Hi everyone, a few questions relating to priming.

[Taximania]

Hello to everyone.
First post on here so :

Lurked the board for quite a while and absorbed like a sponge as much information as humanly possible.

Quick background on my newbie journey down the brewmaster alley.

First brew was a milestones lions pride.
Although not primarily an ale drinker this was very good indeed.
In fact I was amazed at the quality achievable through a home brew kit.
Made in a king keg top tap and brewed to instruction with no mods.
I added 80 gm to the barrel and this carbonated the brew sufficient for an ale.

My next brews were all lagers as that is my tipple of choice.

Cracked on with the Wilko kits as they are apparently knocked out by the Muntons stable and so in the words of the famous actor...
What could possibly go wrong...

The kits brewed up were fantastic value at £7.50 a each so a big happy days to that.
Added a kilo of enhancer to the lager batches and some halertau hops for a very cheap pint indeed.
Good value stores that enabled me to also grab a cheeky Woodfords wherry for under fifteen pounds.

Brews were the Mexican cervasa the golden lager and the Coopers European

So that leads me on to the questions I could not find the answers to regarding priming.
On the wilko instructions they said add 80 gm to the cervasa and golden lager.

The first kit I did was the cervasa and duly batch primed a smidgens over the 80g as they recommended at 100gm of dextrose.
Added this to boiled water emptied into vessel and transferred batch on top and gently stirred a few times ensuring no air invasion.
Then siphoned bottled and stored for 3 weeks at about 20- 21 c
After first week like any nosy mortal being I cracked one open.
Only slightly carbonated.:wha:
Did this for the next two weeks and again only slightly carbed up.

The other two lagers were batch primed at 160g and are just perfect.
All were brewed to 23l and instructions duly followed.

So why are Wilko or Muntons advocating a small prime rate of only 80 dextrose.
These chaps create these kits in laboratory conditions to ensure Joe Soap gets a pleasant result and comes galloping back for more.
Now the newbie brewer being an impatient character and itching to get supping asap wants pleasant beer reasonably carbed in around 4 or 5 weeks as promised(European coopers excluded) so again why do they err on a low side recommendation.
I have seen the posts on here of peeps mentioning they followed the prime rate instructions off the can and were disappointed with the resultant carbonation.

So accepting that all beers and styles have there own requirements what are the members general consensus for carbonation rates on lager beers.

For the batch prime is it to be 80g as recommended by the makers or 120 160 or even 200g plus for a lively pint.
Surely the manufacture can not be advocating a very mild fizz for their lagers.

Btw ; I tried gently inverting bottles to mix up the yeast a little to try to get them excited and slightly increased temp range for a few days to 24 c
But to no avail on the cervasa.
I just think maybe way too little dextrose . thoughts ?

A quickie if I may on chill haze.

If i leave the bottles in the fridge at around 5c for more than a few weeks is it then a certainty that the haze will dissipate .
Understand its only cosmetic but a nice clear pint of amber nectar on a sunny day is a site to behold.

Great board and a absolute mine of information for this great hobby.
Adios and thanks .
Taxi;

 

[Slid]

80g is rubbish advice for priming a lager - twice as much is fine. I would go so far as to say that 200g for a 25L brew will not burst PET bottles, as long as the fermentation is really over at bottling. Since you are bottling at 2 weeks, this ain't happening. And 200g priming is not any problem for that style.

Everything else you say sounds fine to me.

As regards the question of why the instuctions are xxxx - its easy - you get the same set of instructions for every kit. I guess there may be manual intervention here...

...So you buy a lager kit and it comes with the same yeast as an Ale kit, so you get the same instructions. Possibly there is a different set of instructions for your lager, its just that they ran out of them, on account of inadvertenty putting these in with the wrong kit order a week last tuesday.

After about 2 kits, the best thing you can do with the kit instructions is recycle - if you get stuck, just ask on here.

 

[Taximania]

Thanks Slid, appreciated.

For information I was recently reading the Muntons gold continental pilsner box instructions and that too advises only 85 g of priming sugar or half a teaspoon a pint which i believe is one and the same.
This wasn't just included on mass produced instruction leaflets but was printed on the actual box itself.

Not sure why they are keen to steer us all in the general direction of a flat pilsner.

I was under the impression that their head brewers painstakingly mastered these instruction to the letter to ensure we reproduce good tasting well carbonated lager beer

And you would think it equally important for Muntons that the consumer comes trotting back for more.

Sure the consensus on here is around the 160-200 g per 5 gallon batch :wha:

80g is rubbish advice for priming a lager - twice as much is fine. I would go so far as to say that 200g for a 25L brew will not burst PET bottles, as long as the fermentation is really over at bottling. Since you are bottling at 2 weeks, this ain't happening. And 200g priming is not any problem for that style.

Everything else you say sounds fine to me.

As regards the question of why the instuctions are xxxx - its easy - you get the same set of instructions for every kit. I guess there may be manual intervention here...

...So you buy a lager kit and it comes with the same yeast as an Ale kit, so you get the same instructions. Possibly there is a different set of instructions for your lager, its just that they ran out of them, on account of inadvertenty putting these in with the wrong kit order a week last tuesday.

After about 2 kits, the best thing you can do with the kit instructions is recycle - if you get stuck, just ask on here.

 

[pms67]

Lager 8g per litre. Ales 6g per litre

Batch prime

Dump it in,wait 5 mins then bottle.

I don't even stir it anymore so that I don't disturb trub and therefor avoid the need for a secondary fv.

Welcome and cheers

 

[FatCol]

I use 200g to batch prime lagers and ciders and then bottle into Coopers PET bottles and I've had no issues at all. With ales, I tend to keg them in the budget Wilko Pressure Barrels and use 75-85g - again without problems.

One of the issues that kit manufacturers have is that they have to give instructions that will result in a reasonable end product, but without the likelihood of any exploding bottles etc. If you are using glass bottles particularly, even a small amount of damage can weaken them significantly. In our current "where there's blame, there's a claim" culture, can you imagine the problems for a kit producer if someone filed a claim saying "your instructions said 200g of sugar for priming and now i'm full of glass shards!"

 

[Taximania]

Yes thats it Col.
Never entered into my head.
Were theres blame there is a claim !

85g keeps them incredibaly safe.!

Doesn't help me n thousands of others who blindly followed the blind.

So I am Having my flat mexican cervasa party thiz weekend.
First 70 bottles on the house
Bring your own Fajitoes.
Ariba ariba !

 

[norm]

Just bought a bulldog cerveza and it says 150gms for barrelling or 1 level teaspoon for bottling so I was wondering what to do myself as I want to batch prime into another fermenter and then bottle.

 

[Taximania]

Hiya pal

Feel free to come round and sample my batch of flat pish Cervasa
The brewers are being complacent and pretty much ultra safe to say the least.

Batch prime at the 160 g mark pal and you will be pleasantly pleased.
Never had the cervasa down as a massively carbonated drink but I believe 150-160 batch prime will really make your summer.

Only a humble newbie but do trust me on this one :wink:

Leave at room temp for up to three weeks for full carbonation to take effect and then off to your potting shed or somewhere nice and cool

All the best

Taxi ;

Just bought a bulldog cerveza and it says 150gms for barrelling or 1 level teaspoon for bottling so I was wondering what to do myself as I want to batch prime into another fermenter and then bottle.

 

[norm]

Thanks for that Taxi, will try that. Ok in flip top bottles do you think?

 

[mcc111]

This is the link you want... http://www.brewersfriend.com/beer-priming-calculator/ It gives you a range of fizz for different beers and weights for various different types of sugars. Enjoy :thumb: