Do experienced brewers bottle?

[mashani]

Heck, I'm a 30+ year experienced brewer and I am bottling in 740ML PETs.

Do what you like.

I like the PETs because

1) my hands are messed up and don't agree with wing cappers

2) I'm too cheap to buy a bench capper to work around that, I'd rather buy something else

3) because my hands are messed up so glass is dangerous anyways

4) 740MLs = half the time spent bottling vs. 12oz bottles

5) I mostly just bottle prime with Dominos Dots these days, so it takes me all of 30 seconds to prime the bottles for a 3 gallon batch, it takes me longer to batch prime when I do it because boiling sugar and stuff, and Dots work great in 740ML pets, 1 or 2 or 3 depending on if I want English, American, or psycho Belgian (Duval like) or Wheat beer carb.

6) PETs do not explode if I get a brett c infection (shit happens in my house)

7) 5 gallon kegs would be to cumbersome for me to mess with because of my hands, and on the opposite side, the little poppets and do-dads and the type of cleaning involved with kegging and my messed up hands won't get along easily either.

8) 3 gallon kegs are stupidly expensive and probably still would be a PITA for me due to the above.

9) Having to go get a CO2 refill would to me be a drag. I've got other stuff to do (single dad with 2 kids = ugh).

10) I can put the cap back on if I don't drink the whole thing and don't lose enough carb overnight for it to matter to me... I don't have to drink the whole bottle that is opened.

The only reason I'd get any glass and mess with a wing capper is for competition if I decided I cared enough to enter one again.

[Scoper50]

How long does it take to carbonate a beer when kegging? If I could finish a beer faster than it would take with bottle conditioning it might give me more motivation.

[mashani]

You can drink it sooner if you keg as long as your beer comes out of the fermenter in good shape. There are both fast and slow ways of carbing, but even the slow way is still faster then bottling. Others can explain the methods better then me.

Also you might find that pitching more yeast will give you beer you can drink faster even if bottled, we are discussing that in the yeast thread that's floating near the top. It's another reason I'm happy still bottling.

[RandyG]

My Dos centavos. I use bottling as my choice for Homebrewing. I'm like several guys said,I like a variety of beers to have on hand. I'm the only one who drinks it,so I prefer bottles. I did however, try kegging with those 5 liter mini-kegs. I brew Mr.B sized batches so a batch usually results(for me) 1 mini-keg and bottle the rest.(I don't mind bottling). I use the ones that can be refilled. I have a little fridge in my Mancave,which holds a mini perfectly. On Youtube, there are videos on how to prime them etc. If you want to brew 5 gal. recipes you would have to calculate how many minis you would need. Some of them can be dispensed with gravity flow,but I also have a PartyTime co2 set up to dispense mine. I think it cost me around 50 bucks. You can research those also. Anyway,good luck. Cheers

[Kealia]

Been brewing about 8 years, too. I bottled for probably 2-3 years before moving to a keg and have never looked back. As John said, it gives you the flexibility to drink less than 12oz at time if you choose, takes less time than bottling and has other pros....and cons. I will still bottle a few here and there to give to friends, or to free up a keg when it is running low.
I still buy commercial beer because there are so many good ones available to me, so I have plenty of variety on hand.

I found bottling to be a chore, but no

[John Sand]

How long does it take to carbonate a beer when kegging? If I could finish a beer faster than it would take with bottle conditioning it might give me more motivation.

I guess about a week to ten days for kegged beer to be carbonated. I don't roll or shake it as some do, I just give it high pressure at first, then set and forget. I tend to carb in the basement and then chill. There are carbonation lids and stones that carb faster.

I didn't mind bottling. Like Mash I bottle primed using sugar cubes, and had a method. I'm not sure I remember why I switched, but I do like the kegerator.

[ScrewyBrewer]

I kegged 10 gallons of beer about 28 hours before having people over for dinner. The way I went about it was to put the newly filled kegs in the refrigerator. Once inside th refrigerator I connected a gas line up to each keg, then cranked the Co2 regulator up to 35 psi. As a result, at dinner we had the freshest beer on tap and it was perfectly carbonated.

I still need to bottle once in a while. When giving beer for gifts, or for competitions and when aging some beer styles. Even when bottling I still rely heavily on my kegging system though. I like having the ability to force carbonate my beers, and sampling the carbonation levels prior to bottling my beer.

[dbrowning]

Everyone has a story, this is a good discussion.
I think I drink less with kegs. With bottles, if I open one, I finish it. Open two, finish both. The keg lets me easily drink half a beer or a beer and a half.

Also a bonus
Gives me the option to drink 6 1/2 instead of 7

[dbrowning]

Everyone has a story, this is a good discussion.
I think I drink less with kegs. With bottles, if I open one, I finish it. Open two, finish both. The keg lets me easily drink half a beer or a beer and a half.

Also a bonus
Gives me the option to drink 6 1/2 instead of 7

Or I can drink 6 of one and a half dozen of another

[FedoraDave]

I keg and I also bottle. I brew a lot of beer, having a brew day just about every week. I have three carboys (a six-gallon Big Mouth Bubbler and two 3-gallon Better Bottles) and they're pretty much always working in a three-week rotation. I have a two-tap keezer, and I have three 5-gallon kegs and one 3-gallon keglet. As a result, I always have beer on tap and one keg or keglet waiting in the rotation. Still, I often have to bottle one or more of the 2.5 gallon batches. So I manage to have a great deal of variety in the pipeline, and the portability of bottles. I also have growlers and tubing to connect to the taps if I want to bring some of the kegged beer to a party or other function.

Right now, I've got about four different styles ready to drink at any time, and I just kegged another today, so I know it'll be ready to tap in a week or so.

I much prefer kegging to bottling, as it takes a lot less time, but when I bottle, it's only 2.5 gallons, and I use bombers instead of 12 oz. bottles, so bottling day goes quickly.