First time bottling

[Ryan B]

I had a very fun first brew day last weekend brewing an American IPA which is now happily bubbling away. I'm just looking at getting all the stuff to bottle my beer next weekend. I have a bench capper and a bottling wand to put on the tap on my fermenter.

Just wondering if anyone has any tips or tricks? Also, do most people use normal granulated sugar for priming?

 

[GerritT]

Normal sugar is in my opinion as good as bottling sugar. Some people prime with DME, some with honey, some with Belgian candy sugar.
Do you use a syphon or do you have a tap in the vessel?

 

[Drunkula]

Batch prime. Weight out the sugar you want and get it to the boil in a little water and then sling it into your bottling bucket, or if you're not using one you can put it in the fermenter and give it a gentle stir and leave it to diffuse for 20 minutes.
https://www.brewersfriend.com/beer-priming-calculator/

I use white sugar. Even Chris White (Whitelabs yeast) said use it.

 

[GerritT]

Got me thinking: anyone here ever bottled with golden syrup?

 

[Ryan B]

Normal sugar is in my opinion as good as bottling sugar. Some people prime with DME, some with honey, some with Belgian candy sugar.
Do you use a syphon or do you have a tap in the vessel?

I don't have a tap on my fermenter, so I'm going to have to transfer it to another bucket which the bottling wand fits onto.

 

[GerritT]

I don't have a tap on my fermenter, so I'm going to have to transfer it to another bucket which the bottling wand fits onto.

Ah okay, then batch priming is easier. What @Drunkula already said. Makes a more even distribution, AND if you had your last bottle primed for a full bottle, but it only fills up halfway, you'd have overprimed. Not disastrous, just... maybe interesting.

 

[chewie]

I don't have a tap on my fermenter, so I'm going to have to transfer it to another bucket which the bottling wand fits onto.

A bottle wand will fit onto the end of an auto siphon hose so it isn't absolutely nessacary to rack, however to minimise on sediment being bottled it is better to rack beforehand.

 

[LarryF]

As soon as you've finished bottling dismantle the bottling wand and give the inside a quick rinse off. There's a tiny hole in the spigot where crap can hide but washes out easily when still wet.

 

[OlsBean]

Batch Prime as others have said.
If you using reclaimed bottles and they are mixed heights, you'll find it easier to fill similar height ones together, then cap, just saves some time moving the head up and down on the bench capper each time.
Don't forget to sterilise your bottle caps (I just boil in a pan of water on the stove)

 

[ukphiltr7]

I personally use the Coopers FV that comes with a wand. It does make it easier, but I have found that the valve at the end of the wand can leak slightly between bottles. All the bottles are the same size so I use the car drops. Two per 740ml bottles. The drops do make the whole process easy but I will be trying different amounts of sugar next time.

 

[Fil]

before you waste any cash on expensive fermentables to prime your bottles just compare the mass of sugars used to ferment down from OG and provide flavour,(KILOGRAMS) against the mass of sugars used to prime.. (grams) Do you think that any exotic sugar used for priming will have any noticable flavour impact?? personally i would suggest not. imho plain ol white sugar is perfect for priming..

Good luck with the chore, pre-bottling prep - bottling and the clean up are the worst brew chore imho, get through it and its all downhill and fun sampling from then on- with this batch at least .. and .. Remember to rinse out sediment from poured bottles asap..

 

[Ryan B]

Thanks for all the advice, I bottled last weekend and it all went smoothly, no dramas. Just waiting now.....