Bottle Conditioning Issues

by **manplant** » Sat Oct 04, 2008 9:00 pm

I have A Belgian Dark Strong that has been aging in the secondary since the end of Aug. It was 4 weeks primary prior to that with orig brew day 7/26. It has a very high gravity 1.107 (11.7% ABV) and uses 2 Wyeast Belgian strains. I usually keg everything, but in this case I listened to some friends who thought I should bottle condition it.

Bottling was done on Sun 9/28 and and I tested one Friday 10/3 to see how the carbonation was progressing. There is none! Maple Syrup was used as a primer, targeting 2.8 vols of CO2. Temp of conditioning has been 70F.

Is this common for no carb to exist after 5 days?
After letting sit for 2 more weeks and no carbonation what should I do?Is the 11.7% to strong for yeast to survive to ferment priming maple?
Is there a way to rack to an avaialble keg and force carb?
Should I add more yeast and rebottle?

The good news is, this stuff is deliciuos warm and flat.

by **jawbox** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 6:48 am

sounds like your yeast petered out I had a similar experience with a Imperial IPA i made last year. I ended up carefully kegging the bottles.

by **manplant** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 9:51 am

I was leaning in the same direction.

Im not even sure if putting new yeast into the bottles would be a good idea.

by **slothrob** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 12:52 pm

I'd be surprised if there isn't enough viable yeast to carbonate a beer that's only been aging for a month and a half. It doesn't take much

In my experience, it would be rare for a beer to be very well carb'ed within 5 days. I don't even bother check for at least 2 weeks, and 4 weeks isn't uncommon for full carbonation. I usually also give the beer another few days in the fridge to get the CO2 into solution.

To complicate matters, the high alcohol is going to make the process even slower. The maple syrup may cause additional problems if you didn't guess the amount of fermentable sugar in the syrup correctly. But I'd give it a month or more before I worry about adding yeast.

by **manplant** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 1:41 pm

I appreciate the follow up. After 5 days there is no carb.
Thats OK. Il wait a few weeks and asess. After research I assumed Maple was 75% fermentable.

At noon on friday, I threw it in the fridge and drank at 6 pm. Could be the issue of only 6 hrs at lager temp.