Priming Question (and possible mistake)

[Warpig75]

I just got finished bottling my batch of wheat ale and I think I might have done something wrong.

I heated up a few cups of beer along with .75 cups of priming sugar and put it in the bottling bucket. I stuck the auto siphon in the secondary and started filling the bottling bucket with my precious beer.

As it got near the bottom I decided I wouldnt push my luck and siphon trub into the bucket so I just left a few inches of beer in the secondary. I looked at the bottling bucket and saw i had 4.5 gallons of beer. "good 'nuff" I thought and then proceeded to bottle.

After bottling about 20 beers thats when it dawned on me: the .75 cups of sugar is for a 5 gallong batch.... not 4.5 gallons. At this point it was too late to do anything about it and I just finished bottling the beer. I got 48 beers out of the 4.5 gallons.

So my question is: Did i just make 48 bottle bombs by putting in 5 gallons worth of priming sugar into 4.5 gallons of beer?

 

[Yooper]

No, it'll be fine. Next time, just boil the sugar in some water (like 3/4 cup sugar to 2 cups water). No need to use beer to do it. You want to boil the sugar and water, to ensure that it's completely dissolved. I'd be more concerned about that then the amount of sugar in there. Usually I weigh mine, and use 1 ounce per gallon.

 

[cclloyd]

Probably not - there is a formula to determine CO2 volumes based on the amount of priming sugar and all of the other (I don't know exactly) variables involved. Not being a math geek I try to keep it simple myself. You will likely have a little more carbonation than intended but unless you got infected they shouldn't blow based on that small of a reduced beer volume.

 

[SenorWanderer]

heres a good calculator-


The Beer Recipator - Carbonation

 

[TexLaw]

You ought to be fine. It will be more carbonated than you expected, but I do not expect bombs (so long as you fully attenuated).


TL

 

[FishinDave07]

Wheats are normally high in carbonation, so your beer instinct paid off!