Beer not carbonated

aaronm13

Gave in to temptation last night and opened one of the Brewferm Dubbel's I bottled 7 weeks ago and it was completely flat, zero carbonation. Gutted is not the word and I have 25 more bottles of the Dubbel and 25 of the Triple I bottled 4 weeks ago. Quite unpleasant to drink flat and I gave up after half a bottle, taste is good, maybe a tad sweet. Is there anything I can do to salvage these beers. I used the Coopers carb drops, one per 330ml bottle. I know strong beers take longer to carb up but surely should be more advanced than it is. My first brew was the wheat beer from the Craft range and that hasn't got fantastic carbonation either so wondering could the drops be duds or more likely I messed up something. Please advise if there's anything I can do, thanks.

BeerNut

I wouldn't attempt to fix it until you know what happened. The drops are just sugar so there's not likely to be anything wrong with them. Are the bottles sufficiently warm for fermentation to take place? Are they properly sealed?

aaronm13

BeerNut wrote: »

I wouldn't attempt to fix it until you know what happened. The drops are just sugar so there's not likely to be anything wrong with them. Are the bottles sufficiently warm for fermentation to take place? Are they properly sealed?

I have them in a wardrobe so are at ambient temperature, maybe in the range of 18- 20 degrees. Used a bottle capper to seal them and think it's done correctly, no liquid comes out if I place it on its side, is there any other way to check?

d2ww

Beernut can give you a definite answer, but the temp sounds too low. Only ever done kits myself and anything I've read suggests 22-24 degrees, so I leave them in the hot press for a week. I use the PET bottles so it's easy to know how the carbonation is going by giving them a squeeze.

BeerNut

No, the temperature is perfect.

mordeith

aaronm13 wrote: »

I have them in a wardrobe so are at ambient temperature, maybe in the range of 18- 20 degrees. Used a bottle capper to seal them and think it's done correctly, no liquid comes out if I place it on its side, is there any other way to check?

I wonder if it's possible that the caps are not completely airtight. I know you said no beer was escaping but a tiny air leak would be enough to prevent carbonation.

aaronm13

mordeith wrote: »

I wonder if it's possible that the caps are not completely airtight. I know you said no beer was escaping but a tiny air leak would be enough to prevent carbonation.

It's a possibility alright. The only thing I can think of is to place one bottle in some water and see if there's any bubbles.

So my temperature is good and for now let's assume they are capped ok, what else could I do to salvage my beers and where did I possibly go wrong. I sanitized everything with a milton/vinegar /water solution during brewing and bottling. I pretty much hit the original and final gravity.

If the caps weren't fitted correctly am I wasting my time at this stage to go back over all the bottles with the capper?

When I bottled the Triple 3 weeks ago I ran out of glass bottles so had to use 1 Pet bottle and this is rock hard so appears to be carbing up nicely. I might open one of the Dubbles tonight and check, maybe I just opened a bad one. Clutching at straws, I know.

BeerNut

aaronm13 wrote: »

So my temperature is good and for now let's assume they are capped ok, what else could I do to salvage my beers and where did I possibly go wrong.

This is where your local homebrew club is invaluable: there may be something really obvious to someone with the beer in front of them that would be impossible to diagnose over a text-based discussion thread.

Here's a question, though: are the carbonation drops gone or still rattling around in the bottles?

aaronm13

BeerNut wrote: »

This is where your local homebrew club is invaluable: there may be something really obvious to someone with the beer in front of them that would be impossible to diagnose over a text-based discussion thread.

Here's a question, though: are the carbonation drops gone or still rattling around in the bottles?

Was thinking that myself, some things you just need to see in person.

Yes the carbonation drops are completely dissolved.

BeerNut

Right, so the gas has been produced, it's just not where it ought to be. Are your fill levels high enough?

aaronm13

Yeah, filled the bottles with a bottling stick so all levels equal. As I said I'll try another one tonight, maybe I just forgot to put a drop in it but I'm leaning more towards a capping issue.

aaronm13

Opened up another one there and it's so much better in taste and it's carbonated. Maybe I did just forgot to put a carb drop in or maybe the cap wasn't on properly, who know. Thanks to everyone for their help especially Beer nut, appreciate it so much guys.

Bogwoppit

A leaky cap is a common enough mistake that can be easily overlooked as it's hard to spot.

What kind of capper are you using?

I use a hand held twin lever capper and I find I need to push down hard enough that the little magnet inside the capper leaves a god ring mark on the top of the cap. Otherwise I'm at risk of having a leak.

You'd also be better off batch priming with sugar instead of using carbonation drops, much easier and more consistent (and you won't end up missing any bottles).

neoanto

Yes, batch priming in future is the way to go.
You could check one or two random bottles.
if theyre all the same, reprime and make sure you get a good seal on them.
put them back in that 18-20C place and leave for 2 weeks.

In future a really good thing to do is have a plastic bottle handy at bottling time.
fill it up when your doing the rest of them and squeeze out the air.
when that is carbed up you know the rest are done too.