Newbie to brewing, solo bottling woes

[davie887]

Hi all!

Have lurked here for a while and done a few simple ciders and ginger beers, just demijohns though. Really enjoying myself and the fact that the hobby can be left alone for days/weeks is perfect for me as I am often away with work etc.

The one thing that has frustrated me no end is bottling. I live alone and getting someone in to help isn't really practical. I have bought 2 syphons so far and both are terrible! One is just a firm tube with a filter, silicon tube and tap (leaks everywhere, have to suck start) and the other is an auto syphon (hard to start, leaks and very easy to disturb lees).

Without having 4 hands, what does the solo brewer do?

 

[Ezza]

FV with a tap fitted,stainless steel bottle wand.

 

[Galena]

The auto syphon is indeed a terrible device, I still use mine but get so frustrated with it. Starting it is the only real issue, pump like crazy and it doesnt seem to do anything except go up and down without pumping any liquid, then as it starts it causes loads of unwanted bubbles, the end of the tube comes out of the bucket and beer spills everywhere.
I have the bucket and the FV at the same level to help stop that until it starts and then lower the bucket, it would be easier to just suck it through but I suppose that increases the chance of an infection?
Once the siphon starts though, all is good, as the bttom of the tube is not an open end it does not suck any debris and I can push it right into the yeast and it doesnt carry any yeast through, though most of my yeast has high floculation.

My FV's all have taps so I have tried draining but they each have a tiny little hole in which just constantly suck air into the tube, perhaps I need to Araldite the hole up?

Apart from that I actually enjoy bottling, all done solo.

 

[phettebs]

This is the way...

 

[Clint]

I get on ok with my auto syphon. I syphon into a bottling bucket which has my priming solution added then bottle via the tap on the bucket which has a bottling wand fitted.
Strictly no help!

 

[damienair]

I have an auto siphon and it is a bit of a pain to get going solo. I’ve added extra tubing onto it so as it is safely in the bottling bucket. I then start priming and pumping the auto siphon when the tip is only 1/4 way into the brew. Once it gets going it is great. I then follow the brew down. When there is around 20% of the brew remaining I tip the bucket gently over the edge of the table and gently sit the tip of the siphon on the sediment at the very edge of the bucket floor. I’ve had good results so far. I also have a tap on each of my fermentation buckets and a bottle wand. I am only at it a few months, but I actually quite enjoy bottling. I’ll be bottling my latest brew on Saturday.
Welcome as well.

 

[hoppyscotty]

Had similar woes with syphons and bottling wands especially with dry hopped beers and the wand getting clogged with suspended hops (I'm lazy and don't transfer to 2nd bottling bucket!). Luckily I'm part of a home brew group with a few mates so we've all chipped in for a Grainfather conical fermenter and that has been a revelation. Being able to dump the trub before bottling has made bottling day so much smoother and easier with much better results. Still get blocked wand when dry hopping, but have just got a dry hop mesh tube so will use that in future. However I'm looking at pressurising the Grandfather to about 2psi and using one of those bottling guns so we can purge bottles with CO2 first and hopefully the couple of psi of pressure should help with flow.

 

[AXW123]

I have a conical fermenter and when the valve is working it makes a huge difference. With a tube and bottling wand attached to the yeast dump outlet gravity pushes the beer down and you can remove all the yeast and trub before you start so only clear beer to deal with and multiple hands not required.

 

[Burtsbeets]

After trying a few things now, for me this is the best way that works. There are a few tricks to getting it to run smoothly though.

First off is having a good seal on all the parts. I find the parts where the most trouble occurs are the black sediment guard and reduction adapter for the extendable arm of the siphon. The reduction adapter is the main culprit for letting air in that causes a sudden stop in the siphon that can be very annoying. Before you start, block the end and suck on the siphon, you will know if you got a good seal or need to adjust it.
Next, the sediment guard. This can cause a slow siphon when it is pushed all the way up onto the plastic tube. The best thing to do with this is push it all the way up then ease it off to allow a decent flow. As added protection against hop material, I have a small hop bag which usually goes on the end as well.

