Bottling 1 gallon batches

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JLem

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I have several experimental 1 gallon (or less) batches ("leftover" wort from beers I racked over to secondary that I've added fruit, spices, and/or sour beer dregs). Any tips on how to bottle these? They're in 1 gallon glass jugs and it doesn't make sense to me to transfer into a bottling bucket. Can I bottle directly from the jugs using a bottling wand attached to a racking cane? And how would you prime the individual bottles?

Any ideas would be appreciated! :mug:
 
i would consider racking the beer to another 1-gal jug, add the priming sugar and then bottle via a racking cane... or just use the ol' bottling bucket already. it's easy to clean, it (should) already has the bottling wand attached, etc etc etc. quit yer yellerbellyin' and do it right.
 
i would consider racking the beer to another 1-gal jug, add the priming sugar and then bottle via a racking cane... or just use the ol' bottling bucket already. it's easy to clean, it (should) already has the bottling wand attached, etc etc etc. quit yer yellerbellyin' and do it right.

I hear ya...I'm probably overthinking this, which is pretty much par for the course with me. I guess my main concern though is the loss of beer every time I rack. With these small batches I'm only going to get 8 bottles or so if I'm lucky to begin with.
 
I hear ya...I'm probably overthinking this, which is pretty much par for the course with me. I guess my main concern though is the loss of beer every time I rack. With these small batches I'm only going to get 8 bottles or so if I'm lucky to begin with.

I made a couple of 1 gallon brews over the weekend too and I know exactly how you feel about loss with small batches like this.

The way I'm going to handle it is to use a racking wand and be VERY careful to not disturb as much as possible of the sediment once I get to rack into the last 1 or 2 bottles. Worse that'll happen is that a bottle or two may have a bit of a dusting in the bottom.

You can also store that last bottle upside down so that the junk settles on the cap. Then you can freeze neck of the bottle in some salt water solution with ice, pop the cap off, let the pressure shoot the ice plug out and cap it back up. This is a technique used for champagne bottles. I've done it once before when I attempted a home made champagne in my wine making days and it works pretty well. It is a bit of a pain in the ass, but if you're small batch brew turns out to be a very special one, it will be just a bottle of two anyway. If nothing else, it'll be an experience :)
 
Not the perfect answer but I use one of these for my bottling jug instead of my 5 gal bottling bucket. It's PET. http://www.walmart.com/ip/Arrow-H2O-1.25-Gal-Slimline-Beverage-Dispenser-Blue/15915152 I just like the idea of batch priming for consistency instead of priming one bottle at a time. I do get what you are saying about beer loss but I adjusted my recipe so I have the volume I want when I bottle. But then you can't use those 1gal glass jugs. Decisions...
 
put a dip tube in the bottling bucket. A #2-3 stopper and the curved part of a racking cane and jam it in the valve.

Makes the bucket easier to use with less waste with a 1 gallon or 6 gallon batch.
 
For my 1 gallon batches I made a mini bottling bucket. I took a 2 gallon HDPE #2 pail (you can find them in the paint section at Home Depot), then drilled a hole and installed a spigot. It works out pretty well since the surface area is smaller than a regular bottling bucket there isn't as much waste.
 
Gixxer said:
Not the perfect answer but I use one of these for my bottling jug instead of my 5 gal bottling bucket. It's PET. http://www.walmart.com/ip/Arrow-H2O-1.25-Gal-Slimline-Beverage-Dispenser-Blue/15915152 I just like the idea of batch priming for consistency instead of priming one bottle at a time. I do get what you are saying about beer loss but I adjusted my recipe so I have the volume I want when I bottle. But then you can't use those 1gal glass jugs. Decisions...

I just got one of these for small batches, and for batches I'm splitting at bottling for random ideas (5 flavors of Skeeter pee for instance)
 
I lose virtually no beer when I bottle my 1 gallon batches. I use a secondary and as I am racking from the primary, I just stick the siphon end into the trub as it gets low and tilt...I might lose 2-4 ozs tops. You just need to time when to pinch off the siphon right before air reaches the bottom of your racking cane. With so little in the secondary, after a week of dry hopping it is a tight ring of trub like in a bottle. I do the same technique and get 7 16oz bottles pretty consistently. Usually using the 2-4 ounces left from the secondary or bottling bucket as a sample
 
I do this all the time -- I converted a small drink cooler to a mini bottling bucket by removing the valve and installing a bottling bucket type valve (I had to enlarge the hole somewhat). I bottle exactly the same as if I were doing a 5 gal batch (adjusting the corn sugar of course) -- boiling, cooling, etc. I use a small piece of siphon tubing on the end of the bottling bucket valve and then connect that directly to a bottling wand the same is with larger batches. and just tilt it at the end to avoid loosing any to the dead space. Hope that helps!
 
I just did a simple sour recipe that's getting ready to bottle next month. It's been in a secondary since April with apricots and mangos. I just saw that I have to mix up 0.6oz. Of corn sugar but how much water should I boil? Should I divide 2c from 5 to 1 gal.? Also since it's been so long, what kind of yeast should I repitch with?
 
I just found this thread when looking for tips on botteling my 1st 1gal batch i have fermenting and when i was reading all the tips i got simple idea of slowly pouring cold crashed beer on the wall of the botteling bucket and then bottle from there, i will try that when ready
 
slowly pouring cold crashed beer on the wall of the botteling bucket
that'll work but it's less than ideal, you'll be exposing your beer to a lot of oxygen. racking with a siphon of some sort would be better. most likely will not ruin your beer and who knows how overblown the whole oxygenation thing is... but if you can find an autosiphon, or even a plastic tube, i'd use that.
 
My autosyphon seemed overkill, but how to start the syphon? I attached some vinyl tube to my bottling wand and filled the whole thing with starsan. I dropped the tube into the one gallon jug, held it right where I wanted it with a rubber band around the bottleneck and the tube, and bled the starsan into a spare bottle until my cider started flowing into the wand. Filled eight 12 oz. bottles in no time with very little trub.
 
So using the calculator on Northern Brewer, for 1 gallon carbonated to 2.3 units, it says to use 0.7 ounces of sucrose. Does this sound right? Also, what volume would you dissolve this in, 1/2 cup of water?
 
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