root beer kegging

Lost_Sailor15 · 04-28-2011, 02:30 AM

I did a search on this and got a couple of ideas, but want to ask it anyway.

I am trying root beer for the first time. I picked up a 1 gallon container of Spreacher syrup, added 4 gallons of water, force carbonated at 40 PSI + shaking and allowed to sit for a week in the fridge. I have 35 feet of 5/16 ID tubing between the keg and my faucet. I dropped my PSI down to 15 for dispensing. However, I am still gettting all foam. I bursts out of the tap so fast that I actually had it splash out of the glass and hit the ceilling. What am I missing? Also how long can I leave the RB at the lower dispensing pressure before I start to loose carbonation?

SOB_OCDAVE · 04-28-2011, 02:44 AM

Even though you dropped the pressure on the regulator down to 15 psi, the pressure in the keg is still 40 psi (unless you purged the gas before changing to serving pressure). Sounds like you have plenty of hose to equalize the pressure between the keg and the tap.

Lost_Sailor15 · 04-28-2011, 03:20 AM

Ok, so I compleely dropped the pressure on the keg. Purged the pressure out of the keg, and watched my line start to fill with foam as the CO2 came out of the RB that was in the line. Tried tapping the foam out of the line with no success. It just fills right back up with foam.

So confused...

MrFoodScientist · 04-28-2011, 08:56 PM

Once you've carbonated at a higher pressure, then purged and set to a lower pressure, the CO2 is going to come out of your root beer until the system is at equilibrium.
So even if you've purged and pressurized at 15 PSI, the actual pressure in the keg is going to climb higher than that to somewhere between 40 and 15psi depending on the headspace it has to fill and the temperature of the keg.
Just like if you opened a 2 liter and put it back in the fridge, you come back the next day and it's lost some carbonation, but the pressure in the bottle is higher than when you closed it.
Maybe you need to try some dip tube inserts even though your line sounds plenty long.

bambam190 · 04-29-2011, 01:15 PM

My rootbeer we keep the line at 7 PSI, and we don't get the foam problem. However we don't force carbonate that might be your issue.