No carbonation first brew

[steveh1992]

Hi guys,

I've done by first homebrew using the st peters ruby red ale kit. Bit of a learning curve because I think i messed up quite abit!

I did the 7 day fermentation, then bottled it and waited 14 days and the results are a decent tasting ale but its got very little carbonation and goes flat instantly. There's abit of sediment in each bottle aswell.

When bottling I rinsed the bottles out with water and stuck them all in the oven to sanitise which probably isn't the correct method, I've seen now you can just rinse them with sanitiser. I put half a tea spoon of sugar in each of the 500ml bottles for priming.

I'm abit hesitant to do another batch with this having no carbonation, if I haven't explained anything in enough detail please ask.

Thanks

 

[Morri896]

I've never done sugar in bottles individually so I don't know how much is right, I usually put 5oz corn sugar in my bottling bucket and mix it up before bottling. I would reccomend how to brew by john palmer, you can pick it up real cheap on kindle. There is also an older edition available free online.

 

[steveh1992]

I've never done sugar in bottles individually so I don't know how much is right, I usually put 5oz corn sugar in my bottling bucket and mix it up before bottling. I would reccomend how to brew by john palmer, you can pick it up real cheap on kindle. There is also an older edition available free online.

I only have a basic kit, wasn't sure if putting sugar into the plastic fermenter would cause even more sediment to get into the bottles.

 

[coonmanx]

Yes bottles in the oven is a bad idea. Just sanitize them and then let them dry upside down. I would sanitize my bottles ahead of time and then they would get stored in a box upside down with clean paper towels on the bottom and then I would seal the top of the box with newspaper and tape. That way I could do the bottles a day ahead and then when I opened the box back up I would have fresh, clean bottles. A bottle tree may help but I always just flipped them over and let them dry on some clean paper towels.

 

[coonmanx]

I only have a basic kit, wasn't sure if putting sugar into the plastic fermenter would cause even more sediment to get into the bottles.

The bottling bucket is a separate vessel than the fermenter. It will have a spigot on it so that you can attach a hose and bottle filler and then once that priming syrup is mixed in with the beer you are good to go. So I would definitely recommend getting those three things. A bottling bucket, a length of hose that fits on the spigot and a bottle filler. The bottle fillers with no spring will actually fill bottles faster.

You will find that mixing some sugar with some water and bringing it to a boil and then dumping it in to a bucket before siphoning the beer in is much easier than filling individual bottles with sugar.

 

[Jag75]

There are things that carbonation depend on. Amount of beer , temp of beer and amount of sugar . One thing is to make certain your beer is done fermenting before you bottle. Using a hydrometer is best , not the air lock. You will create bottle bombs if you bottle too soon. After you bottled did you keep them about 70 f or did you refrigerate immediately? You want to leave them in a dark warm place for a couple weeks , then put in the fridge for a couple days so the sediment drops then enjoy. Heres a priming calculator to help with future brews. Welcome to the forum !

https://www.northernbrewer.com/pages/priming-sugar-calculator

 

[steveh1992]

Thanks for replies guys, been troubleshooting a lot. I've had a reply on a different forum saying I might of conditioned the beer wrong.

Might of been abit too warm in the fermentation which spilled out abit, and during the bottle conditioning I only left the bottles in a warmish room for 2 days then they've been in the shed ever since and a shed in the UK isn't a warm place

 

[RM-MN]

during the bottle conditioning I only left the bottles in a warmish room for 2 days then they've been in the shed ever since and a shed in the UK isn't a warm place

Depending on the temperature in that shed you may have put the yeast that would normally have provided the carbonation you want to sleep. Bring the bottles back into the warmth to wake the yeast and give them a couple weeks to wake up and get their act together before putting them back in the shed.