So I made breakfast stout clone then added 4oz oak chunks soaked in bourbon for 2 months. Then poured the whole thing in the fermentor for 8 months. Bottling bucket carb with 3oz corn sugar. 12oz bottles when opened seem fine then all of a sudden rush out like a 4th grade science experiment. (Lots of stuff at the bottom even though everything was filtered multiple times) Bombers are completely fine, in fact they far exceeded my expectations. Low carb no rush of gunk outstanding taste. I have opened multiple 12oz to make sure. My process for bottling add gallon of beer then a splash of bottle sugar water until the 5 gallons is added then give a slow stir and let sit for a half hour to try and evenly disperse. Question 1- any chance I can salvage the 12oz bottles and how to? 2- would the bourbon have messed with my priming sugar calculations? How to deal with that part? Carbing seems like it should be easy but it is the part that's giving me some troubles throughout my first 10 batches. Cheers!
Q1: Maybe. I would get the 12'ers very cold (around 30F) and pop the caps. Let them sit for about two minutes and recap. Maybe experiment with one or two first. Q2: Unlikely. The bourbon is nothing but ethanol (plus esters and flavors) and water . . . should not effect the re-fermentation. Letting the bottling mixture sit for half an hour probably is the source of your problem. It's recommended to bottle promptly and stir once or twice during the process. My guess is you bottled from the bottom of the bucket into your 12'ers first and ended up with too much sugar. Or siphoned from the top into the bombers first which ended up with less of the sweetner.
I agree that the bourbon does not cause the gushers. I also agree that you could possibly get the carbonation reduced by PortLargo's method described above. I have never let the beer sit in the bottling bucket for very long before beginning, although I have taken as much as a couple of hours to finish up, and not noticed a difference in carbonation level throughout a batch. Besides that difference, I do have to wonder if the 12s were as clean and adequately sanitized as the bombers? Do you have any reason to suspect a difference based on how they were prepared for bottling? Your situation is unusual in that some seem o.k. and some are over-carbed. It seems like you would have a combination of over-carbed and flat if it was just the distribution of sugar in the bottling bucket.
Gotcha! So I been going about this all wrong. Something as simple as carbing! So bottle right away no waiting for it to evenly disperse.This would explain carb differences bottle to bottle in my other beers as well. So it's possible half my batch may be just as good as the bomber which promising! I'll definitely experiment with the cold crashing. That one good beer was just so damn good! Can't let em all go to waste. Thank you!
This has been occurring in a couple batches more so under carb then over carb. For example my IPA made in May. Singles were nicely carbed. Bombers under carbed. I let the bombers sit a month and they were better just not as crisp as the 12oz. Cleanliness wise I put my bottles on sanitize in the dishwasher with soap and star dan. I inspect each bottle for any reminents of old beer or stains after the cycle. Toss anything that looks iffy.
Chilling the beer is to reduce the pressure (cold beer will off-gas slower than warmer beer) . . . the idea is to minimize gushing. If they are just overcarbed, venting will reduce the pressure and hopefully make them more drinkable after they are re-capped and stabilize. If infected, the bacteria may re-ferment existing residual sugars putting you back to square one. Sounds like you definitely have mixed levels of fermentation. Do you bottle all the 12'ers together then all the bombers? That would explain it. I stir my bottling bucket a couple of times during the process. Not sure how you get starsan in your dishwasher. Once the bottles are clean you want to do a starsan rinse of the insides. Then store the bottles inverted or cover with a sanitized foil. I avoid soap in my bottles . . . instead, soak overnight in PBW then bottle brush and elbow grease.
So did you add coffee to this as well? I had issues with my breakfast stout clone as well. I had a slow infection that evetually turned all of my bottles to gushers. But I would expect that your bombers would gush too. Whats your headspace look like on your 12 oz bottles vs 22oz bottles?
I gotta start marking boxes which is bottled first vs. later on. When I sanitize bottles I put both a soap disc and liquid star san in at the same time. Honestly may have had one bottle out of 10 batches that tasted bad do to laziness on inspection of the bottle on my part. I feel like that system has worked well for sanitizing with no noticeable off flavors or major issues. One other thing I tend to drink my stouts at room temp. Haven`t really put any in the fridge. So let me get back to you on that........
