One regulator, different carbonation levels?

Hi all. I've finally just gotten around to getting myself a kegging setup and have brewed three beers over the last few days to be my first on tap beers. I've got a pale ale, brown ale and a hefeweizen bubbling away in primarys.

My setup consists of a keezer with three cornys and a three way gas distributor, but just one regulator. My question is, is there anyway I can somehow carbonate the hefeweizen more than the other two beers with this setup? And if so, what's the recommended strategy?

Thanks for any suggestions.

No. You're going to need a separate regulator for each pressure you want to keep.

Yep, you'll need a separate regulator for the other pressure. You can do this with a secondary regulator or by replacing your primary regulator with one that can do dual pressure, dual output.

So something like closing the valves to the pale and brown ales, cranking the psi a bit for a day or so, then dropping the psi back down and reopening the valves to the pale and brown wouldn't work (repeating the whole process every now and then)?

Heavyfoot said:

So something like closing the valves to the pale and brown ales, cranking the psi a bit for a day or so, then dropping the psi back down and reopening the valves to the pale and brown wouldn't work (repeating the whole process every now and then)?

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Sounds like a lot of work. If it were me, I'd have the weizen at the same pressure as the others.

You could get another primary regulator and mount it to the other regulator. If it were me and I really wanted to have the weizen at a higher carb, I'd sell the distributor and primary and buy a taprite dual output regulator and then just "T" the one output for the normal carb beers. Kegging equipment sells pretty fast on the Buy/Sell forum here.

It will work in theory to an extent, but it would be hard to get it right. But give it a go if you want to test it. In other words if all three are fully carbed at 12 psi and you shut the valves on two and crank to 30 psi for a day on the third, then you will do as you are asking but there will be no telling what the pressure in the third will be without it's own regulator.

won't work. get two regs.

Heavyfoot said:

So something like closing the valves to the pale and brown ales, cranking the psi a bit for a day or so, then dropping the psi back down and reopening the valves to the pale and brown wouldn't work (repeating the whole process every now and then)?

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This is exactly what I was planning on doing. I don't see any reason why this wouldn't work.Right now I have 1 reg split into 2 lines but only 1 s/o valve upstream of the split....it would be a lot cheaper to just get another valve than a whole new reg...and a little more trouble when switching beers....like maybe 30 seconds extra to adjust the pressure and move 2 valves.

you're gonna spent a crapton of time, it's not going to work very well, you'll get foamy beer, and you'll waste a sh*tton of gas.

all that to get out of spending $20 for another reg?

Heavyfoot said:

So something like closing the valves to the pale and brown ales, cranking the psi a bit for a day or so, then dropping the psi back down and reopening the valves to the pale and brown wouldn't work (repeating the whole process every now and then)?

Click to expand...

Yes this will work...but it will be trial and error, and you will never really know how much additional gas you have in the hefe as it will always be working it's way back to the regulated pressure and carbonation.

Another regulator to do it right...if you want to play...have at it.

bctdi said:

This is exactly what I was planning on doing. I don't see any reason why this wouldn't work.Right now I have 1 reg split into 2 lines but only 1 s/o valve upstream of the split....it would be a lot cheaper to just get another valve than a whole new reg...and a little more trouble when switching beers....like maybe 30 seconds extra to adjust the pressure and move 2 valves.

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Well I'll give it a shot and report back. It'll be a few weeks though, as the beers have only been in the primary for about 4 days right now.

motobrewer said:

you're gonna spent a crapton of time, it's not going to work very well, you'll get foamy beer, and you'll waste a sh*tton of gas.

all that to get out of spending $20 for another reg?

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Can't really see it taking a crapton of time. A crapton is a lot.

Why would the beer be foamy as a result of this, unless I over carb the Hefeweizen somehow?

Is the wasting of gas assuming I'm venting the Hefeweizen each time prior to dropping the psi back down? I'm guessing I would have to do this to prevent the Hefeweizen from increasing carbonation of the other beers maybe? How much does gas cost anyway? I haven't kegged before so don't really know what it costs to waste some gas here and there.

