Bulk priming high(er) gravity beers

[manticle]

Do you reseed all bottle conditioned beers LC?

 

[Lyrebird_Cycles]

As I said, it's a bad habit, probably induced by doing sparkling wine.

Last two beers I've done a lager yeast secondary on an ale yeast primary and let the residual lager yeast do the bottle conditioning, to my surprise this was faster than reseeding with PDM (got to pressure in under three days).

The beer I'm doing at the moment has two ale yeast ferments for primary, I'm planning on combining them and thinking I might do a lager yeast secondary followed by PDM for conditioning.

Why? you ask. Because I thought "I wonder what happens if you do this".

 

[manticle]

Do you filter first?

Your beer and I gather you're pretty confident in what you're doing but reseeding regular gravity beers, unfiltered seems like a very unnecessary step. Have you tried without and find a difference?

 

[Lyrebird_Cycles]

Not yet but I'm planning to: actually the beer I'm doing now might be a good candidate.

I haven't yet seen the need for a filter at this scale.

 

[manticle]

Me neither. Reseeding also except for very well bulk aged stuff.

 

[captsensible23]

So I just bottled my beer the other night. I based my priming amounts based on the volume in the bottling bucket and the highest temperature the beer reached during fermentation. I racked into the bottling bucket, got my volume and used the carbonation tool in Beersmith, and double checked with Brewers Friend. I then measured the right dextrose amount out, and after boiling the dextrose for 15 minutes in 500mL of water slowly added it to the bottling bucket and gave it a gentle stir. This is the first time I have done it this way, and after some flat and over carbed batches, hopefully this way works out.

Cheers

 

[Chris79]

I have a bad habit of using wine yeast for bottle conditioning, it started out as a bit of a belt and braces approach; the yeast is a PDM isolated from Champagne ferments, a tough environment compared to beer.

I rack to a secondary, warm it to 18 or so, add yeast and priming, mix then bottle from secondary.

I'm currently playing with lager yeast for conditioning, no results yet.

They are pretty identical to usual - just I will make a small active starter* with my bulk priming solution and dex, add that to bottling bucket and bottle/cap as normal. 1060 - 1070 doesn't warrant it.

*under normal circumstances my starters are all malt but this has a different purpose.

So my Belgian Dubbel is almost three and half weeks in the bottle. I used Brewers Friend, based on the style guide for a Belgian Ale. So I plugged into the calc - 20 litres, with a carbonation of 2.1, with a typical temp of 18. So using dex I was suppose to use 104g. I added that to the secondary for my bulk priming. I did give it a good stir, then shortly after this I started bottling.

I've had one longneck on the weekend and it had some nice cascading, and had a good half cm of foam. I had a lockneck of this yesterday, it was low carbonation, and no foam head what so ever. Very low cascading in it.

Prior to 3 weeks, I did try a few stubbies, and even at 2-3 weeks they were real low on carbonation.

My previous bulk priming worked fine.

Also, my yeast in my primary was 11g of the Danstar Abbaye.

Does this kind of thing just happen, or was this someone I did? I'd like to correct this before I bottle my American brown ale in a fortnight!

Cheers

 

[manticle]

If your priming amount was correct*, I'd be surprised if, with a bit of warmth and time, your belgians don't carb up like you want. There is currently some carbonation in them, yes?

What was the OG and FG?
Upend the bottles gently and put them somewhere around 20-22 degrees. Then wait a bit.

*What was the volume and are you familiar with 2.1 vol carb spritz level? 104 is not high if 20ish litres but 2.1 isn't crazy fizzy either. There's a chance either your calcs or your expectations are out too.

 

[peteru]

I've had slow carbonation with heavy beers in the past. It varies from bottle to bottle, but usually 8 weeks above 20C will do the trick.

 

[Chris79]

Thanks again Manticle.

Yes there is currently some carbonation. I had another stubby and I could see a slow but consistent rising of Co2.

The OG was 1072, and the FG was 1024. I have tried giving them an up end after getting them out of the fridge. Sounds like, I should get them out all out of my bar fridge. I'll do so for maybe a week.