As for getting the flow started, the best way (and why I extended my tube) is don't do it while you are below the beer to be put into bottles. This is inevitably what causes the moment of panic and a beer covered floor

Stand with the end of the hose above the beer and suck until you feel the weight of the beer in the tube. For me, I have the small plastic piece inserted so I can see the beer in the pipe. Then attach the bottling wand. Lower the tip of the bottling wand below that of the surface of the beer and tap the button to purge the air and the beer now fills the bottling wand. After that its just a case of filling the bottles!

I will also be bottling tomorrow, so if more explanation is needed I can take pictures

 

[Binkei Huckaback]

Definitely a tap and a bottling wand. Or failing that, a syphon with a tap, a bottling clip, a piece of hose a couple of inches long and a piece of hose as long as your tallest bottle.

-Clip the syphon securely to your fermenting bin
-Sanitise the syphon tap and short piece of hose, adding the hose to the tap.
-Suck until you get a mouthful.
Close the tap.
-Remove the short piece of hose and tap.
-Sanitise the longer piece and atttach to the tap.
-Push the longer piece of hose onto the tap and sanitise.
-Push the hose into the bottle and turn the tap. As the bottle fills, gently draw the hose out, keeping it under the beer until desired fill level is achieved.
-Turn off tap.

Obvoously it helps to keep a spray bottle of no-rinse sanitiser handy.

 

[Jim Brewster]

It's very difficult to do from a demijohn, especially if you're using a bottling wand as well. Like you say, you need more than 2 hands, preferably 4. I've ditched the autosiphon and wand and now just use a silicone tube fed in to just above the trub

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

I used to use the tap on the FV and a little bottler but clean up was a real pain in having to remove the tap and try to get all the crap out properly. I spent ages on it with a tooth brush. Then there was the worry as to whether the seal was adequate when all put back together etc so I replaced these with FVs with no tap and bought an auto syphon. Well, I say “a”, the first two cheapos from eBay arrived broken so I ended up getting one from B2B. The syphon works great and is so much easier to clean. I only have to pump it once and it’s off. Works better for kegging than for bottling though as it’s a bit of a pain to attach the little bottler to it.

 

[Graz]

I've bottled from demijohns before now single handed. Just need the right kit, main thing being a bottling wand and siphon clip.

Aside from that just use the bog standard plastic siphon with sediment trap and tube.

So demijohn up on a table / worktop, clip the clip on the rigid siphon tube and lower it into the DJ fixing the clip to the neck of the DJ. Now the thing here is to not lower the siphon all the way down thus stirring up the sediment, I normally put it about half way down to start with then put a clothes peg on the top bit to stop it sliding down through the clip.

Now stick the flexible end of the siphon tube into the bottling wand, have your bottles ready, and something to catch any drips etc. I use a washing up bowl.

At this point I suck start the siphon, I know some people don't like doing that but I've never had a brew go bad because of it. Then it's a simple process of filling each bottle with the wand. When the liquid is getting close to where the sediment trap is on the siphon I finish whatever bottle I'm doing and lower it some more.

The last bottle or two is the hardest as it's a little bit of a contortion act trying to tilt the DJ, make sure the siphon is in the right place (i.e. at the bottom by now), and fill the last bottle or two all without trying to stir up any sediment but I usually manage it.

 

[dearleuk]

After trying a few things now, for me this is the best way that works. There are a few tricks to getting it to run smoothly though.

View attachment 43324

First off is having a good seal on all the parts. I find the parts where the most trouble occurs are the black sediment guard and reduction adapter for the extendable arm of the siphon. The reduction adapter is the main culprit for letting air in that causes a sudden stop in the siphon that can be very annoying. Before you start, block the end and suck on the siphon, you will know if you got a good seal or need to adjust it.
Next, the sediment guard. This can cause a slow siphon when it is pushed all the way up onto the plastic tube. The best thing to do with this is push it all the way up then ease it off to allow a decent flow. As added protection against hop material, I have a small hop bag which usually goes on the end as well.

