Bottle conditioning in brew fridge

[Unclestewbrew]

Hi Fellas ,
Throughout the warmer months , my ales have been bottle conditioning quite nicely in my garage. However , with the recent temperature drops , my garage is now below 18 degrees most days.
I am thinking of putting my newly bottled brews in the brew fridge with the temp set at 20 degrees. There will be a fermenter in the fridge at this time with the probe attached to it.
Will the bottles condition OK like this or should the probe be laying in the door or somewhere else to get the ambient temp in the fridge right ,

Thanks in advance for any help ,

Cheers

 

[wereprawn]

I'd use the temp probe the way you do normally. Small temp fluctuations won't make much difference to already bottled beer. Is there anywhere inside your home you can put them? Beside/behind something, like a hot water system,fridge, freezer ect... where the temp is high teens to mid twenties. Would save fermenting space. Could even rig up a cupboard, old fridge with a heat source.

 

[Unclestewbrew]

Thanks wereprawn , haven't really got anywhere inside and besides , the missus has insisted I keep it all in the garage haha

Is 20 degrees sufficient to get good carbonation and how long should I leave them in there for ?

Cheers

 

[wereprawn]

20 c is fine mate. Will be carbed in 2 weeks or less. If using PET bottles, give em a squeeze at around the 1 week mark and if they are hard, they should be fine to take out of the fridge and store at ambient. If using glass you could open one to test for carb level after a week or so.

 

[Unclestewbrew]

Cool , thanks
Only bottle into glass so I will give it a go,

Cheers for the advice

 

[yum beer]

I have a cupboard in the garage I use to store bottles. empty and carbing up.
In summer they are carbed in 7-10 days, temp in garage normally 28-32c.
In winter they take longer, 3-4 weeks, temp sits around 12c and drops lower overnight(outside down to freezing most nights) and sometime creeps a little higher.
Just means I need to brew a little more during autumn to stock up for the longer carb period. Come spring things are back to normal.
The longer wait doesn't hurt it gives the beer a little more time to settle and age before drinking.
Once they are carbed they go into the fridge at 2c and stay there till they get drank, up to 6 months normally.
After 3 months yeast is pretty much rock solid and I can pour clean beer without upsetting the muck and the beers are conditioned loverly, lagers are great at 6 months in the fridge.

 

[Kingy]

Thats just overcomplicating things. Just stick em anywhere and wait 2 months. Sample one here and there after that. When there good youll relise as you wont have many left.

 

[yum beer]

Yep, cupboard and a fridge, really complicated.

 

[Kingy]

I wasnt havin a dig at you mate,
There is no need for a temp controlled bottle carbing fridge setup. Just bottle them, stick em anywhere out of the sunlight and wait. Simple. Just like you said. when i bottle they just sit in the shed at ambient. Summer or winter. I dont touch them for at least 2 months. Carbed and aged at tge same time. No loss of bottles trying to drink undercarbed underaged bottles.
Edit. Change wording to try keep everyone happy.

 

[Spiesy]

If you've got room, throwing them in your fermentation fridge works a treat.

I've had issues with some beers not carbing up enough in the colder months.

Whilst I'm no bottling expert, as I keg, and rarely bottle, I would imagine there's no hard and fast rule to ambient bottle carbing/conditioning. Different yeasts will fall asleep at different temperatures, different brewers live in different climates and even then, a particular brewers ambient temperature can vary wildly within a given 24-hour period.

 

[Wolfman1]

I'll often stick bottles into the fermenting fridge with the next brew and it works fine. If there's no room they go in the freezer section of the brew fridge (when the heat belt is on, not the fridge) with half a dozen milk bottles filled with hot water. I change the milk bottles every evening for a week and it's all good.
Normally I lay them on the side to fit them in and then stand them up for storage.
I've also got a big lined box for brewed beer which helps stabilise temps in the summer time and I can ferment in it during the winter with a heat belt.
Give it time and they normally come good.

 

[yankinoz]

Agree that 20 is fine. Depending on the yeast strain's temperature range and how much is in suspension, you might even go several degrees lower, but it would take longer. Been there, done it with Notty.

 

[Unclestewbrew]

I'm going to grab a reptile heat cord and whack that in the fridge connected to my temp controller this arvo.
Temps are dropping below 16 degrees in the fridge ATM so I'm thinking I better raise it if I want good carbonation and good ale brews