Priming blunder question

[Nightwulf1974]

Hey all,

Complete brain fart and rookie mistake on my part. As I was racking onto the priming sugar as normal, I thought hey, let's take another final sample to test the gravity. This was mistake and blunder #1. Completely brain dead maneuver there, taking a sample full of priming sugar. Yikes.

Blunder #2 was that only after bottling did i realize that as I drew a sample from my spigot, there was only about 1.5 gallons of beer at the time filling up and it was continually filling up as I drew. The batch size was just a little over 2.4 gallons prior to bottling.

The sample to fill the hydrometer container was maybe what, 8 oz? Not sure as I'm away from home. The thing I'm now worried about post bottling is that I was drawing concentrated amounts of sugar to beer while I drew my sample.

Should I just let it ride? I don't want to uncap as I have no idea what amount of sugar I drew out, but I don't want flat beer obviously. I have no way to know how much sugar I pulled out.

Important to note that my tubing was on the bottom creating a constant whirlpool and only 3 inches from the draw on the spigot, so unprimed beer would have been flowing over the drain as it came out, hopefully mitigating or weakening some of the priming sugar to beer ratio.

This was only a few hours ago, so just wanted some input on what you would do. On the plus side, I measured out enough sugar to create just over 3 volumes of co2, more than anticipated as I had less beer in my fermenter than calculated and have to slightly tweak my equipment profile. I was aiming for 2.5 volumes, so I added more sugar than I wanted anyways to some degree.

Hope this makes sense. Any input appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[JimRausch]

So, you have a pre-priming FG, and then had a brainfart and drew a during-priming SG? What was the difference in SG? Mostly just curious. Withdrawing 6-8 oz., even while filling should not affect the SG enough to make that much of a difference. Let her ride.

 

[Nightwulf1974]

So I already drew a sample at two weeks and it was done, with a FG of 1.006, a highly attenuated Kolsch. The OG was 1.054 IIRC. Today was 3 weeks.

When I measured the sample realizing it was now introduced with priming sugar, the gravity reading was about 1.019 temp corrected, which was when I realized my brain fart. Now I don't know how much sugar caused it to go that high obviously or what amount of sugar it would take to do so, and like you, I'm inclined to just let it ride. I can't imagine the risk of oxidized beer and/or potential bottle bombs would be worth it. Worst case i just set it and forget it, letting the beer carb for a few months.

Just another dumb mistake, I'll get over it. What do you think?

 

[ncbrewer]

On the plus side, I measured out enough sugar to create just over 3 volumes of co2, more than anticipated as I had less beer in my fermenter than calculated and have to slightly tweak my equipment profile.

I'd be more concerned about the high sugar addition (just over 3 volumes). Normal re-used bottles from commercial craft beer are generally thought to be good for about 3 volumes, more or less. Drawing off some high sugar concentration beer for the sample reduced the carb level some, so you'll probably get pretty close to 3 volumes. You should get plenty of carbonation. Allowing for a small amount of variation between bottles (since real world mixing is never perfect), some could be over 3 volumes. To be on the safe side, I'd treat these carefully in case some explode.

 

[BrewZer]

I think it would be an unwarranted spoiling risk to uncap your bottles at this stage. Agree with others that you should keep these bottles in a sturdy box, just in case...

 

[Nightwulf1974]

Interesting as I would have thought removing that higher concentration of priming sugar would have lowered the carbonation a lot more and why I was actually worried about under carbonation. Either way, I'm not touching them and they are in a sturdy box. These are bottles from my local LHBS and I've brewed wheat beers just over 3.5 volumes with no issues, so I'm fairly confident they'll be ok, but I'll keep an eye on them.

Can anyone explain how the gravity would change .013 points just in that small concentrated sample drawn from the bottom as I was only maybe 1/3 full of the beer flowing in? Just curious.

Thanks again!