWIW I am trying to develop my own little technique to draw my beer directly from the fermenter and into the bottle without much disterbence. I'm mainly just tired of messing with my bottling bucket, boiling water, cooling it...bla bla bla. Thanks.

Cabo

 

[McKnuckle]

Get a small gram scale with 0.1g precision, and weigh the sugar instead; it's much more accurate. Figure out how much here: http://www.brewersfriend.com/beer-priming-calculator/

To get the sugar into each bottle fairly neatly after sanitizing them (which unfortunately wets them), I fold a piece of card stock loosely in half and use it as a chute, which I tip into the bottle. The sugar doesn't stick to the card material, and slides right in when you tap the chute.

 

[Gerry_P]

I plugged the numbers into Northern Brewer's priming calculator and took a screen shot. I assume the bottles will be holding 12 oz.

Instead of making a tedious task even more tedious, have you considered using a fermenter with a spigot, attaching a hose to it, and placing the other end of the hose at the bottom of the bottling bucket containing your priming solution? Aeration will be minimal if any, just keep the hose near the bottom so it doesn't pop up and start making bubbles. You can position the hose so it creates a whirlpool that helps distribute your priming solution evenly. It's easier than it sounds.

 

[Gerry_P]

A couple things I forgot to mention:

A fermenter with the spigot is much less of a PITA than a siphon, imo.

If you have about $150 and a place to keep a 5 gallon keg cold, get a Corny keg setup. It's worth every penny, trust me. Sanitizing a keg takes a fraction of the time that it takes to do a couple cases of bottles, it's less messy, you can't break a corny keg (usually), you can carb your beer in a matter of days (or even hours), force carbonation allows you to control your carbonation level more precisely, and you can adjust the carbonation level if you mess it up. Your corny keg can even act as a secondary fermenter if you're into that sort of thing.

 

[Gerry_P]

Get a small gram scale with 0.1g precision, and weigh the sugar instead; it's much more accurate etc...

Sorry, I wasn't trying to one-up your calculator. You posted while I was taking screenshots and whatnot. I normally use Brewer's Friend, but for priming it seems like Northern Brewer's calculator is more detailed and precise. Brewer's Friend only goes out 1 decimal place, and it gave me .1 oz. per 12 oz. using table sugar, corn sugar, and DME. That didn't seem kosher to me.

 

[cabo]

Ya. Thanks for the ideas. But I have my reasons for not kegging. Well - mainly to keep my wife from whining about all my brewing stuff. But anyway, I was hoping to just dump a little sugar into each bottle. I just am not sure where within the 1/2 to 1 tsp/bottle rule 2.5 volumes layes. I am ok with a little bit of error. Just trying to get it close without much fuss. I don't want to buy tablets either.

 

[cabo]

Plus all the priming calculators I've looked at calculate everything by weight and/or assume I want to batch prime. Maybe I haven't looked hard enough.

 

[flars]

Use the Northern Brewer priming calculator to find out how much sugar you need for the volume you plan to bottle. Calculate how much would go into each bottle. Buy a set of Lee powder measures and use the one that is closest by weight as a scoop to dole out the priming sugar for each bottle.

Or you could use Domino Dot sugar cubes.

 

[TonyKZ1]

^^ The Domino Dot sugar cubes are what I use when I bottle prime, 1 cube (equals a half teaspoon) for 12oz. and 3-4 cubes for a 1 Liter bottle.

 

[TurnipGreen]

When I've done this it's been 1/2 teaspoon per 12 oz bottle. It been a while and I don't know what sort of co2 measurement that would work out to be. I recal it being a little less fizzy than when I measure out a full batch. But I also never had bottles explode.

 

[cabo]

Thanks. I might just try the cubes.

 

[popsicleian]

I use the Domino Dots as well--much easier than measuring loose sugar for every bottle, and I've had very good results.

 

[kh54s10]

My question? Do you really think that weighing out 50+ doses of sugar and adding those to 50+ bottles, one at a time, will be easier than priming the batch in a bottling bucket??

Why not use carbonation tablets. I don't know the volume levels they do but they are made specifically for the purpose of carbonating a beer in the bottle.

 

[BitterSweetBrews]

Back in the day, when my first brewing kit was a Mr Beer setup, they had a chart for table sugar priming. Here it is:

http://www.mrbeer.com/media/wysiwyg/Misc/sugar.png

 

[McKnuckle]

The oval shaped, brewing-specific carbonation drops weigh 3g and a Domino Dot weighs 2.4g. The carb drop is 25% more sugar than the Dot - a pretty big difference.

 

[Gerry_P]

Ya know...I actually thought of sugar cubes or carb drops but didn't think they were a great option because OP specifically mentioned 2.4 vols. He'd probably end up having to split and weight the pieces of carb drops and/or cubes if he wants to be that precise with his carbonation level. The chart above doesn't say how many vols. you'd get with those sugar additions.

As far as weighing stuff goes, I use one of these for water additives and hops. It would also work well for weighing miniscule amounts of sugar, as you might imagine:

 

[McKnuckle]

According to online calculators, A Domino Dot will carb a 12 oz bottle to approximately 2.52 volumes of CO2. Not perfect for every style of course, but very good for many of 'em.

 

[flars]

Thanks. I might just try the cubes.

Be sure the box of "Dots" you buy is the 198 count box. Quite often an internet search will yield a picture of the "Dots" box but it will be the regular 126 count cubes offered. The Dots are 2.29 grams versus the regular 3.6 gram cubes. The Dot should give you right about 2.4 volumes of CO2.

Check my math with the Northern Brewer carbonation calculator.