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Faster carbonation?....
How can I get bottles to carb faster? I usually put in the standard 3/4 cup priming sugar, and let sit at room temps. The problem I'll be having with my next couple batches is that room temps are lower coinciding with the weather....Can I just add more than 3/4 cup, or can use the normal amount and try to keep the bottles warmer? Maybe if I pile them up near the heater, but not next to it, and cover them with blankets they'll stay warmer. I suppose if they all explode, having blankets covering them would be a good thing......
I leave a little more air space in the bottle and place on a higher shelf in a warmer part of the house. Did this to a wheat for a club comp. Bottled Monday, served the following Sunday and missed first place by one vote (ok, yeah it would have been a tie then). I would not up the priming sugar.
More sugar won't get you to carb up any faster, but it doesn increase the likelyhood of overcarbed (maybe exploding) beers.
The only way to get it to go faster is to find a warmer place to condition them.
So where is there a warmer place in your house....
Pull your fridge away from the wall and put the cases of beer back there. Push the fridge back up against the cases. This has worked for me before. Rotate the cases every couple days to get an even heat exchange.
If your fridge has those two little cabinets above it, the you can stack the cases on top of the fridge and use the cabinet doors to drap a blanket over the cases and around the sides of the fridge a bit. This creates a "hood" to trap the warm air rising up from behind the fridge and keeps it close the beer cases.
Another option would be to just place a heating pad on low between two boxes of bottles and cover with a blanket. If you have a large enough box to hold the cases then put the cases in there and put the heating pad in there. Closing the main box should warm the interior enought to accelerate carbonation.
Oh hell, quit all that and start kegging.
Brewmando wrote:
I would not up the priming sugar.
+1 on that. Elevating them will keep them warmer as well, on the floor temp may be as much as 10 deg colder than chest height in the same room.
I thought upping the sugar was a bad idea...glad you guys confirmed that for me. I'll try finding a higher place to store them if I can. The fridge location at my place kinda sucks, so I can't pull it out, or use the cabinet above. That's already filled with my beer glass collection.... I never thought about floor temps being so much lower....I could put them in the spare bedroom, near the heater, under a blanket....Hmmm.....thanks guys!
Just remember that if they are wrapped in a blanket they won't really gain from a warmer area much. It will take time to equilibrate.
You want to try and trap heat under the blanket with the beer.
I just thought of another idea!
Put the cases in the oven and toss the heating pad in there with the light on. That would be warmer than ambient too!
Ricka, how fast are you wanting your bottles to carbonate? It still takes beer time to condition and its a natural process that you can't really rush.
brewchez wrote:
Just remember that if they are wrapped in a blanket they won't really gain from a warmer area much. It will take time to equilibrate.
You want to try and trap heat under the blanket with the beer.
I just thought of another idea!
Put the cases in the oven and toss the heating pad in there with the light on. That would be warmer than ambient too!
Hey, I like the oven idea....I would need a heating pad though...how warm is to warm? I wouldn't want them to blow because temperature. I was thinking of maybe putting a blanket tent over the bottles on a shelf, near the heater. Heat could rise up, but not completely through the blanket tent. I would think it could be warmer there. What about an electric blanket? Or are those just asking for a house fire?....
FirePitBrew wrote:
Ricka, how fast are you wanting your bottles to carbonate? It still takes beer time to condition and its a natural process that you can't really rush.
Of course.....I usually wait 3-4 weeks to have a good drinkable beer. I'd like to have them ready in 1-2 weeks. 1 week would be great, so I can have some ready for the local brew session coming up, but not required.
ricka182 wrote:
[ 1 week would be great, so I can have some ready for the local brew session coming up, but not required.
Ah, don't worry too much if they are not ready.
We would also drink DeuS, Kwak, Unibroue, or westvleteren- whatever you happen to have on hand.
Yeah don't worry about it if the beer isn't ready. I'm sure there's going to be plenty of other beer on hand. Do you have any bottles of that grape pale ale left?
One thing I discovered. I have been using cartabs to carbonate my beer recently. You can put as many as 5 carbtabs in a 12 ounce beer and it will most likely be ready to drink within a week athough not fully carbonated. I found that out when deciding on how many to add to 22 ounce bottles. I was stuck between 7 or 8 carbtabs. So I decided to go with 8. Better a little over carbonated than under. Also I use a couple 16 ounce swing tops for test bottles when I make a batch. I add 5 to those. Each time I opened one of them in about 4o or 5 days they were nicely carbed though not fully. I also use a glass that was in the freezer and pour the warm beer into the glass. So you could just go with cartabs and add 5 per bottle for 12 ounce bottles and you should have partially carbed beer in about 5 days.
I like the carb tabs as it saves havinh to transfer the beer onto priming sugar. Just put the carbtabs into sanitized bottles and then syphon the beer into the bottles.
DC
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