Corn sugar vs. Cane sugar

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smizak

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Hi.

I'm thinking of bottling today, but try as I may, can not find dextrose (corn) sugar in any of the stores around here. I think the rule of thumb is 3/4 corn sugar of 2/3 cup cane sugar. Am I right? Or will I be cleaning up bottle bombs?
 
Here, try this chart that's posted at howtobrew.com

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looking at the above chart, yeah, you'd use slightly less cane sugar than corn sugar.

you'd have to double or triple dose the priming sugar, or bottle before primary ends, to get bottle bombs.

i would boil 1 cup water and dissolve the sugar first, simply to sanitize it, and make it easier to mix into solution for even carbing.
 
I just realized that the temperature of the beer at bottling is important in how much sugar is used. Didn't notice that in Beersmith (it's there) before.
 
I wonder if that is the temperature at bottling or the temperature that the beer is carbed/aged at? I think the bottling temperature, because of residual CO2.
 
Actually, the serving temperature of the beer is what's important when determining carbonation level. The bottling temperature should be adequate to support yeast function, but you should enter the serving temperature into BeerSmith in order to figure the priming sugar amount.
 
I thought BeerSmith's help file said that you want to calculate the temperature at which it'll be stored during carbonation not at serving.

I did the opposite of this on my blonde ale and now it's drastically undercarbed (shooting for about 2.9 vols, got about 1.8 vols).
 
chriso said:
I thought BeerSmith's help file said that you want to calculate the temperature at which it'll be stored during carbonation not at serving.

I did the opposite of this on my blonde ale and now it's drastically undercarbed (shooting for about 2.9 vols, got about 1.8 vols).
Interesting. The help file does indeed say what you think it does:

Beer Temperature - For forced (Kegged) carbonation, this is the temperature at which the keg will be carbonated. For bottled beer, this is the temperature of the beer when it is primed and bottled (not the storage temperature).

That doesn't make much sense to me since a given amount of sugar will produce the same amount of CO2, regardless of temperature at the end state. The amount of CO2 that goes into solution at a relatively high temperature will be less than at a cool one, but as you cool the beer, it will reabsorb CO2.

Either way, if I'm bottle conditioning without carb tabs, for 5 gallons I use 3/4 cup corn sugar for most American style ales and decrease it slightly to around 2/3 cup if I'm brewing a stout or English ale that calls for lighter carbonation.
 
smizak said:
I wonder if that is the temperature at bottling or the temperature that the beer is carbed/aged at? I think the bottling temperature, because of residual CO2.

I assumed it was residual CO2 also, not related to temperature during carbonation. I've always used ~3/4 cup of corn sugar and everything worked out Ok.
 
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