Amount of Priming Sugar per bottle

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ME_Brewski

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So I have been taking everyone's advice on using the priming sugar calculators. Only problem is that I don't have a bottling bucket yet and will be priming each bottle individually for my first batch. Using the various calculators, and after I scaled down the sugar to per bottle, my math is telling me 0.4-0.6 tsp per 12 oz. bottle. So, I was going to add 0.5 tsp of table sugar per 12 oz. bottle to achieve a CO2 vol of 2.2 in my Classic American light (Came with Kit). This amount of sugar seems low to me, does it sound right to any veterans?
 
Six tenths of a tsp would be a rounded half teaspoon. But get a bottling bucket together asap. It cost me about $13 to make my own. A fermenting bucket,one of those Italian red & white spigots & a dremel with router bit did the job.
Then you can heat 2C of water in a small sauce pan to boiling for a couple minutes. Remove from heat & stir in weighed amount of priming sugar till it goes clear again. Cover & cool a bit before adding to beer racking into the bottling bucket by way of a tube running down half way round the bottom of the bucket. This induces a swirl that helps mix the sugar solution with the swirling,rising column of beer.
 
I suggest leaving the beer in the fermenter a few more days or a week until you get properly set up to batch prime and bottle. It won't hurt the beer at all and will make your first bottling day much more successful (and less of a PITA) than if you try to do this w/o the right tools. It's easy to make a real mess of it if you lack the proper gear.

Do you have a Lowes nearby? My bottling bucket is a 5-gallon white food grade bucket I got there plus a lid. It works great and was cheap. You'll have to drill a 7/8" hole for the spigot, but that's pretty easy.

If you don't have an LHBS handy, jump online and order 1) an Italian spigot, 2) a spring-loaded bottling wand (this is a must-have IMO), and 3) a bit of 3/8" food grade tubing (you'll just need a couple inches to attach the wand to the spigot).

Last hint - bottle over an open dishwasher. Just trust me on that one.:D
 
Yeah, I still have a week until I even need to be bottling and I have a Lowe's and lhbs nearby and I have planned to make a trip there tomorrow. I only have a 2 gallon fermenter so I just didn't know if it would be worth it with bulk priming, but you do make it sound a lot easier that way.

What about a 3 gallon water cooler with built in spigot? Then attach tubing from spigot to bottling wand that I can pick up tomorrow?
 
You'd still have to use a tube from an autosiphon to the bottom of the cooler jug to prevent aeration at this point. Then bottling wand & tube to it's spigot to bottle from. And something to cover the open end of the jug.
 
I can't imagine bottling any other way than to batch prime. Adding sugar to each bottle sounds like a mess and a giant hassle. Bottling can already be enough of a pain as it is. DIY bottling bucket and some sort of bottling wand will help you avoid cursing the beer gods on bottling day.
 
Oh yeah,I even got frustrated the 1st couple brews using the Cooper's carb drops. Was it one or two I put in? Did I even put any in? Dang,gotta look'em all over again@##$#$^%$! Bulk priming is cleaner & a lot less hassle.:mug:
 
Yeah, I guess it could be bad from a 5 gal. Carboy but I only have a 2 gallon fermenter with built in spigot, so the only real trouble is putting the sugar in each bottle. But in total should only be around 20-21 and I have a funnel.
 
But I do agree with you, and I will be moving to bulk priming as soon as time/money permits.
 
I agree. Leave the beer for another week or whatever and drop the $15 on a bottling bucket. Bottling can be enough of a pain as is; trying to siphon one bottle at a time, let alone prime them one at a time, is a nightmare. And a funnel? That's asking for oxidation.
 
bottle priming is terribly inconsistent as well. Batch priming will produce even carbonation for the entire batch.
 
homebrewdad said:
I agree. Leave the beer for another week or whatever and drop the $15 on a bottling bucket. Bottling can be enough of a pain as is; trying to siphon one bottle at a time, let alone prime them one at a time, is a nightmare. And a funnel? That's asking for oxidation.
Click to expand...