I think I had 20 litres to bottle. I have some experience on that lower end. The batch before this beer was about the same total volume to bottle and I used 120g of dex. The batch before that was an English IPA, and I only used 95g of dex - yes very low I know

 

[Rocker1986]

The SG of the beer affects the solubility of the CO2 as well from what I understand.

It certainly appeared that way for me recently, when I had 3 kegs in the kegerator. The two at the front which were a lager and a red ale both finished around 1.008-1.010, and the keg at the back contained a stout that finished at 1.015-16. They were all sitting on the same gas pressure, but the stout was less carbonated than the other two were. It was perfect for my tastes actually which saved a lot of hassles.

 

[Lyrebird_Cycles]

The SG of the beer affects the solubility of the CO2 as well from what I understand.

The presence of sugar will slightly decrease the solubility of CO2, figure 1% lower [CO2] for a given pressure / temperature for each oP if the system is modelled as sucrose (the closest sugar for which good data is available). The effect is greater for monosaccharides such as glucose and fructose, it appears to be determined by the number of molecules present not the mass (eg it's a colligative property).

Assuming you are talking about beer not wort, the opposite effect occurs due to the increased solubility of CO2 in alcohol. The effect is not large, roughly 0.5% increase in [CO2] for a given pressure / temperature per % ABV.

A higher SG beer will normally have both a higher ABV and a higher concentration of remnant wort solids, so the two effects will oppose one another.

Since remnant wort solids have a mean degree of polymerisation somewhere about 6, for a beer with approx 75% true attenuation the net effect is an increase in solubility roughly 2/3 of the increase that would be expected from the alcohol alone eg a beer of 7.5% ABV will show a 2.5% increase in [CO2] for a given pressure / temperature compared to water.

 

[Rocker1986]

I was talking about beer yes, thanks for the explanation. Interesting stuff as always!

Given that, what would have caused the stout to be less carbonated than the other two beers? It was about 7% ABV with the other two being around 5%, and its SG was as noted in my previous post. I have no gas leaks in my system so it's not that. I wasn't complaining about it though, it was a good carb level for it without having to do anything differently to normal.

 

[Lyrebird_Cycles]

As I see it there's nothing to explain.

One of your beers seemed to be less carbonated than the other when conditions should have been similar. There are a whole bunch of uncontrolled variables and a single unmeasured result.

 

[manticle]

Chris - 1024 seems quite high, depending somewhat on ingredients and process. How certain are you the beer had finished fermenting prior to packaging?

 

[Chris79]

Yes, I had hoped it would be lower than 1024.

This was done as a partial mash on my gas stove. I did not sparge. My mash and brewhouse efficiency is fairly low. I'm starting to wonder if from not sparging my efficiency is so low, I'm guessing that effects the total amount of sugars I extract. But does that have a direct cause and effect on my final gravity?

Just registered my copy of Beersmith. Attached is the recipe as html file. Couldn't see just yet how to export as pdf.

I feel fairly sure it had finished fermenting, I did take two readings over two days and they were the same. I had thought my final gravity may have been 1022 but felt clearer that it was 1024.

Cheers

View attachment Belgian Dubbel.html

 

[Rocker1986]

As I see it there's nothing to explain.

One of your beers seemed to be less carbonated than the other when conditions should have been similar. There are a whole bunch of uncontrolled variables and a single unmeasured result.

Fair point. I'll see if it happens again next time I brew a big dark beer.

 

[manticle]

Be wary of assuming it's finished just because 2 days were similar/same.
I'd be expecting lower - you may have created some potential bombs.

Glass or PET?

 

[Chris79]

I would have thought so too. It was bottled in glass. It's in my garage.

Given what i've mentioned on my setup and techniques used, is it possibly something to do with my brew setup and it's low efficiency?

Or was the 11g of Danstar Abbaye, simple not enough yeast?

 

[manticle]

11g for that gravity is an underpitch.

How fresh was the yeast and how did you use it?