Serious undercarbonation Problem

[LaurieGator]

Hey everyone,

Been away for a long time, been busy building solar panels and working 16 hour days so I haven't done much brewing. The temps being in the 100+ range outside haven't helped much either. I am planning a Belgium Saison next weekend since the garage temps are in the 90's...

I tried Yoopers Dogfish head clone and I am having a problem with the carbonation. The beer tastes REALLY GOOD but I didn't really get the carbonation that I expected. I brewed it on 5/8/09. I added the dry hops on 5/18/09 then bottled on 6/21/09. I used 4 oz of priming sugar and bottled it. I have been testing it since the middle of July and tested another bottle today. The beer has a wonderful smooth taste with the hops right up front, but I don't have the amount of carbonation that I thought there would be.

Did I use too little priming sugar? Should I try giving the bottles a little shake to wake the yeasties back up? I would like to have some more carbonation in the bottles. Would it be possible to put the bottles into a keg and add some CO2 to help carbonate it?

Any help would be appreciated. I will not dump this since it tastes so YUMMY but hubby won't drink it since it is undercarbonated. I would love to show this one off to friends but I won't with the undercarbonation...

Thanks! Laurie

 

[AnonyBrew]

4 oz. does sound low for a 5g batch. What temperature was the beer at when it was bottled? There are many free priming calculators online.

Here is one: Bottle Priming

A standard amount of CO2 volume is around 2.5 volumes for most beers.

For an example: If you are priming a 5g batch to 2.5 volumes, and the beer was 75F at the time of bottling, you would require 4.62 oz. of dextrose/corn sugar.

 

[LaurieGator]

Thanks, the temps were around 75F when I bottled... I went by the Beersmith calculations. I have been overcarbonating the last few beers so I decided to go with the lower Beersmith calculation. I am wondering if I let the dry hopping go on a little long and that killed off some of my yeasties?

 

[2-0turbo]

What were you using for yeast? I brewed my first batch with dry yeast and the bastards gave up at 1.020. I used 5 oz of sugar for carbing and the carbonation is not nearly what I have achieved on my 2nd batch, an IPA that I used White Labs yeast. I might not be correct, but I'm thinking since the yeast gave up at 1.020, there was plenty of sugar for them still to eat and they didn't care about the little bit extra I threw in there.

 

[LaurieGator]

I used Pacman yeast from Wyeast...

 

[AnonyBrew]

As far as yeast health goes, how much yeast was pitched, what was the pitching temp, & under what conditions did you ferment at?

It's possible if conditions were harsh for the yeast that they just pooped out on you.

To answer the other question you had I see no reason why you couldn't add them to a keg & carb like that, even though that would be a big PITA.

 

[LaurieGator]

I did a yeast starter with 1L of water and 100g of dry malt extract for 24 hours at room temp with a stir plate. I used the Wyeast package along with the yeast nutrient that was included. I fermented at about 65F for a week then let it sit at room temp (74F) until I bottled it.

This is the first time I have seriously undercarbed a beer...

 

[MVKTR2]

One thing to try would be to pop open a cheap pack of dry yeast & drop in something like 1/8-1/4 of 1/4 tsp. of yeast into 2 or 3 bottles and wait 2-3 weeks. Pop em open and see if they're carbed. If so, you know it's the yeast. At the same time you could drop in some carb tabs into 2 or 3 bottles and wait the same 2-3 weeks. It should be one or the other, I'd guess sugar measurement was somehow off.

Schlante,
Phillip

 

[JRPVR6]

My guess is you waited too long to bottle and didnt get enough active yeast in to carb up the bottles. 6 weeks sounds like 2 weeks too much.

 

[weirdboy]

I have bottled after 2 months in secondary in the 70's with no ill effects on the carbonation. I just don't think you can make a judgement one way or the other without further information.