Secondary racking, cold crash and flat beer - Any correlation in this?

[Nubiwan]

If I rack into a secondary, or attempt to flcocculate all my yeast from the primary by cold crashing, then am I risking my bottles ultimately having too little yeast to carbonate my beer? Will it make a difference to how carbed my beer becomes, or conversely, how long it will take my beer to fully carb?

I recently put off a red ale and have to say the results have ben pretty "flat". Literally. Beer is fine to taste, but just a hint of carb in each bottle, and zero head. Therefore. unimpressive.

I cold crashed for about a week or more, and then used the calculator to estimate around 2.5 levels of CO2. I used around 3/4 cups of dextrose/corn sugar I think, for 20 odd liters. Whatever the calculator called for. Been 3 weeks and little to no carbonation. Oddly, opened one in the case tonght and it gushed. The rest (at least 7 or 8 I opened) have been hardly cracking my lids off. Consistently just a little carbionation in each.

Mixed priming sugar with water and siphoned from secondary to the bottling pale, using swirl to mix from the bottom. Sugar was in the pale before I siphoned.

Any ideas? What can I do with my flat bottles?

 

[RPh_Guy]

I have some suggestions:
1. Skip using secondary vessel. It doesn't help anything. It drastically increases risk of oxidation and also contamination to some extent.
2. Skip the fermenter cold crash. Instead, make sure your brew water has plenty of calcium and pick more flocculant yeast if possible. Cold crashing also causes oxidation unless you have a device in place to prevent it.
Bottles are your secondary. Let them carbonate and then cold crash.
3. The temperature you enter into the priming sugar calculator should be the highest temperature the beer reached since the end of fermentation. (E.g. not the temperature during cold crashing.) Entering too low of a temperature will cause under-carbonation.
4. After bottling, rouse the yeast in the bottles several times daily. Store the bottles relatively warm, low 70s at least. This greatly accelerates carbonation; it should finish in a few days. Once they carbonate, store refrigerated if possible.

Your priming procedure sounds ok. Was the sugar 100% dissolved? It should be crystal clear. Some flat and some gushing bottles does indicate a problem with mixing -- or possibly a contamination (less likely).

What temperature are the bottles while conditioning?
What yeast did you use?

 

[Nubiwan]

Just an extract kit, so the yeast it came with is not known. I did have bottles stored around 68-70 for couple weeks, then jacked it to low 70s for a week.

I gave them all a shake yesterday. I had 8 or 9 in fridge. Opened them all. They were flat. They are flip tops. I added a small amount (less than quarter teaspoon) of sugar to each, and gave them a shake. Kept them separate from rest of batch. Hope it's not A-bomb time.

I did not have secondary, but they did crash around 45 degreees to clear for about a week. Ferment temp was used in calculator.Beer tastes good, but only very slightly carbed. I boiled sugar to dissolve in about a cup of water. I let the swirl into bottling bucket stir it from bottom. Not convinced this doesn't need a manual stir, as I am not sure you get even mix. But the risk of oxidation?

 

[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

Your temps and process sound fine. Cold crashing shouldn't be an issue. I do it all the time without a problem. It sounds like the flip tops may not be sealing well. If you have crimp caps, try repriming a couple of bottles and capping with them. Store in the low 70s and give it a week or two to see what happens.

 

[kh54s10]

There will be plenty of yeast left to carbonate the bottles. I wonder if the flip tops might not seal tightly enough. Uneven suggest not a good mix of the priming sugar. Also if you don't cool long enough, the co2 doesn't go into solution properly and even a flat beer might gush. That would be cooling only long enough to chill. Allow at least 12 hours, longer than that is better.

Most beers will show carbonation in 1-2 weeks. ALL of my beers have tasted better with 3 weeks conditioning. A few have taken longer but did carbonate. An exception to the 3 week tasting better might be NEIPAs or other highly hopped beers that lose flavor and aroma quickly.

 

[rburrelli]

Ther is nothing wrong with gently mixing your priming sugar by a slow stir.

Colder temp beer holds more CO2. So if you are bottling colder beer and enter a higher temp in your calculator then you are under carbonating.

 

[RM-MN]

. I boiled sugar to dissolve in about a cup of water. I let the swirl into bottling bucket stir it from bottom.

Next time use more water. Your sugar water with such a small amount of water is very dense and does not mix well. Also, start the siphon first to get a good swirl going before you add the sugar water, then use a big spoon to slowly stir to ensure good mixing without adding any more oxygen than you have to.

The one gusher suggests poor mixing. I've had that happen. The undercarbed ones are probably because one or 2 bottles got most of the sugar.