Keg overflowed

Good morning everyone, I had a chocolate milk stout in a keg at 8-10 lbs of pressure for about 3 weeks to carbonate. I was told to put the pressure at 20lbs to serve this type of beer. Yesterday afternoon I poured a glass and bumped up the pressure. I wake up this morning and opened my keezer to find 5 gallons of stout on the bottom of the keezer and it looks like it seeped out if the output on the keg. Is this just a bad o ring or did I get bad advice?


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You should be able to "burst cab" a keg at 30psi, or serve soda at 40psi without any leaking. You have a leak in your keg. Although it could be one of the o-rings on the liquid post, did you attach a disconnect to pour your glass and then disconnect it yesterday? I'd check the poppet to see if it sits right and seals. I think the most likely scenario is that the poppet didn't reseat after you removed the quick disconnect. You need to find out exactly where the beer is leaking before using the keg again.

Sounds like a leak somewhere not caused by the pressure. Check all your O-rings, poppets, etc. Are you using a picnic tap? These are notorious for leaking.

20 PSI to serve a stout? No.
Which "output" do you think it came out of? You do not want to fill a keg so that it hits the gas in dip tube. You'd have to put quite a bit of beer in there to actually get to that point but your best bet is to never over-fill a keg. You obviously have a leak somewhere. It is time to pull the keg out, do not let the pressure out yet and start spraying star san over everything. If you see bubbles, that's your leak.

Now that you have the leak some of the beer is gone, you should be good. 8-10 PSI to carbonate is fine. I'll stick by my 20 PSI to serve sounds like a no no but what is the length of your line and the ID of your line? Also, what's your serving temp.

To answer the other questions, could be a bad o-ring but my suspicion is the her hit the gas tube and the pressure just pushed it right out. You did get bad advice. When the beer is done replace the o-rings and be sure it holds pressure without leaks before filling it again. Be aware of the amount of beer you're pouring into the keg. Was it definitely 5 gallons or was it a little more or less?

Also, think about using water to fill a keg. Count the gallons and find out what 5 gallons looks like in a 5 gallon keg. It's a good learning tool and the worst you do is waste water, not beer.

Thanks everyone, the keg wasn't full enough to hit the gas tube, it sat on pressure for weeks without issue until I was told to raise it.

I am using picnic connectors for the ball lock keg, are there different connectors that are better?

I like the star San idea, I'll try that this weekend and also order more I rings and poppets.

It was probably my best beer yet, at least I got one glass out if it.


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Picnic taps can and will leak at higher pressures. I do not trust them especially since some people notice that they have a tendency to get stuck between the keg and door and as a result pour all your delicious beer on the floor. I would disconnect the beer out quick disconnect when using the cobra style taps if I am not going to be going back to the keg for a little while. Just seems to be better safe than sorry with them.

I lost a whole keg of beer through one once as well when carbonating due to regulator creep on a sankey keg. Made me sad.

10 lbs or so is plenty for a stout. Keg posts are designed to provide better sealing when you have more pressure. But that's only when they are not connected to the Quick Connect. Once you open that poppet, the seals on the QD and Picnic taps are taking over. It's possible that one of those started leaking when you upped the pressure due to a minute flaw.

Generally Faucets are considered the better option for permanent installation. They are fine for parties and like that. They are unreliable enough to make me hesitant to use them in my kegerator. I've even used a faucet on a board when serving soda 30+ lbs. at a party.