I made a belguim blonde. Left it in primary for 4 weeks, then cold crashed for 3 days, racked to bottling bucket with priming sugar, bottled and put in my spare bedroom to carbonate. This was the first batch I have ever cold crashed, otherwise everything else about the processes was the same as other beers i have brewed ( also first time with this recipe). Now I know I should wait 3 weeks at 70 for it to carbonate, but I was really curious to taste so i threw one in the fridge last night, its only been 2 weeks, and tried it. Dead flat, not a hint of carbonation. So now I am freaked out that the cold crash dropped all of the yeast and its never going to carbonate. Suggestions? Do I wait it out and see what happens, do I carefully ( hoping to avoid oxidation or infection ) open all of the bottles and add them bake to the bottling bucket with a second yeast and more priming sugar, than rebottle?
bottles not carbonating, help/suggestions please
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This pretty much never happens.
Is there a 1 in 1000 chance the bottling/priming sugar never made it into the bottling bucket?
My most puzzling thing along this line was when I was POSITIVE I had got the priming solution in the bucket, because I remembered bringing up the priming sugar pot the next day and cleaning it. In retrospect I left it on the floor and the dogs drank the priming solution, because 4 weeks later after still flat beer I added priming sugar to each bottle, and all was well within a week.
Did the priming sugar get mixed up really well into solution? It's pretty common to get some dead flat beers and some bottle bombs if you did not get it mixed up well.
Pretty much all you need for bottle priming is 1) yeast 2) sugar 3) correct environment.
I'm sure you got the yeast. You may or may not have the sugar. The environment should be favorable temp-wise, is there a chance you left some yeast killing chemicals in the bottle i.e. strong bleach?
In my experience, these are the 2 things that will lead to lack of bottle fermentation. I know all the rules of thumb, but generally you should have a bit of carbonation at 1 week if your temps are in line.
You "know" but.....There's no "but" about it...we don't tell you to wait a minimum of three weeks because we want to be cruel to the noobs, we tell you that so that when you ignore the advice and open one anyway, you don't start a panic thread about. It's so you slap your self on the forehead and go, "Duh, that's why it's not carbed. Not because there is something wrong with my beer, it's because I'm impatient."
It's not because you crash cooled, which people do all the time...or anything else you think may be to blame...Because there's nothing wrong.
It's not carbonated for the very reason YOU KNOW it isn't." What you've read on here 10,000 times, and where the OP usaually comes back and says. "I just wanted to let you know that the beer carbed up just fine when I let it. I guess I was just impatient."
So you know what's going on, and you know what you have to do, right?
Now go back and read those threads, and go back and read the blog posted in those thread....and come back in a couple weeks to report all is well.
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Just as a note...
I don't know the the strength of the brew you made, but that may play a part. End of last summer I was brewing every week or so and had a lot in primary/secondary. I had a problem with too much sediment in my bottles for a while, so I started to schedule 2 weeks in primary, 2 weeks in secondary, then rack to a tertiary (3rd rack). Until I got around to bottling. Most of my brews were fine, but I made a Russian Imp Stout this way and had it sitting at room temp for about a month in the third carboy. I bottled it and put aside for over a month, planning on taking it to Punkin Chunkin with me. I popped one the night before, and it was flat. I waited (and fretted) for another 3 weeks, and opend one for Thanksgiving. It had only the tiniest bit of carb. So I waited some more. Opened my third on Christmas eve...and the head was 3in high! Lesson...if it' a big beer, and you do all you can to get the sediment out, then come bottling time it may take a while to carb up. Well, that's my experience anyway!
I don't know the the strength of the brew you made, but that may play a part. End of last summer I was brewing every week or so and had a lot in primary/secondary. I had a problem with too much sediment in my bottles for a while, so I started to schedule 2 weeks in primary, 2 weeks in secondary, then rack to a tertiary (3rd rack). Until I got around to bottling. Most of my brews were fine, but I made a Russian Imp Stout this way and had it sitting at room temp for about a month in the third carboy. I bottled it and put aside for over a month, planning on taking it to Punkin Chunkin with me. I popped one the night before, and it was flat. I waited (and fretted) for another 3 weeks, and opend one for Thanksgiving. It had only the tiniest bit of carb. So I waited some more. Opened my third on Christmas eve...and the head was 3in high! Lesson...if it' a big beer, and you do all you can to get the sediment out, then come bottling time it may take a while to carb up. Well, that's my experience anyway!
It's not because you took the sediment out...it's because, as written in those other posts the OP HAS read, gravity and temp are the two factors that determine how long a beer needs to carb. 3 weeks@ 70 is just an average minimum for average gravity beer.
Sorry Rev, saying 6 hail marys and 3 our fathers as penance for starting this thread, then sitting in a corner, drinking a few of my belgium ipas and keeping my mouth shut, and having faith it will be fine since, well, like you said it will be
