Oxidized or Infection?

[EMH5]

I brewed this IPA 7/7 bottled at the end of the month, maybe 7/21 or 7/28... I don't remember.

I have noticed that the last couple of beers I have bottled, both IPAs, darkened considerably after just a couple of months. My bottling process is simple and clean. I clean and sanitize everything: I take apart the spigot, the wand, tubes, auto siphon, bottles, caps etc.

The top photo is the oxidized beer and the second is what it should look like (A few bottles that I opened were even darker than the top).

I store the bottles in my basement, not in the fridge and under a blanket to hide from the light. The temp in the basement was a bit warm this summer and rose to probably 75-80 at max sometimes.

So what the hell is going on here? My guess from all my reading is oxidation but how and why?

 

[m00ps]

you answered your own question - its oxidation. 100%

What steps or measures do you take to minimize oxygen exposure post-fermentation?

Do you not keg your IPAs?

 

[FruityHops]

Bottled as in bottle conditioned? It looks to me like you're brewing a New England IPA (I see a beautiful hazy IPA in your before pic and a Sip of Sunshine in your fridge). I've come to the conclusion that NE IPA and bottle conditioning are mutually exclusive. Maybe bottling from a keg is an option if you can purge the bottle with CO2, I don't know. An IPA that has been heavily hopped during flame out and/or whirlpool and then dry hopped once or more just doesn't stand up to even the slightest bit of oxygen, which is inherent to the basic bottling method we've all learned.

The process of bottling the way its been done by home brewers for decades doesn't work for this new style of beer. You're not the only one who's had this problem. I've had this problem (going to be kegging for the first time next batch) and there is a Facebook group called Tree House Home Brewers where a contributor brewed one batch, dry hopped half the batch, and then bottled the entire batch. The dry hopped half was oxidized within a couple of weeks, the other half was fine.

Maybe someone who knows the chemistry better can chime in. I believe I've heard that the polyphenols from the hops contribute to oxidizing more quickly.

 

[derekcw83]

Be extremely, extremely gentle in racking, adding priming sugar, and using bottling wand. Also - fill your bottles to 1/4" of headspace. 1/2" for big bottles or quarts. And place caps on bottle for 20 minutes, then cap securely, this allows o2 to escape, by letting co2 to start pushing it out once priming sugar is added.

 

[EMH5]

@m00ps: Ha! I have a single tap kegerator and didnt like how quickly filling growlers drained my keg so I made "to-go" IPA bottles which I go through less frequently (because come on, we love tap beer). I've been making hoppy, NE style IPAs and they are getting better and better. I just expected oxidization to take much longer than 2 months! That 1st beer is like 7-8 weeks old from being bottled.

@fruityhops: Thanks for the info - that's helpful to know. It's just so fast! I brew and bottle brown ales/stouts for winter so maybe I'll just stick to bottling darker beers. Oh and Sip is my favorite beer! Nice spot.

@derekcw83: Thanks for the tip. I'll really try everything.

Also, I think for this batch I may have racked the beer to the bottling bucket, then measured the priming sugar, boiled it, cooled it and then mixed it. So may be I'll just estimate the priming sugar measurements before exposing this type of beer.

 

[jddevinn]

It's very hard to bottle without naturally carbing (or having expensive equipment) and not oxidize. 100%oxidation to me. Before I focused on reducing o2 concentration my kegged IPAs were always oxidized before 2 months

 

[skraeling]

But the real question... does it still taste fine?

 

[EMH5]

Nope. Tastes awful. Tastes completely different. Stale. I'm putting a few in the fridge and opening them - if I get one not oxidized (only 1 so far) or not too far gone, I drink it... otherwise down the drain it goes.

 

[jddevinn]

I have decent luck bottling from kegs using the below..... although I never intentionally save them for more than a couple days. They are normally "to go's" that go places growlers can't easily, pool, boat ect.

• small cut from a section of racking cane
• .152"ID 1/4" OD 316SS Seamless Tubing from Amazon
• #2 stopper with a drilled hole. (for a bottle) not sure of the growler stopper size.

• Use the piece of the racking cane to fit the SS Tube to the picnic tap.
• Drill a hole for the tube in the stopper (in the image the stopper I had was too big so I added another piece of racking cane).
• Drill another small hole for air relief.
• Position in the bottle or growler so that the stopper is in the opening and the tube is very close to the bottom.
• Fill, the small tube diameter creates a restriction and lowers the flow rate.
• air will be pushed out of the small opening in the stopper
• Cap on foam