Flat Lager

Australia & New Zealand Homebrewing Forum

Help Support Australia & New Zealand Homebrewing Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Greg Howard

Member
Joined
23/5/09
Messages
7
Reaction score
1
Hi could I get some insight into conditioning beer .

After 2ndary fermenting a Pilsener bottled the beer and used the standard carb drops (two for a tally) then thought I have a week before the next batch goes into the ferm fridge so decided to lager the pilsener for a week at 4 deg.

The result is the beer is flat. :angry:

So what goes on when you use the carb drops ? Are these small amounts of suger food for residual yeast. If this is the case should the bottles at room temp eventually wake the the existing yeast and once woken begin to feed on the suger disolved in the bottle from the carb drop and create bubbles?

Or are they carbonation drops like they say on the label and as they melt create co2 thus bubbles?

So here is my plan of attack give the existing bottles a week and crack one to see the result , If dead flat still look at an alternative method of carbonation , method one open all the bottles and chuck in another carb drop . Havent come up with method two yet .
What are your thoughts
Cheers
 
Carb drops are just sugar. The yeast eat the sugar and create the co2.

Warm them up to room temperature and leave them for 2 to 4 weeks, you should see an improvement.
 
Warm them up. Give them two weeks to carb.

Don't add more sugar. Unless you like smashed glass.
Carb drops are basically sugar. Food for yeast as you say. Yeast eat sugar, piss alcohol and fart co2.

edit: dammit, beat me to it
 
The drops are a mixture of sugars (types unimportant), the yeast remaining in your beer will consume them and the resulting byproducts are alcohol, CO2 and a tiny bit of water(?), with it being a sealed container the CO2 is what carbonates your beer. However, they do take some time to work, at room temperature you're looking at at least a fortnight to be sure with lagers (often longer), lower temperatures will take much much longer, if at all. You haven't left the bottled beer long enough at room temperature, take them back out of the fridge and keep them at 15-20C for a few weeks is what I would do. Test one and if it is carbonated, lager away. If you're using PET bottles the firmness should indicate how well it is progressing, in glass you just have to guess.
 
Warm them up. Give them two weeks to carb.

Don't add more sugar. Unless you like smashed glass.
Carb drops are basically sugar. Food for yeast as you say. Yeast eat sugar, piss alcohol and fart co2.

edit: dammit, beat me to it


Ha ha yer that was quick ,thanks both of you I appreciate it
 
The drops are a mixture of sugars (types unimportant), the yeast remaining in your beer will consume them and the resulting byproducts are alcohol, CO2 and a tiny bit of water(?), with it being a sealed container the CO2 is what carbonates your beer. However, they do take some time to work, at room temperature you're looking at at least a fortnight to be sure with lagers (often longer), lower temperatures will take much much longer, if at all. You haven't left the bottled beer long enough at room temperature, take them back out of the fridge and keep them at 15-20C for a few weeks is what I would do. Test one and if it is carbonated, lager away. If you're using PET bottles the firmness should indicate how well it is progressing, in glass you just have to guess.

I took them out on saturday night and will give them a couple of weeks Im on the GC hinterland so nrmal house temp should be good 18 to 20 , they're in glass so no way of knowing I was going to open one tonight to see any change but didnt want to waste a beer so thought I would try this forum. So know I not only know whats going on I dont have to waste beer in the process. Thanks For your help
 
I took them out on saturday night and will give them a couple of weeks Im on the GC hinterland so nrmal house temp should be good 18 to 20 , they're in glass so no way of knowing I was going to open one tonight to see any change but didnt want to waste a beer so thought I would try this forum. So know I not only know whats going on I dont have to waste beer in the process. Thanks For your help


Consider bottling one PET with each batch. It can indicate how carbonation is progressing. eg. Big W
 
Carbonation drops take some time to dissolve. Wait for a couple of days after bottling and then invert each bottle a couple of times to mix the dissolved drops. If you don't do this the dissovled drops end up as a thick syrup sitting in the bottom of the bottle. which the yeast will be very slow to ferment. It's worse in the cold.

If you have problems with flat beer when using carbonation drops, usually the bottles need a couple of turns to mix the syrup into the beer.

Pat
 
An excellent point Pat, I had just that problem lately where lagers in particular didn't want to carbonate in any great hurry, even throughout summer. I picked up a few bottles and had a closer look, where carbonation was lacking there was indeed that syrupy layer at the bottom so while the carb drop had dissolved it hadn't distributed throughout the bottle, easily fixed though with a few inversions and away it went over the next week or so.
The newer Coopers PET bottles seem to be much darker and its harder to see what's going on in there, but the pressure or rather the lack of it and the resulting soft bottle should be a give away.
 
A little of topic but still on carbonation, I have found that as there is no (sugar) in most all grain recipes the beers that are bottled gain off flavors from the fermentation of sugar in the bottles.
To combat this I recently filled a keg and allowed the beer to get carbonated appropriately, then filled sterilized bottles from the tap as I would have done from the fermenter.

The resulting bottles are carbed perfectly , last for ages and ages, dont have shitty sediment in them, and taste exactly how they should taste out of the keg.
You can of course transport the carbed bottles wherever you go and they taste great.
Perfect for taking a lazy 10 pack to a BBQ ect.

I have always wanted to try carb bottles with honey or corn starch, anyone done that?
 
Back
Top