I am going to be bottling my beer in 4 days. We are going to use priming sugar, put it in the sanitized bottling bucket, and siphon beer out of the fermenter into the bottom of the bucket. I was thinking for clarity sake I could Cold Crash my beer by leaving (the fermenter) outside overnight (will have to check the temps, but I think it's getting down to about 38 degrees). Hopefully more of the yeast will drop out and improve the clarity. Downside is it's a little more jostling for the carboy. But I'm worried if I cold crash the beer, will I still get carb from bottle conditioning? Am I overthinking things?
The beer will need to be at warmer temperatures for carbonation to take place. If you cold crash before much your yeast will drop out and it may not fully carb.
The first sentence is a true statement, but not the second...there will still be plenty of yeast in suspension for carbonation, given a normal timeframe.
It'll easily carb up. YOu can lager for weeks and still have enough yeast in the cleared beer to carb properly
That's why I said "may not", certainly some yeast would be lost. I would at least expect carbonation to take a little longer. Maybe not though. I keg everything, haven't bottled in years so I may not be the best to answer this question.
For the extra work of lugging your fermentor outside and then bringing it inside for bottling just for some clarity, I don't think it's worth it. If you go ahead and do this, you do have to haul that fermentor back inside with a lot of graceful moves or you'll just be stirring up the trub and defeating what you are trying to do. Another point regarding your priming procedure that you mentioned -- boil your sugar in water to get it into a solution and then put that into the bottom of you bottling bucket. If you are a quart short of your desired recipe volume, then boil the sugar in a quart of water to make a sugary water solution, and then cool it. If your volume is already where you want it to be, then boil it in just a cup of water to make a syrup. But regardless of the amount of water that you choose to use, be sure to stir it gently into your beer after racking it on top of the sugar solution. (Racking beer on top of the solution doesn't always work well.) I also like to stir it a few times during bottling too which helps to guarantee that it is staying suspended in the beer, thus a more consistent amount of sugar goes into each bottle.
Agree with Mothergoose - moving the fermentor will likely stir up the same stuff you worked so hard to eliminate. I like to put my fermentor up on the bar or a table a couple days (or even a day) ahead of time for things to settle prior to racking. If you are looking for clear beer, maybe fine with gelatin days before bottling. With respect to sugar priming solution, I don't bother cooling the mixture. I dump it in the bucket and then rack on top. A quart of boiling solution will equalize with your 5 gallon (I assume?) batch without killing all your yeast in suspension.
I routinely cold crash for a week+ before any bottling . . . plenty of yeasties left over. If your conditioning phase is complete (and you are sure of this), it wouldn't hurt to leave it in cold weather for the 4 days (or 7 or 10 ...), this would help settle some yeast. What is important is to set up your fermenter in the position you'll be racking from the night before. Then don't touch anything (except opening the lid) before racking.
I rack to my bottling bucket first to verify my volume, and add sugar as needed to carb to my specific needs. It's easy to overcarbonate a batch because you left a gallon of your 5.5 gallon batch with the trub.
