Carbonation Help Wanted

[Twtr25]

With my first two batches of home brew, I bottled 12 of each and kegged the rest. Since I was splitting up the batches, it would've been difficult for me to measure out the proper amount of priming sugar for just 12 bottles. Because of that, I went with Brewer's Best conditioning tablets. Here's my thoughts on them...

The package says to use, per bottle, 3 for low carb, 4 for medium carb, and 5 for high carb. My first batch was a red ale so I used 4 because that's what was recommended by my LHB. Unfortunately, after letting those bottles condition for almost 2 months, they are under-carbonated. When I pour it, I get very little, if any, head at all. And it tastes under-carbed as well.

With my second batch, which was a wheat beer, I instead used 5 tablets per bottled instead. So far, those bottles have only been sitting for about 2 weeks, but I went ahead and opened one last night just to see where the carbonation is at. It seemed like it had just as much, if not a little more carbonation than the first batch.

I'm curious...has anybody had any luck with these tablets? Are the tablets from Cooper's better? I'm just looking for the best way to properly carbonate my bottles in the future, when I split up a batch like between bottles and a keg. Any suggestions??

 

[unionrdr]

I think the cooper's carbonation drops are better. 1 drop per 12-16oz bottle. 3 weeks was good,4 weeks was def better using them. I did notice,however,that at 7 weeks+,they tended to over-carb. So beers that peak in 3-5 weeks is best when using them,ime.

 

[Twtr25]

I think the cooper's carbonation drops are better. 1 drop per 12-16oz bottle. 3 weeks was good,4 weeks was def better using them. I did notice,however,that at 7 weeks+,they tended to over-carb. So beers that peak in 3-5 weeks is best when using them,ime.

I've read quite a few reviews on the Brewer's Best tablets, most of which said that typically you need at least 6 per bottle. But, I went with them anyways because my LHBS recommended them.

You said that it's possible for the beer to over-carb. Is it less likely for a beer to over-carb if you're bottling the whole batch and using priming sugar?? I've always heard that beers usually taste better the longer they condition in a bottle.

 

[unionrdr]

Aging is good,but to a point. Hoppy beers are best up to 5 or 6 weeks ime. Then the hops start fading. Low to medium gravity beers don't last really long like high gravity ones do. I'd say a couple months max for medium gravity.
But if you bulk prime to style with a priming calculator (free on line),then it won't over carbonate if you had a stable FG to start with.

 

[cervezarara]

Brewer's Best "technical" sheet says that each drop has 545mg of a combination of dextrose and BB Pilsen light DME. That is a little more than a half a gram. If your beer fermented at 65F, there should be 0.9 volumes of CO2 already present in the beer. Say you wanted 2.5 volumes in the bottled product, you would have to add enough fermentables to give 1.6 volumes of CO2. To add 1 volume of CO2, you need to add 4g/l of sucrose, so to add 1.6 volumes to a 12 oz bottle, you would need to add 2.27 g of sucrose. This would be the amount in four of BB conditioning tablets, but they're not sucrose. You need about 15% more dextrose and about 35% more DME than sucrose to produce the same amount of CO2.

To make a long story short, if your beer was fermented warmer (at any point during the process) or BB drops really do contain DME (doubtful, since the cost is much higher than dextrose) 5 tablets would be about the minimum for a beer carbonated to 2.5 volumes of CO2. On the flip side, if your conditioning temps are low, then two weeks may not be enough for them to fully carbonate, either. Carbonation may improve after three weeks in the bottle.

I think you would be pretty safe using 6 tablets, and see where that gets you.

 

[theonetrueruss]

Get a scale that measures in small enough increments. Here is one: Blade Precision 100g Digital Scale with 0.01g accuracy - Spectrum Scientifics

Use between .9 to 1 oz os either corn sugar (dextrose) or just plain old white table sugar per gallon you are going to bottle. .9oz/gallon will give you around 2.5 volumes of CO2 and 1oz/gallon will give about 2.7 volumes.

 

[Twtr25]

Aging is good,but to a point. Hoppy beers are best up to 5 or 6 weeks ime. Then the hops start fading. Low to medium gravity beers don't last really long like high gravity ones do. I'd say a couple months max for medium gravity.
But if you bulk prime to style with a priming calculator (free on line),then it won't over carbonate if you had a stable FG to start with.

By bulk prime you mean using priming sugar before I bottle, right? I just brewed a batch last night and I'm planning on bottling the whole batch because it is for my fiance' and she won't drink it fast enough for me to keg it. You don't think I'll have any issues with it over-carbonating if I'm bulk priming with the priming sugar??

 

[unionrdr]

Not if you prime to style,all other things being equal. I use this calculator; http://http://www.tastybrew.com/calculators/priming.html
Once you highlight a style on the list,it'll give you min-max volumes of co2. Click on the right style,then go to the "volumes of co2" box. It'll show you the volume of co2 recommended for that style,temp,& total beer volume. You can then change it as you see fit from experience. It's a great program that gives you more control in the final flavor of your beer. Carbonation drives head. But it also alters our perception of flavor complexities in the beer. You'll see this with time & experience.