Carbonation Tabs: Friends or Foes?

[Fedor]

Welcome back, me!

Hope everyone is well and the community is growing. And hopefully somebody has tried carbonation tabs and can tell me how it turned out. I was thinking this could help out when priming from an inverted carboy instead of flipping it over, siphoning in the priming syrup (malt or dextrose boiled in a pint), then flipping back over -- maybe swirling a bit, and letting it settle to bottle later. Actually, now that i write it, the process doesn't seem so bad, but still -- i'd like to simplify the last step.

Any tips on the carbonation tabs? Or any reasons/suggestions that don't use carbonation tabs but do involve my inverted carboy setup?

Thanks, all!

[backyard brewer]

I always used a bottling bucket. I would boil the sugar, put it in the bottom of the bucket, then gently rack clear beer on to if form the carboy. I would try to get it to form a little whirlpool so mix the sugar completely. This would avoid any sediment, get a good mix and then I'd just bottle from the bucket.

[BrewMasterBrad]

I've used the carb tabs in the past and they work fine. The problem is that they do not give you much control over the amount of carbonation for different styles of beer. This may or may not be important to you.

[bwarbiany]

I've used them and love them. Often my bro-in-law Dustin and I would be brewing what was close to 15-gallon batches. We'd each keg 5 gallons and then bottle the leftover (which often was not a full 5 gallons). Carb tabs allowed us to be sure of our carbonation without mis-measuring our priming sugar. There was no difference to the finish product, as far as I could tell.

[lexuschris]

Heya,

I noticed this little piece of equipment in the Williams Brewing catalog this week.



It has premeasured corn sugar scoops for 12oz, 16oz & 22oz bottles.. Another way to skin the same cat, but at least you might have a little bit more control over carbonation levels with this thing. And at $1.35 ... it will probably make it into my bottling drawer for sure!


--LexusChris

[kevinham]

They work fine. They are all sterile in the package, so make sure you don't touch them and drop them in. Just make a small hole and drop them in one at a time straight from the bag. Usually one bag will do a 5 gallon batch. Reducing the number of steps and transfers is a good way to reduce risk of infection and oxidation.

[oc eric]

+1 on the ease and good results from carb tabs

[gromitdj]

I've used the Munton's Carbtabs and they worked great. I would recommend them over the Coopers drops because they are smaller, and you can fine tune carbonation a little better. The recommended usage is 3-5 tabs per 12 oz. rather than one of the Cooper tabs.

[BrewMasterBrad]

......but kegging is better.