Brett not carbonating in bottles

[tiredofbuyingbeer]

I've had a beer I fermented with saccharomyces and fermented with brett in secondary. I bottled the beer about a month ago, and I still haven't seen any CO2 increase. Completely flat beer.

I added priming sugar slightly on the low side: about 2 vols, because it's a stout and because I wanted to be safe in case the brett dropped the gravity a point or two. (I was pretty careful before bottling it, though, so I think I'm good on that front.) I also added a little S-02 at bottling when I added the priming sugar, but a subsequent read suggests that brett produces something that kills other yeast, so maybe that won't work.

It's a pretty big beer. I'm not sure where my notes are for it, but it was about 1.082. It took a looong time to fermented and then stabilize.

So what gives? Is this beer ever going to carb? Is flat after a month a sign that something is really wrong?

 

[Bassaholic]

I wouldn’t be too concerned yet, Brett can take a while to carbonate and big beers that are sacc only can take a while as well. What was the finishing gravity/how long was it stable before bottling? What temp are the bottles at that you’re trying to carb?

I’ve never heard that Brett can kill other yeasts, only that some wine yeasts produce a by byproduct that kills beer yeast. I’d say give it a few weeks, maybe in a warmer spot, and if you still don’t see any carbonation you could try adding more fresh yeast or even Brett.

 

[RPh_Guy]

Brett doesn't kill other yeast, so that's not an issue.

Priming calculators are based on the assumption that there is some carbonation in the beer after fermentation -- around 0.7-0.9 vol. Since such a long fermentation allows the extra carbonation to off-gas, the calculator provides an underestimate of the amount of sugar needed. You may end up with only about 1.4-1.7 volumes, which would probably taste flat to most people.

I'm not sure what yeast you added at bottling, but normally wine yeasts are used because they tend to be more accustomed to high ABV, high acidity, and low nutrient conditions. Did you rehydrate the yeast at least? Sometimes acid shock starters are a good idea.

Also, most Brett strains struggle to ferment at such high ABV, so hopefully the added Sacc can pick up the slack. It'll probably take more time regardless of any other factors.

Lots more info here:
http://www.milkthefunk.com/wiki/Packaging

Hope this helps, good luck!