Too Much Priming Sugar?

[Hucko]

Hello All,

I am currently at the primary stage of the Delirium Tremens extract recipe given at : https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f37/delirium-tremens-extract-77321/

I have two questions:

1.) It calls for 1/3 cup Belgian candi sugar in addition to the 1/2 cup corn sugar I normally use for priming. Is this correct? How much would it take before bottles actually start to explode?

2.) It indicates 4-6 weeks in the secondary fermenter. That seems rather long. Fermentation should be complete well before that. What requires so much time in the secondary, and what will be the impact if I bottle after only 5 days to a week in the secondary?

Thanks in advance for any input...

Hucko

 

[mattreba]

The general rule per John Palmer's How to Brew is:

3/4 cup of corn sugar (4 oz by weight), or 2/3 cup of white sugar, or 1 and 1/4 cup dry malt extract in 2 cups of water

How to Brew - By John Palmer - Priming Solutions

So that's a bit higher than average and Belgians are often on the higher side. I wouldn't worry about explosions.

The secondary's job is mostly for clarifying. If you do not care how clear your beer is you could skip or shorten the time in secondary. This of course means you are likely to have more sediment in your bottles. I know waiting is hard but unless you need it for a specific event I'd recommend following the recipe at least the first time through and evaluate changes in the process next time.

 

[Nurmey]

That's funny, I just typed out a recipe today with those exact amounts of priming sugar. The recipe was taken from Beer Captured so my guess is that it's not out of the question that it's right.

 

[Whisler85]

You are definitely playing a risky game bottling a belgian after a week in the primary and a week in the secondary. With a high gravity beer like this, just the density of the beer alone makes it harder for the yeast to attenuate, plus the higher alcohol slows them down even more.

i'd almost guarantee that you will have bottle bombs if you prime with both those sugars after only two weeks-ive had high gravity brews in the secondary for upwards of two months that were still not attentuated enough when i bottled them and ended up as bottle bombs

if you have never experienced bottle bombs, they are not fun, they are not cool- i had about eight of them explode at once and i thought they dropping the big one

glass thrown 25 feet, glass in my beard, in the hair on my body, in my shoes, covering the driveway- not good

rushing to bottle a beer is always a bad idea-but rushing to bottle a thick belgian is a terrible idea

 

[discgolfin]

Hello All,

I am currently at the primary stage of the Delirium Tremens extract recipe given at : https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f37/delirium-tremens-extract-77321/

I have two questions:

1.) It calls for 1/3 cup Belgian candi sugar in addition to the 1/2 cup corn sugar I normally use for priming. Is this correct? How much would it take before bottles actually start to explode?




2.) It indicates 4-6 weeks in the secondary fermenter. That seems rather long. Fermentation should be complete well before that. What requires so much time in the secondary, and what will be the impact if I bottle after only 5 days to a week in the secondary?


Hucko

This is on the high end but they will not explode(see next answer)

What was the OG and FG? If it is done fermenting than it is safe..but that is not the point of secondary fermentation.....6 weeks is so the beer can age..with this big of a complex beer it needs to age for it to mature and become the beer it needs to be. No fermentation takes place in secondary so it needs this time to mature(dont rush a belgian beer).

that being said I would leave it for minimum 4 weeks and than bottle.

IMO

J