I was just going to use the funnel to put sugar in each bottle and spigot alone for moving beer into bottle.
 
are you planning to boil a sugar solution? Simply adding dry sugar could infect your beer. I also agree with the inconsistent priming, I tried this when I used the Mr. Beer keg the first batch or two and I got wildly inconsistent results.
 
Lots of good advice in this thread but just to be clear...

Half of a teaspoon is the general consensus, right?
 
It's decided, I'm just going to bite the bullet and get a bottling bucket, auto siphon, and bottling wand.
 
ME_Brewski said:
I was just going to use the funnel to put sugar in each bottle and spigot alone for moving beer into bottle.
Click to expand...

Are you using a Mr. Beer LBK? I know that their instructions tell you to fill the bottles using the spigot, but that's just asking for aeration which leads to oxidation (imagine the taste of wet cardboard:(). It's also messy.

You can run a longer (like 4ft) piece of 3/8" tubing off the LBK spigot and into the bottom of a bottling bucket to prime. Put the LBK on the counter and the bucket set up on something to raise it off the floor about 18". You'll be able to drain the LBK into the bucket w/o aerating your beer (which is bad at this point). Using a bottling wand avoids aeration since it fills from the bottom of the bottle.

ME_Brewski said:
It's decided, I'm just going to bite the bullet and get a bottling bucket, auto siphon, and bottling wand.
Click to expand...

Good for you! You'll be glad you did.
 
Update for you guys, I went to the lhbs and got a 6.5 bottling bucket, auto siphon, and bottling wand. Thanks for the suggestions, I decided to take your advice on the easier more efficient route.

Cheers!
 
Awesome, you'll be so much happier. Bottling sucks anyway so the easier you can make it the happier you'll be.
 
ME_Brewski said:
Update for you guys, I went to the lhbs and got a 6.5 bottling bucket, auto siphon, and bottling wand. Thanks for the suggestions, I decided to take your advice on the easier more efficient route.

Cheers!
Click to expand...

Good for you Brewski.:rockin: May your bottling day be less of a PITA than it otherwise would have been.

P.S.- your bottling bucket is also a handy place to store Star-San for when you are brewing. You can dip stuff in it to sanitize and also use the spigot to drain a bunch into your fermenter (and swirl it around) then return it to the bottling bucket.
 
0.5 teaspoons is what I decided to go with when I bottled some small ( < 1 gallon) experimental batches. Seems to have worked fine.

Edit: just realized I didn't read through the whole thread before posting. Guess I was late to the party, but I'll leave my post up for anyone searching for priming individual bottles.
 
JLem said:
0.5 teaspoons is what I decided to go with when I bottled some small ( < 1 gallon) experimental batches. Seems to have worked fine.

Edit: just realized I didn't read through the whole thread before posting. Guess I was late to the party, but I'll leave my post up for anyone searching for priming individual bottles.
Click to expand...

I appreciate it!
 
BigFloyd said:
Good for you Brewski.:rockin: May your bottling day be less of a PITA than it otherwise would have been.

P.S.- your bottling bucket is also a handy place to store Star-San for when you are brewing. You can dip stuff in it to sanitize and also use the spigot to drain a bunch into your fermenter (and swirl it around) then return it to the bottling bucket.
Click to expand...

That is a great idea! I will definitely do that!
 
You're welcome.

Here's a bonus one for you. Go to Lowes down the aisle where the wallpaper hanging stuff is. Look for a long, narrow plastic wallpapering glue tray. They're just a few bucks.

It's very handy for both brewing and bottling day to have that about 3/4 full of Star-San for smaller stuff like spoons, thermometers, airlocks, etc. so you don't have to fish them out of the bottom of a bucket.
 
BigFloyd said:
You're welcome.

Here's a bonus one for you. Go to Lowes down the aisle where the wallpaper hanging stuff is. Look for a long, narrow plastic wallpapering glue tray. They're just a few bucks.

It's very handy for both brewing and bottling day to have that about 3/4 full of Star-San for smaller stuff like spoons, thermometers, airlocks, etc. so you don't have to fish them out of the bottom of a bucket.
Click to expand...

or, even better, one of these - http://www.lowes.com/pd_92191-75830-SP32_0__

and just spray the star san on
 

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