I used 4 bottles on my 46g, rotating in 1 fresh bottle a week. I got pretty good consistency and drop checker was usually close to green. I got full diffusion with my reactor.
One thing to note is that your water chemistry can have big impact on how your yeast "burns" through the sugar. I'm on a well with fairly hard water. I tried RO and also softened water. One gave a very low but long lived production. The other produced a lot over a few days, and then not much. I eventually just tried the untreated well water and found it gave the most steady production and also the most total production over the 4 weeks. I added a couple of tablespoons of baking soda, even though the pH is already 8.4. This seems to extend the production cycle quite a bit.
Regarding activating the yeast, I found I needed to activate it with near scalding hot water. The instructions say "warm" water, but then say 100 to 110F. I consider this hot and found if it was not hot enough to make me pull my hand out from under the tap after a few seconds, then it usually didn't activate the yeast well. Make sure you are getting a good amount of foam after 10-15 minutes (like 3/4"). Otherwise it's not activated.
Also, the brand of yeast will also have an impact on the CO2 production. I used Fleischmanns. That's not to say it is best for all situations, but with my water and my 4 week approach, I felt it did really well. Getting a green (or at least nearly green) drop checker on a 46g with just one fresh bottle a week is pretty good by most counts.
One thing to note is that your water chemistry can have big impact on how your yeast "burns" through the sugar. I'm on a well with fairly hard water. I tried RO and also softened water. One gave a very low but long lived production. The other produced a lot over a few days, and then not much. I eventually just tried the untreated well water and found it gave the most steady production and also the most total production over the 4 weeks. I added a couple of tablespoons of baking soda, even though the pH is already 8.4. This seems to extend the production cycle quite a bit.
Regarding activating the yeast, I found I needed to activate it with near scalding hot water. The instructions say "warm" water, but then say 100 to 110F. I consider this hot and found if it was not hot enough to make me pull my hand out from under the tap after a few seconds, then it usually didn't activate the yeast well. Make sure you are getting a good amount of foam after 10-15 minutes (like 3/4"). Otherwise it's not activated.
Also, the brand of yeast will also have an impact on the CO2 production. I used Fleischmanns. That's not to say it is best for all situations, but with my water and my 4 week approach, I felt it did really well. Getting a green (or at least nearly green) drop checker on a 46g with just one fresh bottle a week is pretty good by most counts.
