Using clear bottles?

[azezal]

So far all my brews have been mostly successful. The only problem I have encountered is that some of my beer is a bit flat. I know its to do with the ammount of sugar I use to prime the bottles and the temperature, I store them in after bottling.

The thing is I have already maxed out 3 fridges and if I buy another one, my gf will kill me lol. So I just store the beer bottles in room temperature storage about 20c. I have not had any bottles break doing this and only 1 cap failed, when I dropped one bottle by accident after filling. So I don't know if storring in neutral temp rather than cool for a couple of weeks can effect carbonation? For instance, instead of refridgeration after two days for 14 days, its refrigeration for 2 days after 14 days of storage.

I noticed in supermarkets and warehouses, the beer is not refridgerated and the is light aswell. I now have a large supply of Bishops Finger bottles. They are really easy to cap, but are made from clear glass. I will try and protect the beer from light damage, but wonder sometimes if this is necessary. Are commercial brewers using a technique that protects the beer from light damage, while using clear bottles, or is light damage exagerated?

 

[BrewStew]

Hi azezal,

Typically you should store your bottles at room temperature after filling for a week or two so the yeast can mop up your priming sugar and produce CO2 to carbonate the brew, then move it somewhere cold and the yeast will then go to sleep and drop out of suspension. This could be why you're suffering from flat beer.

The problem of light struck beer or "skunking" does affect commercial brews... i've had a couple of nasty ales that have been put in clear bottles and stored badly. I think they suffer less though because they are filtered before they are bottled so maybe some of the hop extracts that react with sunlight are removed during this process

 

[MEB]

I've NEVER had a beer 'skunk'-but then i'm not american so i prolly will never have one.
Use clear glass bottles but don't store them on your windowsill or in your brightly lit supermarket and you'll be fine :thumb:

 

[prolix]

once you have tasted a light struck beer you can recognise the flavour and it is there in a lot of clear bottles. LAB had some once that someone brought in to share bad practise and recognise off flavours, uv light is the key so avoid that and there is no problem