Carbonation Question

[Jason Lopez]

Hey everyone,
Quick question here. As some of you know, I recently bottled my first batch, but I can't see much visible evidence of carbonation. Do I need to be worried, or is it just less visible than fermentation?

I'm asking myself a million questions, like if I didn't mix the sugar water in well enough, or if it needed to cool down more, etc. I haven't cracked a bottle yet, just curious.

Thanks!

 

[Blacksmith1]

I never saw any evidence in my one attempt a bottle carbing. When I opened them, everyone was carbed to the level I chose on this calculator.

 

[brewgar]

You don't SEE evidence of bottle carbonation. Wait a week after bottling. Chill one. Pour. Taste. Admire.

 

[Chalkyt]

Don't panic, waiting to see how it turns out can be quite nerve racking the first time but it usually turns out fine.

I find that if I bottle at anything from 0.002 to 0.005 above the finishing gravity, it all ends up pretty good with something like 1.5 to 2.5 atmospheres of CO2 giving a nice petillant fizz. I generally aim for a 0.002 increase so that if the cider is not fully fermented at that stage (maybe it seems stable at 1.001 or something like that but hasn't quite finished), I still have quite a margin of pressure safety for bottling in beer bottles. Mind you, I currently find that I prefer less rather than more carbonation.

In my early batches' adding sugar to each bottle (like "a teaspooon per litre" was a bit hit and miss) so I adopted the idea of adding the sugar (or juice or FAJC) to the bottling bucket or secondary container to get a more "precise" increase in the gravity for bottling (i.e. this way you aren't dealing with miniscule amounts of sugar) and end up with the same carbonation for each bottle.

 

[Maylar]

Give them 3 weeks

 

[Abhishek Dewan]

Add a Soda bottle in the batch next time. It’ll tighten. You can’t go wrong with it. One week should be good for carbonation if temperature is good.

 

[Jason Lopez]

Hey everyone, thanks for the advice! Carbonating really helped the flavor, it was a bit bland and dry when i tried it before bottling. Can't wait to see how my next batch comes out!

 

[blasterooni]

Hey everyone, thanks for the advice! Carbonating really helped the flavor, it was a bit bland and dry when i tried it before bottling. Can't wait to see how my next batch comes out!

Ya got hooked! Let the chase for that perfect cider begin