Keg Conditioning

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Wild Duk

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I just brewed a high gravity Belgian style blond ale. Its been in the secondary for about two weeks and not sure what to do next. I have always kegged, and /i'm not sure if I should place secondary in the fridge and crash it for a week, or just keg and carbonate. How long should I let it condition, and what should it be in. The keg or the carboy?

thanks
 
It doesn't matter, you can do it either way. If you do it in the keg, your first couple of pints might be cloudy, but that's pretty much the only difference. If it's high gravity, you'll want to let it age before tapping it though.
 
thanks. Can i age it in the carboy, or keg. If in the carboy, should I put it in the fridge. If in the keg, should I put it in the kegerator, and or carbonate it and for how long?

thanks
 
You can age it in the carboy or the keg. I prefer aging/conditioning in the keg. If you want to get the best clarity for serving/bottling, just rack to another keg after you are done aging/conditioning. If you only have a single keg, you can serve from that keg after conditioning, but don't move it around, and as stated previously, your first pint will be a bit cloudy.

If you can age it in the kegerator or fridge, that is optimal, as colder temps retard the growth of any bacteria that is in there. Aging it in warmer temps does not improve anything, and is also fine in most cases. Worry more about sanitation than anything else. :)
 
Official thread jack.:D


I have a keg system, without the CO2. SHould I just rack onto some simple syrup to carbonate? How much sugar should I use in my syrup?
 
physzac said:
Official thread jack.:D


I have a keg system, without the CO2. SHould I just rack onto some simple syrup to carbonate? How much sugar should I use in my syrup?
You can carbonate it in the keg like bottles but you need CO2 to seal it up. I used to use 4.3 oz. of dextrose. You have a portable CO2 system?
 
Throw it right in the keg, then put it in a temp controlled space for several months. Belgians can take a while, but it is so worth it. You may have to take up corny space, but at least you won't have the liability of a full glass carboy and airlock to maintain.
 
...so those of you who condition in a keg, do you purge the pressure through the relief valve at any point, or do you just let it build up? I'm about to rack my first lager (maibock) to a secondary, and was pretty much just going to put it in another glass carboy and crank my kegerator to it's warmest setting, slowly bumping it down a few degrees over a few days until it sat at just above freezing.

Doing it in a corny would be ideal because I could keep other beers on tap during that time.
 
Thanks for the advice. Now I have 3 options.

1. Place secondary in fridge and condition un carbonized.( plenty of room here)

2. Rack to keg and condition in fridge uncarbonized

or

3. Rack to keg and carbonate and condition

Which method is recomended or prefered.
 
Digging up this old thread since I have the same question, and Wild Duk's final question wasn't answered.

I'm doing a RIS and Barleywine as soon as we have a day below 90º here (almost passed out while brewing last week it was so hot). The way I see it, once fermentation is complete I've got a few options:

1. Age in keg with no carbonation; carbonate in 6 or so months when ready to drink
2. Age in keg with carbonation
3. Carbonate in keg, then age in bottles

What's everyone's favorite methods, and why?
 
I would either do 1 or 2 if you don't mind keg tied up for that long (I only have 3 so I can't afford that) Bulk aging/conditioning is always better than bottles. You can seal the keg with a burp of CO2 and leave it alone, no need to carbonate it right away but it won't hurt it either.
 
I would leave in the keg, purge it with CO2 and leave about 15 or so PSI in there. Age it room temp 50-60F ish if possible. Then carb when you are done conditioning. That is what I did for my quad and the stuff is awesome.

+1 on teh benefits of bulk aging vs bottle aging
 
Thanks, guys. This is my first time doing a really big beer that I'll be aging, and I want to make sure it turns out right. I fell into 12 kegs a couple weeks ago for $200 on top of the 5 that came with my kit, so I'd definitely prefer to age in a keg rather than a carboy.

CidahMastah, after purging it, how long would I need to have it hooked up to the CO2 at 15 psi?
 
Thanks, guys. This is my first time doing a really big beer that I'll be aging, and I want to make sure it turns out right. I fell into 12 kegs a couple weeks ago for $200 on top of the 5 that came with my kit, so I'd definitely prefer to age in a keg rather than a carboy.

CidahMastah, after purging it, how long would I need to have it hooked up to the CO2 at 15 psi?

That is awesome about the kegs - wish I had about 6 more (I have 14 right now)

anyway, just purge them, hook them up to 15psi just to pressurize the keg. So maybe 20 seconds (or until you stop hearing gas enter). You just want to make sure that your kegs are sealed with pressure and that they won't breathe in.

Some of my kegs hold a seal only under pressure.
 
I have recently started doing this as well. I have a four tap kegerator and always like to have all four taps ready to go with something. I have eight kegs. I always try to keep everything full, including my secondaries. Once I know that a secondary is about to open up, I'll brew something and keep it in primary for a week, then move the beer to the secondary. After my beers have sat in secondary for a week or two, I'll move them to a keg. While I'm doing that, I'll boil just enough water to dissolve about 3/4 cup of corn sugar in it. I'll boil that for about 5 minutes, then crash cool it with ice water in the sink. I'll add that to the keg. I usually have an inch or two of head space in the top of the keg if I've done everything right. I put the lid on, pressurize with CO2, and burp it a couple of times. I keep just a bit of pressure on it like previously noted. I'll usually leave it in the keg for about three weeks to age and carbonate at room temperature. Then, when I'm ready to move to the kegerator, it's already carbonated! It just needs to cool overnight. Eventually, I'd like to have another fridge to cool the kegs before moving them to the kegerator. Lack of space is my current problem.
 

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