I made a apricot blonde. I used dregs from a sour beer I like. It has been sitting on apricot puree for about 7 months in secondary. It's finally reached the tartness I want. I was a little fearful of there being enough live yeast left to bottle condition my beer. Based on the recommendations from my local HBS, I pitched about a quarter packed of some basic Safale 05 Dry Ale Yeast on top of the beer in the bottling bucket. But within 10 minutes, I could already see activity and stirring around. Question: will I be making bottle bombs? Should I let it go for a little bit, then bottle? Thanks and cheers!
Found some info on another site and it makes sense: "It's not more yeast that causes bottle bombs, it's adding too much sugar, or adding sugar to too much unfermentable sugar already present (like bottling too soon.) The yeast will only consume what sugar is available to it, regardless of the amount of yeast you add. You can add a pound of yeast and if there's only 5 ounces of sugar to be eaten, then once it's gone the yeast will not have anything to eat." I did measure out my priming sugar like every other time I've brewed, so I think I will be okay.
Get those babies carbed up and in the fridge. Way too much sugar left in that batch, you will have bottle bombs. If not bombs, at least super gushers that will stir up all the yeast sediment, and fiz out of the bottle and fill your glass with foam. I've been there, not a fun place. I think it was Vinnie that said don't bottle sours over 1.008?
Shoot... Thanks. Well, I also mistakenly took the FG after adding the priming solution to the beer. how much did that affect my "true" FG. I'm hi ssing its stil high.
i've asked myself that question before and tried to do a quasi-experiment. as an example, how much water would i have to add to my wort to lower the OG by X number of points? the easy answer for you would be to use brewing software to give you the exact amount. i'm at work, so i don't have it handy. but lets assume you used 4 oz of table sugar to prime 5 gallons. the sugar would bump the gravity, and my (hopefully educated) guess is that it could bump it from 1.008 to close to your readings. but i'd be tempted to guess that your FG was slightly on the wrong side of 1.008. probably not by that much. but by enough that you'll get bottle rockets in a few weeks. i'm more curious as to why you added more yeast when you bottled?
My gravity was hanging out at 1.015 for a little over a month. I didn't know if there was enough viable yeast to carb the bottles. My homebrew supply store suggested pitching a half pack an bottling . Now im wondering if I should have pitched the yeast in secondary to bring the FG down a bit before bottling....
4 oz (assuming) of priming sugar @ 46ppg in 5 gallons is around 2.5 points. True FG is still around 1.012-1.013. Either way though, you're still bottled @ 1.015.
assume that Brett knocks the sugars down by 1 POINT a month. if you were at 1.015, we're talking about 7 more months of fermentation. and if you put in fruit puree, which I have not done so I'm talking not from experience, that would be a bit of a sugar bump. for fruit and brett, i'd be targeting a one year secondary fermentation. probably wouldn't expect it to be completed sooner than that. but yeah, dude, you iz gonna git bottle rocketz.
My initial thinking is that you probably shouldve waited longer before bottling. What dregs did you use? At what point of fermentation did you pour them in? Sometimes the wild yeast can stay inactive. Just cause you poured some stuff from the bottom of the bottle of your beer doesnt necessarily mean it's all going to work.
I would probably un-bottle and place back in a carboy. And wait a good long while until the gravity is lower. Unless, you plan to drink it very soon.
I used Trinity The Flavor and Brain of the Turtle dregs. I pitched those at start of my secondary with the puree (2.5 Weeks in primary). I'm thinking of putting it back in a carboy and waiting it out. Maybe some more apricot puree? Appreciate ALL the replies and advice. Cheers!
But I have carbed other beers at or around the same FG without gushers or bombs. Granted they are different styles, why does a this FG for a sour potentiate the possibility of a bomb?
Whereas your whatever-ale might finish in the carboy at 1.015 and be fine to bottle condition, those yeasties are about spent. They probably have enough life to carb the bottle. Sour bugs chew through sugars very slowly, but also very steadily, usually finishing somewhere around 1.000-1.004ish. So all that slow chewing away will blow your shit up.
Standard Sacc yeast can't eat the more complex sugars in the wort which is why they don't (typically) drop the FG down to nothing. Some Saison strains can get them down that low. Brett and bacteria don't face the same problem as standard Sacc; they will eat all of the sugars down and leave nothing (or almost nothing) behind.
This is my understanding of it. It might take a year or even longer, but I have seen the gravity drop below 1.000 on a bugged beer.
