Bottle carbonating at altitude?

[Chalkyt]

Does anyone have any views about carbonating above sea level? Having scratched around a few websites to see what CO2 levels people aim for with cider, the penny dropped that altitude makes a difference.

For my first batch I aimed for a conservative 2.25 volumes with bottle carbonation (using the Brewersfriend calculator). The result is a pleasant, lightly carbonated cider, which could have benefited from a bit more fizz (and in fact, lost its fizz quite quickly).

Some sites suggest anywhere between 1.0 and 3.5 volumes of CO2 for cider. I see that there is a general recommendation to increase kegging pressure for beer by 1psi per 2000ft, which is just under 10% (seems to be a big deal in Colorado... Coors?), but I couldn't find anything about bottle carbonation.

We are at 3000ft and I imagine that 2.25 - 2.5 would be fine at sea level. I will probably aim towards 3.0 with the next batch and see what happens.

Does anyone live "up in the hills" and bottle carbonate at more than 2.5 volumes?

All views and suggestions are welcome.

 

[Drewed]

Cider does loose it fit quite quickly when bottle carbing. Adding more pressure can lead to foaming. I've foamed a few, and even they have lost fiz quickly.
We are dealing with volumes (pressure) in a closed environment, air pressure because of environment shouldn't matter. But that is just my thoughts, I have not science to back it up.

 

[jmartie13]

I believe the only affect you should see is at higher elevations the CO2 will come out of solution quicker than it would at sea level or lower elevations. If you calculate how much sugar to add for 3.0 volumes there will only be X amount of CO2. It's just the rate at which the gas is trying to reach equilibrium that changes when you crack a bottle.

On a side note, I usually bottle carb my cider to 3.2 volumes and like the results at 1500ft elevation.

 

[Chalkyt]

Thanks for the replies. In the meanwhile I found some references back to this forum where the same topic came up in 2010 and 2007. The short answer seems to be (albeit with a fair bit of technical explanation), "it doesn't matter too much".

Thanks also for the advice re 3.2 volumes. I was a bit worried that going to 3.0 might produce volcanoes. In the past (before I measured stuff) I did get some interesting "fizzy drinks"!