I know getting another regulator for an extra 20 bucks or whatever is the best solution, but I still think its a worthy experiment. If it works not too badly, I'm guessing a few readers on here would be interested in doing it too.

i don't know what anything costs in Winnipeg

5 readers including myself have responded in this post that you'll need a second reg. I'll bet all of them responded that way because they tried exactly what you're trying, and found it to be a waste of time, didn't work very well, got foamy beer, and wasted a sh*tton of gas.

motobrewer said:

i don't know what anything costs in Winnipeg

5 readers including myself have responded in this post that you'll need a second reg. I'll bet all of them responded that way because they tried exactly what you're trying, and found it to be a waste of time, didn't work very well, got foamy beer, and wasted a sh*tton of gas.

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Did you try it?

of course. i found it to be a big waste of time, it didn't work very well, i got foamy beer, and i wasted a sh*tton of gas. so, i bought a second reg.

i'm sort of doing it right now. i have 5 kegs, and a total of 4 gas lines (two regulators, one fed into a 3way distro). but, i'm not really carbing the 5th keg, i just put gas on it every once in awhile to ensure it stays pressurized and sealed.

it takes a bit of time under gas 24/7 (3 weeks is commonly accepted) for a beer to be carbonated. once you take the gas source off, the rate of dissolution slows.

Just trying to understand what you want to do here....you are talking about serving the beer under 2 different pressures in order to maintain equilibrium on each keg for it's intended volume of co2, correct? If you have 2 shutoff valves , I don't see any reason why you couldn't force carb all kegs to the value of the keg with the lowest target co2 volume, then shut the valve to those 2 kegs, then keep the other valve open to the hefe and increase the pressure till the hefe is properly carbed. At that point you should be able to just isolate the hefe from the other kegs / co2 bottle anytime you want using the valves and adjust serving pressure accordingly. where would the co2 be wasted besides bleeding off the keg which is very minimal?The kegs will not know weather you have 1 regulator or 2. I see people posting that you will waste gas and it will not work, but can someone please go into detail as to why the beer will be foamy if you have it carbed properly and are serving it at the proper serving pressure?Just looking for a better explanation than don't do it, it won't work.

It will work just fine if done right, but it's also a huge hassle, and you'll be messing with your regulator and valves nearly constantly for the life of the kegs. I think most people would much rather either buy another regulator and do it right, or simply drink all their beers at the same carb level than go through all that hassle, but to each their own.

If you try this, you're going to want to make sure that the less carbed beers and the higher carbed beers are never connected to the gas at the same time after they've been carbed. You're also going to want to have a check valve on each gas line for when (not if) you mess up the order on switching things around or forget to vent the lines or turn the pressure down before swapping.

As for strategy, carb all the beers together to the lowest desired carb level. Remove the beers you want to stay at that level from the gas, increase the pressure to whatever corresponds to the carb level you want for the higher carbed beers, and let it/them fully carb. Once everything is carbed to the desired levels, if you want to serve one of the less carbed beers, you'll have to shut the gas off to the keg/s with higher carbonation, then shut the gas off at the tank, vent the pressure from the lines, turn the pressure on the regulator way down, connect the keg/s you want to pour from, turn the gas on at the tank, and then turn the pressure up to whatever corresponds to the carb level you chose for those kegs. Every time you want to serve from the keg/s at the higher carb level, you'd repeat the above process except that you wouldn't need to turn the pressure way down or vent the lines. As you can see, that's a lot of steps and hassle just to pour two beers that have different carb levels. If you had firends over for a tasting, you'd probably spend more time screwing with the kegerator than drinking beer.

For proper pours and a balanced system, you're also going to need longer lines for the beers with higher carb levels to prevent foaming. If you're going to have a lot of different pressures (carb levels) over time, I'd just make all of the lines overlength, and live with very slow pours for all of your less carbonated beers.

My advice is to try serving all of your beers at the same carb level for now, and see how you like it. If you find that it's lacking, and you really want another carb level for some of your beers, save up for a secondary regulator.