Bottling Day!

[Brewno]

Ok, not really a topic but tomorrow (Saturday) will be bottling day for my first brew. I have my bottling bucket with spigot, bottles, siphon and tubing, bottling wand, sanitizer, bucket for sanitizing, bottle tree, caps and capper, priming sugar and brew that has been fermenting for 2 weeks.
Oh yea, I also have some store bought beer (some Weyarbacher "Double Simcoe IPA" and some Sam Adams Boston Lager) for afterwards
I was originally thinking "during" but thought better of that since it's my first time and mistakes are inevitable.
Well, wish me luck!


Tommy

 

[Sephro]

Good Luck! Just make sure to sanitize those bottles and caps!
IMO bottling is one of the easiest steps. Most seem to hate it though. The only part I hate was removing the labels and rinsing the sanitizer out of each bottle... But with the bottle washer attachment for the sink that's a snap! and no rinse sanitizer is even better! This is one of the hardest steps to screw up. It’s all just repetition… Like 54 times
Also batch prime the wort... don't add to each bottle..

 

[artfldodger]

its a pretty easy step, but kind of boring... so don't make any dumb mistakes. Like I did when I backed up into 4 full, but uncapped bottles when i tried to avoid the spill that I made from knocking over the beer i was drinking. Not very graceful but my kitchen is about the size of a hallway, so what can you do!

 

[Brewno]

Ok here are the ups and downs of how it went.
Sanitizing the bottles and other equipment took awhile and I had sanitizer all over my kitchen floor. While waking with the bucket of sanitizer I also bumped the spigot and it opened dumping sanitizer all over.

Siphoning went ok I guess except for the siphon tube getting away from me and getting beer all over the floor. I'm not sure if the tube touched the floor or just the chair but I'm sure it hit something, I don't know if that's very bad or just "could be bad."
Next, after boiling the priming sugar I didn't wait long enough for it to cool and was worried about melting the siphon hose by putting it in the hot liquid or pouring the liquid on the hose itself. So I let a little beer into the bottling bucket, an inch or less and then poured in the priming sugar. Well, I got about 1/4 through into pouring when I remembered "don't hydrate the beer!" and stopped. There were some bubbles. After they subsided I continued. I let in some more beer then slowly added the liquid. Lesson learned? let the priming sugar cool then add it, then add the beer...gently. I hope this didn't screw things up. Other then that the rest went pretty good except for a few more spills.

My last problem was my FG. I had an OG of 1.040 and after 14 days (12 and a half since airlock activity stopped) my FG read 1.020. I'd say that beer is a little light in the ass!!! What's that, like 2% ABV??? Blahhhh!!! It tasted like beer though.
Well it's all bottled and stored away. And that was my day...........took about 2 hours.

EDIT:

After thinking about it and retracing my steps I realized something. I took my reading from the unprimed wort. I took the siphon tube out of the bottling bucket and let beer from the primary fill my flask. Maybe that's why I got that reading of 1.020. According to Charlie Papazian, who's recipe I was following, 1.020 should be the gravity to look for to know it's ready for priming.

Should I have taken a reading of the primed brew?
Maybe I'll open a bottle and take a hydrometer reading.

Tommy

 

[david_42]

Leave the beer alone! A cup of priming sugar won't make much difference in the final gravity. I've had a number of ales stall at 1.020, then slowly slide down to the expected FG. By the way, 1.040 to 1.020 is about 3% ABV and you should pick up another 1% by the time it's done.

 

[Brewno]

It's been 10 days since bottling my first brew and I cracked one open today.
I didn't see any sediment so I wasn't expecting much, this caused me to pour straight down the middle of the glass. I thought there wouldn't be any carbonation.
Well, I ended up with half a glass of head and had to let it settle before pouring the rest! The color was a nice amber and it was pretty clear.
The smell was terrific and then came the taste test. In all honesty it tasted a little thin. There wasn't enough mouthfeel or the full body taste I prefer. Other than that it was pretty good. There may be a slight off flavor but I can't really put my finger on it. Almost like the glass had a little soap on it? (which it didn't). But all things considered it's pretty good and very drinkable.
I let my son try it and he really liked it a lot. Then again he likes light bodied easy drinking beers. I'll see how much it improves over the next week. I'm happy with it, especially considering it's my first batch.


Now for batch two!

Tommy

 

[Mr Bigins]

Ok here are the ups and downs of how it went.
Sanitizing the bottles and other equipment took awhile and I had sanitizer all over my kitchen floor. While waking with the bucket of sanitizer I also bumped the spigot and it opened dumping sanitizer all over.

Siphoning went ok I guess except for the siphon tube getting away from me and getting beer all over the floor. I'm not sure if the tube touched the floor or just the chair but I'm sure it hit something, I don't know if that's very bad or just "could be bad."
Next, after boiling the priming sugar I didn't wait long enough for it to cool and was worried about melting the siphon hose by putting it in the hot liquid or pouring the liquid on the hose itself. So I let a little beer into the bottling bucket, an inch or less and then poured in the priming sugar. Well, I got about 1/4 through into pouring when I remembered "don't hydrate the beer!" and stopped. There were some bubbles. After they subsided I continued. I let in some more beer then slowly added the liquid. Lesson learned? let the priming sugar cool then add it, then add the beer...gently. I hope this didn't screw things up. Other then that the rest went pretty good except for a few more spills.

My last problem was my FG. I had an OG of 1.040 and after 14 days (12 and a half since airlock activity stopped) my FG read 1.020. I'd say that beer is a little light in the ass!!! What's that, like 2% ABV??? Blahhhh!!! It tasted like beer though.
Well it's all bottled and stored away. And that was my day...........took about 2 hours.

EDIT:

After thinking about it and retracing my steps I realized something. I took my reading from the unprimed wort. I took the siphon tube out of the bottling bucket and let beer from the primary fill my flask. Maybe that's why I got that reading of 1.020. According to Charlie Papazian, who's recipe I was following, 1.020 should be the gravity to look for to know it's ready for priming.

Should I have taken a reading of the primed brew?
Maybe I'll open a bottle and take a hydrometer reading.

Tommy

Rookie!

:cross:


You live and you learn. If you have access to a dishwasher, you should sanatize your bottles with that. So me easier and less of a hassel.