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Carbonating Cornnie Keg

J

john turnbull

Hello, recently have just started brewing my own beer, three batches in the last 2 months and I am well impressed with the quality of the 80 Shilling I have made.  I have about 10 litres of beer which has finished secondary fermentation in a plastic keg and I have transferred it to a Cornnie Keg but the beer is a little lifeless,  this is just a test to check for air leaks etc in the keg before I fill in with good beer. 
1. The keg is 19 litres with a S30 valve attached and I have a CO2 and nitrogen mix to add pressure to the keg, will this set up be enough to force carbonate the beer or would I need to add priming sugar and the gas to start secondary fermentation again.
2. Any idea what sort of pressure can be put into a keg with a S30 valve on it obviously the S30 valve will give way before the keg relief valve.

Thanks for any help.

John Turnbull
 
John,
  You should be able to force carbonate it as long as its refrigerated.  Carbonating at room temperature is also possible, but the problem is that it requires very high pressure which usually results in considerable foaming when serving the beer.

  I personally have my keg set at about 10-12 psi with the keg in a regular refrigerator.

Cheers,
Brad
 
Thanks Brad, with the fridge and the amount of pressure your using what sort of time scale are you looking at to get a fully carbonated keg, don't have a pressure regulator or gauge at the moment so really just guessing as to what kind of pressure I'm putting into the keg.  Will wait to see what sort of result I get before opting to spend more money.

Thanks John
 
John,
  10psi is a pretty low pressure.  It takes 2-3 days to get some carbonation and perhaps a week to get the fine bubbles throughout the beer.  I do highly recommend using a pressure regulator of some kind.  Its really unsafe to pressurize without a pressure gauge as you can easily overpressurize the keg.

Cheers,
Brad
 
john turnbull said:
Thanks Brad, with the fridge and the amount of pressure your using what sort of time scale are you looking at to get a fully carbonated keg, don't have a pressure regulator or gauge at the moment so really just guessing as to what kind of pressure I'm putting into the keg.  Will wait to see what sort of result I get before opting to spend more money.
Thanks John
Without a regulator there is no telling what the outcome will be. You really need a regulator...

Cheers
Preston
 
Late to the discussion but....

I force carbonate at the pressure appropriate for the temperature of the beer after it has spent time in the refer. (use the kegging option in BS to determining the right pressure for a given temperature and desired volume of CO2).

I'm usually impatient so I speed up the carbonation thusly. Connect to the CO2 regulator to the keg & set the pressure. I lay the corney over on it's side and roll it back and forth on the floor. (sitting on a rocking chair and using a foot works :) Laying on it's side increases the beer surface area and speed up the process and makes it easy to shake up. If it's quiet enough you can listen to the regulator hiss as CO2 is taken up. Once you stop hearing the hiss return the corney to the refer and leave the CO2 regulator set at the carbonating pressure for a day to finish off. Then drop the pressure back to what ever you dispense at and wait another day. By then you should be able to draw beer. The first draw will be a bit foamy but so is any freshly tapped keg.

If at any time you think you need more carbonation you can repeat the process.

Doug

 
I force carbonate at the warmer pressure because I don't have a refer for the kegs.  I will usually use a variation on the rolling carbonation to speed the process and also let the keg sit for a couple of days after to get the finer carbonation.  I also vent the keg pressure down to serving pressure after adjusting the regulator.  I serve in frozen pint glasses to help keep the head under control.
 
another method for reducing your work is to force your CO2 through the liquid out side so it bubbles through your beer.  May not help much, but I'm sure it doesn't hurt.
 
Good point... if you plan to carbonate in the refer with the keg up right.

For the "rock&roll" technique if you keep the "in" side port down the CO2 will bubble thru the beer. It actually is more audible this way than trying to hear the regulator hiss.

Doug
 
Thanks for the good info, I'm new to kegging it and am curious about how much CO2 you guys use to carbonate a 5 gallon keg?
I started with a fresh 5 lbs CO2 can at 1250 psi, after carbonating I'm left with approximately 600 psi in my canister.  Is this typical? Or do I have a slow leak I need to find?
Thanks,
Tim
 
It sounds like you have a leak. However, you cant go by pressure. If you let your bottle come to room temp and make note of the reading.Then bring it down to keging temp and take a reading, you will see a significant drop. The only thing you can do is go by weight. Your 5# bottle will hold 5# of Co2 if all things are perfect (Which they are not). Honestly I never have gotten more than 3.5# in mine. So take it to your bathroom scale and weigh it (Bottle only, no gauges). My bottle empty weigh's about 1.7#. So if I have 3.5# in it, the bottle will weigh 5.2#.

I normally get about 3 keg's out of a bottle (like I said 3.5# per fill), so I figure about 1# per keg, which covers everything from carbonating each keg, to pushing the beer out. I thought about taking the bottle to a gas store that has Co2, but normally I just take it with me when I get grains.

Hope this helps

Cheers
Preston
 
Excellent thanks.  I'll check for leaks, but the pressure gage has not dropped since it hit the 600 psi mark.  I did forget that chilling it would make a significant difference in pressure.  My initial pressure reading was at ambient and the latest (600 psi) was after sitting in the refridgerator with my keg.  Ahah!

My first batch, an IPA is great and a bit over carbonated right now, but I'm sure it will mellow.  I have the pressure regulator set at 10 psi, but charged the first 24 hours at 30 psi.  Do you folks do it that way?  Seems like it would be fine to set the regulator at the desired pressure and leave it alone until it comes to equilibrium would be best.
Thanks again.
 
I crank the pressure up to 30 for 2 days and then back it down 8-12 depending. It will take about a week to get it up to the right carb levels if you just leave it at 10, and I don't think it matters, both ways carb the beer.

Cheers
Preston
 
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