I decided against hijacking the thread about carbonation with this query. Other than an occasional batch that turns into volcano beer months after bottling, I rarely have problems with bottle conditioning, once in a while I'll have a batch that takes an extra week or so to carbonate, but not often. Big, high gravity/high ABV beers though are another matter, it doesn't seem to matter what I try they either take months to carbonate or they don't carb up at all. For more normal beers I'll inoculate my priming spiese with an once or so of harvested yeast, with big beers I forego the spiese and use simpler sugars, either corn or cane. I've tried using harvested yeast from the same batch, fresh properly rehydrated yeast of the same type that fermented the beer, and fresh CBC-1 properly rehydrated, all to no avail. I've thought about trying EC-1118 cuz from my experience it handles high ABV better than most lager & ale yeasts, but have concerns because FME it ferments to lower final gravity in the same wort than most beer yeasts, if it ferments the bottled beer a few points lower, then when coupled with whatever priming sugar is added I'm afraid I'll have bottle bombs.
I bottled an IRIBA on 11/19 that had been in a bourbon barrel for a year, using fresh US-05 and it is still essentially flat. Interestingly, I bottled a batch of barrel beer last spring, the 1st bottle exploded in cool storage months after bottling but the rest of the batch is seriously under carbonated.
Anyone have a brilliant solution to my problem?