Dry yeast or carb tabs?

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bertmurphy

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I have a Scottish Wee Heavy Ale that I bottled two weeks ago with 4.5 oz dextrose for my 5 gallon batch. I cracked one open for kicks yesterday and it doesn't have any more carbonation in it than it did when I bottled it. I'm sure this is from the two months that it spent in the fermentation vessel (Wyeast Scottish Ale strain). So my question is should I throw some dry yeast in the bottles, put some carb tabs in them, or maybe just wait it out and see if they carbonate? I'd like to drink these puppies on new years. Any recommendations would be appreciated.
 
I would leave it alone for a while, especially if it is high gravity it may take a while to get a good carb. Hopefully it will be ready by newyears but don't rush it. Whats the recipe?
 
No carb at all? Nothing? Is there any sediment in the bottles? How cold have you kept the bottles?
 
None of the above...

The third option is patience

It doesn't matter that your beer spent 2 months in your fermentation vessel. I bottled a chocolate mole porter after 5.5 months in PRIMARY. And it carbed up fine...in time.

The 3 weeks at 70 degrees, that we recommend is the minimum time it takes for average gravity beers to carbonate and condition. Higher grav beers take longer. Lower temperatures take longer.

Stouts and porters have taken me between 6 and 8 weeks to carb up..I have a 1.090 Belgian strong that took three months to carb up.

Temp and gravity are the two factors that contribute to the time it takes to carb beer. But if a beer's not ready yet, or seems low carbed, and you added the right amount of sugar to it, then it's not stalled, it's just not time yet.

Everything you need to know about carbing and conditioning, can be found here Of Patience and Bottle Conditioning. With emphasis on the word, "patience." ;)

Read the above blog, and come back to the beer in a couple more weeks.

If a beer isn't carbed by "x number of weeks" you just have to give them ore time. If you added your sugar, then the beer will carb up eventually, it's really a foolroof process. All beers will carb up eventually. A lot of new brewers think they have to "troubleshoot" a bottling issue, when there really is none, the beer knows how to carb itself. In fact if you run beersmiths carbing calculator, some lower grav beers don't even require additional sugar to reach their minimum level of carbonation. Just time.

If you add carb tabs, you will get bottle bombs. If you add yeast it will STILL need a couple weeks to carb and then CLEAR your beer so it doesn't taste like the yeast you added.

Patience is all you need to fix this....
 
Everything you need to know about carbing and conditioning, can be found here Of Patience and Bottle Conditioning. With emphasis on the word, "patience." ;)

Great post.

This is the biggest beer I've ever brewed at about 10.5% abv (1.090 to 1.012) and I didn't take that into consideration. My post characterizes me as naive but my brews have won awards I swear! :D

Patience it is...
 
Just thought I would jump on here instead of start a new post. Does any of Revvy's advice change if you have exceeded the alcohol tolerance of the yeast? I have a holiday ale that is 10%+ ABV and I used Wyeast 1968, whose tolerance is reported as 10%. My bottles are at nearly a month with very little to no carbonation. I can see little chunks of yeast in there, but are they too tired/dead for this to work?

Thanks
 
Does any of Revvy's advice change if you have exceeded the alcohol tolerance of the yeast?
Thanks

I do believe I've answered it everytime, here;

Stouts and porters have taken me between 6 and 8 weeks to carb up..I have a 1.090 Belgian strong that took three months to carb up.

If you Don't add more yeast it will take awhile....If your beer didn't finish too sweet then there should be some yeast left to carb your beer. They WANT to eat sugar....so if you have some viable cells left in their then they will try their darndest to make you happy. It just may take awhile....
 

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