Help I have flat beer

[auburntsts]

Full carbonation will not happen unless the bottles are chilled for at least three days in the refrigerator to force the CO2 into solution.

This is not intuitive to me. Isn't most of the CO2 produced during conditioning already in solution since the bottle is under increasing pressure with a fixed volume--where's the gaseous volume that's being more readily absorbed into solution by chilling for 3 days?

 

[flars]

This is not intuitive to me. Isn't most of the CO2 produced during conditioning already in solution since the bottle is under increasing pressure--where's the gaseous volume that being forced into solution by chilling for 3 days? I could understand that for kegging but not bottling.

The CO2 produced by the yeast utilizing the priming sugar takes the path of least resistance. The CO2 mixes with the air molecules in the head space. Cool temperatures and time allows the gas to reach equilibrium through out the confined space which is the bottle.

 

[auburntsts]

The CO2 produced by the yeast utilizing the priming sugar takes the path of least resistance. The CO2 mixes with the air molecules in the head space. Cool temperatures and time allows the gas to reach equilibrium through out the confined space which is the bottle.

I got it, but the headspace in a bottle is miniscule. I still don't see how chilling will effectively increase the volume of dissolved CO2 in solution in a bottle especially since I assume by this time little to no additional CO2 is being generated or added to the bottle. I'm of mind that what you are perceiving as increased CO2 forced into solution by longer duration cooling, is actually just the beer retaining more of the CO2 that's already in solution as a result of normal conditioning once the bottle is opened vs a warm beer that will more readily release its suspended CO2. IOW I'm thinking once it's cooled to serving temp, waiting a few won't change the amount of suspended CO2 appreciably. But hey, that's just my gut. I don't have any data to prove one way or the other.

 

[Rhaop]

Chilling the beer after it’s carbonated helps keep the gas in solution, gushers when opening warm bottle conditioned beer is common in my opinion

 

[ncbrewer]

I used the Brewers Friend priming calculator. Using 5 gallons and 68F, it shows 3.5 oz of corn sugar yields 2.07 volumes. That's really low - that could be the whole problem.