Minikeg Carbonating Advice

**Hauntedyards** · 02-04-2012, 02:29 PM

Before we digress... I'm positive one day I will probably upgrade to a corney keg system but for lack of space and refrigeration we are using mini kegs for a while first.

So...

Before we invest in a homebrew mini-mash/extract brewing setup we decided to try it at a brew-your-own business first just to try it out.

We only have 2 businesses in town. One turned us away citing minikegs as "dangerous" and they won't help up make beer in them... lol

The other place will let us put the beer in our shoes if we wanted but they demand that they filter it first.

SO... my question is:

From my reading I've gathered that if they filter it I will most likely have to prime each minikeg with a tablespoon of bottling sugar.

SHOULD I ALSO pitch a batch of EC-1118 yeast and add some of that to each keg as well before I add the beer and plug?

Just to be sure there is enough active yeast?

I'm bottling a Czech Pilsner in 2 weeks... any solid input on this would be appreciated!

Thanks!
Jeff

http://www.hauntedyards.com

**Hauntedyards** · 02-06-2012, 08:22 PM

There gotta be some mini-keggers out there besides me... lol

vydyne · 02-07-2012, 02:38 AM

Not seeming that way. I'd put a post up about the avanti party pub which is for the mini kegs but my thread went unreplied to...

**starman** · 02-07-2012, 03:23 AM

5L mini kegs can be primed and conditioned just like bottles. It would use less priming sugar for the batch than all bottles due to less head space. In your case, the filter could pull the yeast out where you'd need to repitch but the place youre brewing at should know. I also am unsure how that will impact your lagering.

I just built a carbonator cap that works as a mini keg bung. I was able to reuse an old Oberon keg with gravity spiggot and force carb with a 16g CO2 cornie charger. Look for my post in DIY. Its fun, but keep in mind you only get a couple days to drink before the beer goes flat. There are other DIY mini keg builds that use standard co2 tanks to push the beer to a tap handle just like any kegerator.

**Hauntedyards** · 02-08-2012, 01:38 PM

I have the Party Star Deluxe Tap System for dispensing which should keep the opened beer longer.

I'm just thinking I might have to repitch something neutral to eat the dextrose in the keg at kegging time due to the filtering out of the yeast.