Just a tid bit, and like everyone else said, I never stop slowly stirring the beer while bottling. I have my wife, son or who ever keep slowly stirring through the hole in the stop of the bucket until it's empty. .... Don't stop!.... That Stirring!.... Hold on to that Handle!. (read as you think of "Don't Stop Believing" by Journey.
YES to the coffee (sumtran boil/ dry hopped with whole kona last week ). I did 10 gal batch of this no issues with the first half. Still quite awesome and full of great coffee flavor! Headspace is probably an inch in both sizes. I use a bottling wand.
Follow up. Moved all bottles to the fridge for a week. Then put one in the freezer for a half hour prior to opening. No science experiment! perfectly carbed no issues. All the dense gunk stayed put at the bottom of the 12 oz bottle. Next step to try just a refrigerated bottle. What will this tell me if anything. freezer vs. fridge and carbonation? Taste was outstanding. Seems to me like unequal dispersment of priming sugar. Not a huge amount of head on the beer in glass, not over carbonated on the pallet. Just a lot of gunk at bottle bottom.(chocolate, yeast, etc. unable to filter it all out) Maybe just filter better next time? Anything else to think about? Gotta open the fridge temp bottle to see if any other differences. Hopefully this batch is saved! Thank you
I'm reading this thread for the first time, so I'm chiming in a bit late. It sounds like you may have misunderstood the reason for the suggestion above about putting bottles in the freezer. At freezer temps the beer can get colder than at fridge temps so that you can pop the caps, let the beers breathe a bit to release CO2 pressure, then put a new cap on them. (Don't let the beer freeze, so 30 degrees is about as low as you want it to go. It's not easy to determine when the beer is at that temp, so this method is a bit of a crap shoot, but I doubt that 30 minutes is quite enough.) So if you can identify which bottles are over-carbed, this freezer treatment is for them. But putting a bottle in the freezer for 30 minutes will probably only chill it roughly the same as a bottle in the fridge for an hour. Your declaration that your freezer example was okay as far as the carbonation is concerned may not be telling you anything about the over-carbonation if this was a bottle that you think should have been over-carbed. All it tells you is that the cold beer is slow to release the CO2 per the suggestion, and maybe the beer was at 30 degrees at that point. If you are going to open a bottle that has been in the fridge as a comparison, and if that bottle is also suspected of being over-carbed, you're probably going to get a gusher if your over-carb suspicions are correct. Your initial post in this thread says that you put the sugar into the bucket by alternating some sugar solution insertion with some beer insertion, and that would tend to get the sugar mixed, but only for a few minutes. The sugar solution is heavier than the beer, so it's going to immediately begin to try to settle out and your first filled bottles will get too much sugar and the last filled will not get enough. (And some in the middle will probably be just right.) That's why a few suggestions were made above about the need to stir occasionally during the bottling process. I stir gently with an upward motion from the bottom when first adding the sugar solution. then 3-4 times during the bottling process (after about every 12 bottles are filled). If you begin to see that some of your bottles are under-carbed, see this thread. http://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/recarbonation-is-it-possible.337318/ Let us know how it goes.
Definitely will do on thirsty Thursday after work! I`m only about 10 batches in to beer making. Seems like every batch I encounter a new issue! I primed the bottles with 3 oz. corn sugar. I appreciate everyone's willingness to help on what would seem like such a simple task in beer making!
Decided to open one last night. Fridge temp no issues whatsoever perfect! So my technique must be off stirring essential when bottling.
If it is inconsistent carbonation, then you could still have some gushers. Just be close to the sink and have a glass ready when you open any of them. Keeping all of them chilled, if you can, will stop/slow the remaining bottles from getting any worse. How's the beer taste?
It'll be a pain in the ass but colder the better. Took 8 months grain to mouth! Taste is awesome if you like coffee it leans heavier toward the suma/ kona. The eagle rare is definitely there but balanced. No sour or buttery favors at all definitely not infected. If you want some id be happy to send some out to you!
