I brewed a couple 1 gallon kits from NB, they came with fizz drops for the bottle carbonation. It has been about 3 1/2 weeks since they were bottled and I opened a bottle from 2 different kits and boy were they carbonated. Will they calm down a little bit with time or what am I to do?
Couple questions first. At what temp did your beer ferment at and did you chill your beer, and for how long, before you opened it?
I used the fizz drops before and never had an issue with over carbonation. They were pretty spot but they tend to be on the lower carb side.
Anyway. If you chill your beer for a couple hours before serving the carbonation will settle down.
There are a lot of different brands of “fizz drops”. The ones I have seen caused overcarbonation every time. My recommendation is to break them up and use about 3/4 of one per bottle, then you won’t have this problem anymore. Or better yet, ditch the drops and add your priming sugar in bulk to the whole batch. Dissolve 5/8 cup of table sugar per 5 gallons in 2 cups water, and add to the bottling bucket. You’ll never have this problem again, or it will be very rare.
[quote=“TheNerdyGnome”]Couple questions first. At what temp did your beer ferment at and did you chill your beer, and for how long, before you opened it?
I used the fizz drops before and never had an issue with over carbonation. They were pretty spot but they tend to be on the lower carb side.
Anyway. If you chill your beer for a couple hours before serving the carbonation will settle down.[/quote]
I fermented in the lower 70’s and had in the fridge for 1 1/2 days before opening.
I only used the drops because that is what came with the 1 gallon kits and I bottled straight from the primary. I have always used priming sugar in my 5 gallon batches.
Okay, so just cut up your drops to 3/4 their original size when you drop them into each bottle. Problem solved.
Not really, I have 3 kits already bottled.
Okay… How about you pop all the caps, let them sit open and fizz a bit for 15 minutes, then recap them. You’ll lose a good bit of carbonation that way.
fizz drops did fine for me doing a 1.050 all grain oatmeal stout in 12oz bottles. I also used them with the NG Innkeeper AG kit bottled in 22 oz bottles, using 2 per bottle, and I had 3 bottles explode in the case (while we were out of town, no less). A fourth blew up in my hand while I was uncapping them to try and salvage something. A couple of the bottles in the case burst hard enough to chip the bottles around them in the case.
I’m certainly not using them again.
[quote=“jwr”]fizz drops did fine for me doing a 1.050 all grain oatmeal stout in 12oz bottles. I also used them with the NG Innkeeper AG kit bottled in 22 oz bottles, using 2 per bottle, and I had 3 bottles explode in the case (while we were out of town, no less). A fourth blew up in my hand while I was uncapping them to try and salvage something. A couple of the bottles in the case burst hard enough to chip the bottles around them in the case.
I’m certainly not using them again.[/quote]
I’m guessing your Innkeeper batch either got contaminated or was not finished fermenting when you bottled it.
this is good advice as I had issues with fitting fizz drops into my bottles. How did you cut them up?
I’ve had trouble with the drops too. I’ve seen 2 kinds… the smaller ones that call for either 2, 3, 4 per bottle depending on how much carb is needed. And the larger ones that call for 1 per 12oz or two per 22oz bottle. These larger carb drops have given me lots of trouble. I’ve had many over carbed beers and am blaming them. I’m gonna try dmtaylo2’s suggestion and cut them up.
the ones in the NB kits are the larger types so I had to crush a few which ended up creating a lot of waste. a simple way to split them up would be best
Same here- Used 1 per 12oz. bottle (Honey Porter). 4-5 fingered head in a pint glass. Guess it’s better to overcarb a little rather than not enough. Can’t wait until I start doing 5 gal. batches.
I’m bottling this weekend and will try “splitting” them with a lobster cracker. I saw elsewhere a suggestion to use a heavy chef’s knife to chop them in half, but I envision pieces flying around the kitchen.
