Bottling Day!

[BillyVegas]

Ive been on the sidelines watching my two buckets sit for 3 weeks now.

The time has come. Thanks to everyone who has helped along the way...

BOTTLING DAY

I put all my bottles in the oven last night for an hour @350- capped with foil.

Now, to sanitize everything and rack to the bottling bucket and get this party started.

Still trying to figure out the best ratio of my priming sugar (dextrose) solution for my two beers. Some more reading should set me straight.

Im amped.

 

[Pelikan]

It sounds like you have everything fairly well covered. One little tid-bit: on my very first brew, the only thing I did wrong was go light on the priming sugar. It turned out well, but was somewhat under-carbed.

For most beers, I find that about 2.5 volumes is a good target. This translates to 4.5 oz priming sugar (either cane or corn, the difference in this case is fairly negligible).

Make sure to wait at least three weeks before diving in...preferable 4-8 weeks (the darker, the longer). Also make sure that the brews are at room temp (68-72*F) for roughly 2 weeks after bottling to make sure the yeast carb everything up (if it gets much cooler than mid to upper 60's the yeast slow down considerably, and eventually stop).

After that 2 week period, it's a matter of redissolving the CO2 back into the beer and conditioning...which is best done at lower temps. So upstairs for two weeks, then cellar for at least 2 more. Then put in the fridge for at least a week before sampling to cold condition (settles out the yeast and particulates).

Inevitably, you're going to want to try some before their time, and that's okay, because it gives you a feel for how the brew is maturing over time. But make sure you properly age the bulk of it.

 

[Malticulous]

Priming is really dependent on the beer. Some take little others take a lot. Anywhere form less than one once to eight onces of sugar. This calculator can help.

 

[Pelikan]

Priming is really dependent on the beer. Some take little others take a lot. Anywhere form less than one once to eight onces of sugar. This calculator can help.

One ounce of sugar? That'd be a pretty flat brew...

...2.4-2.6 volumes is a pretty good all around range, but feel free to experiment a bit based upon personal taste and style recommendations. This KotMF calculator will provide you with guidelines based upon style.

 

[Revvy]

One ounce of sugar? That'd be a pretty flat brew...

...2.4-2.6 volumes is a pretty good all around range, but feel free to experiment a bit based upon personal taste and style recommendations. This KotMF calculator will provide you with guidelines based upon style.

There are some old British brewing books where the brewers added NO priming sugar, just bottled and walked away, but it would take a hellova lot longer than 3 weeks for the beer to carb up then, especially at cellar temps. It was probably the practice for long sea voyages in the IPA days, to let it carb very low and naturally, especially if the beer was being pushed with a beer engine...I imagine some brewers though who have come upon those old books forget that part about the amounts being used for cask conditioned beers...Though I do think some of the IPA's did travel in corked bottles.

I thought I heard some bottles were brought up from a shipwreck and sold at auction...Methinks they would be purposefully under carbed/natural bottle carbed to prevent them from "bombing" while they traveled as cargo, where the temps in holds would probably go all over the place, near freezing to over a hundred degrees...you wouldn't want them to be that primed up or else they'd blow.

IIRC I ran the numbers a year ago using an ordinary bitter as the base beer, and came up with some sugar amounts/per volumes of Co2 that were practically microscopic...One of the volumes actually came up as a "-" negative amount of priming sugar to hit the lowest end of the range for the style of the beer.

In the 21st century, especially in the states, we tend like our beer more carbed up then they did back then...I think I heard the same for England, despite camra...The actual carbed levels of the real ales are a little higher now than their historical ancestor batches.

Even looking at a style volume range on beersmith, I will tend to hit the high, or the mid end of the range, as opposed to low end volumes..though I just had an ordinary bitter that I purposefully bottled at the bottom end, and though it has little bubbles it is still carbed and conditioned (actually it's been conditioning since July to let it mellow some, I used aromatic malt for the first time, and wasn';t sure I liked the profile.)

 

[Malticulous]

One ounce of sugar? That'd be a pretty flat brew...

...2.4-2.6 volumes is a pretty good all around range, but feel free to experiment a bit based upon personal taste and style recommendations. This KotMF calculator will provide you with guidelines based upon style.

I shoot for 2-3 volumes but the guidelines are sometimes less. Tastybrew list the BJCP on the calculator page too. A lot of styles could be primed with 1/2 once dextrose to five gallons and still be well within the guidelines. It looks like if you bottle at 60f you already have one volume with out adding anything.

 

[BillyVegas]

Looks like I read these a bit to late, but it seemingly went well.

Bottling process was less hectic/messy than anticipated, which is always a bonus.

I used a generic amount of 2/3 Cups, around 4.5+oz of dextrose in a warm water solution disollved for both the Fat Tire Clone and the Stout. I intended to use a little less in the Stout to minimize carbonation, but the lurking hangover from nights past clouded my brain and I put the initial 2/3C solution into the Stout.

Oh well. I hope my Stout dosen't come out all carbed to hell and I hope my FTClone comes out perfect.
Roll Them Dice!

Beer is sitting in my closet now at room temperature. I don't plan on touching them for at least 2 weeks. I'll reassess my anxiousness at that time and see if I need to crack one open to try.