Technique question – Bottle conditioning and force carbing keg

[Mrakis]

Can someone provide you technique when you intend on force carbing a keg, but bottle conditioning a six pack or so to age for later? I am wondering how much to leave behind to bottle a 6 pack (do I just eyeball it?). Then how much dextrose do you use (which I know is directly related to how much is left behind to bottle). I’d appreciate someone just walking me through their process.

The last time I did it, I did half and half. For bottling, I used the brewers best carb tabs (4 tabs per bottle for medium carb). I am not very happy with how they turned out. Going on 2 ½ months in the bottle and they are minimally carbed. I’m trying to save them, but the batch was so good that I keep trying one every few weeks, hoping that they are ready to drink. It was a pretty decent sized beer, coming in at 7.7%, which I assume could be playing a part in the length of time it is taking to carb. At the same time, I am starting to think that I just didn’t add enough sugar (tabs) per bottle. I’ve had great results just using the standard dextrose formula. At this point, I wish I just kegged the entire batch because I enjoyed it that much.

Any advice is greatly appreciated

 

[LansingX]

Bottle first then keg the remaining beer.

Since you are wanting to bottle 6, I will assume you are using 12 ounce bottles therefore you are bottling exactly 72 ounces of beer (1/2 gallon) I recommend that you use 1/2 ounce (approximately 1 Tablespoon) dextrose at bottling time. Or if you want to put the sugar directly into the bottle, use 1 teaspoon per bottle.

 

[JonK331]

Just keg all of the beer and force carb as usual. Then bottle off the keg. It's super easy, check out this thread:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/we-no-need-no-stinking-beer-gun-24678/

Basically, I just sanitize the cobra taps and a bottling wand with the spring and pin end piece removed so you have just the tube. Then shove the wand into the cobra tap and fill the bottles from the bottom. Cap on the foam and you're good to go. You will have some overflow to get the liquid level high enough and push out the foam. Takes a bit of practice and you may want to do your filling in a clean basin so you can save the overflow and drink it.

 

[ArcticBear]

Just keg all of the beer and force carb as usual. Then bottle off the keg. It's super easy, check out this thread:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/we-no-need-no-stinking-beer-gun-24678/

just did this for the first time last week and it was SUPER easy... took 1 bottle to figure out what to do and what not to do and by the 2nd and 3rd bottles i had perfect fills. capped and opened days later with perfect carbonation!

 

[mappler]

Use tablets instead of priming sugar. Then you can carb each bottle individually.