Expecting Undercarbonation

[sodapop]

Can anyone tell me what they feel the best way to remedy this? I bottled a stout last week, and only used 5 oz of corn sugar for a 6.5 gallon batch, and as I was sitting around the other day checking out HBT it hit me. Ive gotten so used to just measuring out 5oz cause I usually have 5 gallons to bottle. Should I open them and add some amount of sugar or just leave it? I definately would not like an undercarbed Stout. Also, I am curious if anyone else has used Better Brewer Bottle caps? I have only used them on one batch, but the bottles I capped with these babies seem significantly undercarbed from the Grolsch style ones. Thanks!!!

 

[Donasay]

How many atmospheres of pressure do you want in your stout? Undercarbed stouts and porters sometimes are part of the style, the amount of sugar you add is determined by the amount of carbonation you want, you obviously don't want a stout to be as carbonated as a lager do you. A good place to start is to figure out what your ideal carbonation level in atmospheres is, figure out a good example of a stout and shoot for that, then see how far off you are. If you are not very far off, (and I suspect you won't be) just leave it. If you are far off, there are some things you can do to fix the situation, provided you took good brewing notes and know your fg prior to adding the sugar. These will be discussed in other threads, but we can go over it again depending on what you decide..

 

[McKBrew]

Leave it for at least three weeds at around 70 degrees. It is also perfectly fine to carbonate stouts on the lower end of the spectrum. Using this calculator, I think your 5oz of priming sugar will be fine.

As for the bottle caps, I don't have experience with them

 

[carnevoodoo]

You should be fine. Maybe keep them a little warmer during carbonation to get the yeast more active than normal, but a stout is not an overly carbed style anyhow, so it might work out to your advantage.

Check out the priming sugar calculator here. You'll get a little over 2 volumes of co2 if I am looking at it correctly, of course that depends on the amount of sugar left and if you are doing extract or all grain...

http://www.kotmf.com/tools/prime.php

 

[carnevoodoo]

whoa. jinx.

 

[TheFlatline]

Beersmith notes that in a 5 gallon batch, the difference between 70 & 75* during bottle conditioning will result in perhaps .4 ounces less priming sugar needed to maintain consistent carbonation depending on the beer.

Let them sit slightly warmer (5* or so) and you'll be fine. They probably need to age longer anyway.