As for getting the flow started, the best way (and why I extended my tube) is don't do it while you are below the beer to be put into bottles. This is inevitably what causes the moment of panic and a beer covered floor

Stand with the end of the hose above the beer and suck until you feel the weight of the beer in the tube. For me, I have the small plastic piece inserted so I can see the beer in the pipe. Then attach the bottling wand. Lower the tip of the bottling wand below that of the surface of the beer and tap the button to purge the air and the beer now fills the bottling wand. After that its just a case of filling the bottles!

I will also be bottling tomorrow, so if more explanation is needed I can take pictures

Yes please, I'd like to see some pictures

 

[Binkei Huckaback]

Sorry OP, I missed the bit about demijohns. If a bucket clip doesn't fit properly, take the foot off the rigid tube of the syphon and push the tube through the airlock bung, sanitise and replace the foot.

 

[Burtsbeets]

So, at the request of @dearleuk I took a few snaps of my bottling process.

Today I am bottling a tropical stout. During conditioning in the primary I thought, lets make this more tropical and break the guidelines and dry hopped.

After sanitising the bottles I dissolved up my sugar in some boiling water and poured it into my bucket ready to mix in with the incoming beer. I took my trusty siphon, as pictured below, with a small hop bag tied on to the end to stop it from picking up those loose hops after the dry hop. But, even if I don't dry hop, I always put it on. As I mentioned before, I made sure the sediment guard was not pushed all the way up and tested the suction before hand.

I placed my siphon in the brew all the way to the bottom, then started it siphoning into the bucket with the sugar solution below.

I have the outlet tube in the beer to minimise dissolved oxygen. Nice to see that the hop bag has done an excellent job at stopping the hop particulates, and as it gets to the bottom I give it an ol' tilt to the get as much as I can out of it without disturbing it too much.

Just to note, I remove the sediment guard and hop bag as I no longer need them and use the siphon without.

After lifting the "bottling" bucket on to the worktop I hold the tube above the water line and start the siphon. I can feel the tube is full of beer, but can also see in that little clear insert. With the tube still above the waterline, I attach the bottling wand.

 

[Burtsbeets]

CONTINUED FROM ABOVE

Lowering the bottling wand below the waterline, I tap the button on the top to purge all the air out of the line then go about bottling.

View attachment 43405

All in all, this took under an hour including sanitation time. Having more or less bottles doesn't really affect the time too much as setting up.

Also, I used the same set-up for botting out of demijohns.

 

[DocAnna]

Lots of really good advice. The things that really made a difference for me:

• Use a syphon clip to hold the syphon steady
• Don't lower the syphon right to the bottom initially, but reposition it lower after emptying most of the fermenter, that way inadvertent movement of the syphon doesn't disturb the sediment.
• Invest in a steel bottling wand since they leak a lot less than the plastic ones and are faster- they also unscrew at the barb end: means you can start the flow going, close a clip on the tube and screw in the wand - keeps the end that goes into the bottle nice and sanitised, and everything stays controlled, clean and tidy (who me .. a control freak.. hmmm.)
• If you have a crate for storing your beers, fill them while in the crate while on a rubber mat - any overflow is easier to clean up.

Anna

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

If you have a crate for storing your beers, fill them while in the crate while on a rubber mat - any overflow is easier to clean up.
Anna

One of the best bottling tips I’ve seen was from @Clint who puts the FV above the dishwasher and the bottles on the open dishwasher door at bottling time. Clean up then involves little more than closing the dishwasher.

Unfortunately, no part of my brewing process is allowed indoors ☹

 

[dearleuk]

CONTINUED FROM ABOVE

Lowering the bottling wand below the waterline, I tap the button on the top to purge all the air out of the line then go about bottling.

View attachment 43405View attachment 43410View attachment 43411

All in all, this took under an hour including sanitation time. Having more or less bottles doesn't really affect the time too much as setting up.

Also, I used the same set-up for botting out of demijohns.

Great stuff, thanks for your help. I'm going to give this a try tomorrow