Purging Oxygen From kegs

First time kegging - I racked two 5 gal batches from secondary into keg saturday afternoon, and Sunday afternoon. After going through some notes online this morning I did not purge the oxygen out of the kegs correctly. If I get home and purge this afternoon (Monday) is it soon enough to save the beer or will oxidation have ruined them both at this point?

Thanks.

Joe

I think you'll be fine. Warm temperatures and a lot of shaking would contribute the most to oxidation. If you have your kegs in your kegerator or keezer, they should be chilled and not moving around, so you probably won't notice anything.

Doed said:

I think you'll be fine. Warm temperatures and a lot of shaking would contribute the most to oxidation. If you have your kegs in your kegerator or keezer, they should be chilled and not moving around, so you probably won't notice anything.

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Ok thanks! They are in the Keezer so hope it will be fine.

I believe that Co2 is heavier than oxygen as well so the co2 would settle below the oxygen keeping them out of contact.

I think....

fergusmj said:

I believe that Co2 is heavier than oxygen as well so the co2 would settle below the oxygen keeping them out of contact.

I think....

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This. CO2 is heavier than oxygen so if you pressurized your kegs after filling it would form a blanket that would sit between the O2 and the CO2. The only problem would be shaking. If you want, just pull the pressure release on your keg for a second and you should get the air out.

Gases will readily mix so the co2 will have just mixed with the oxygen immediately. I think it's fine to purge a few times now that you're thinking about it to help remove any excess oxygen in the keg. Otherwise, I don't think it's a big deal and not enough to worry about. I believe it to be a precautionary step to reduce risk of oxidation, but I don't find it to be a "deal breaker" situation. In other words, remember to do it in the future and don't stress about it this time

stpug said:

Gases will readily mix so the co2 will have just mixed with the oxygen immediately......

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I agree with this statement. I believe there is a common misconception of how "purging" oxygen/air from a filled keg actually works.

A shot of CO2 simply mixes with the air (21% O2 / 0.03% CO2), which reduces the oxygen percentage and increases the CO2 percentage within the gas mixture. There would be no stratification of the gases due to the turbulence of injecting the CO2. I would think that one would need to wait a fair amount of time, likely days, for the gases to actually separate out, if they ever did. After all, air doesn't readily separate on its own.

A few pressurize/purge cycles would eventually reduce the percentage of oxygen down to a level that oxidation would be of little concern.