Transporting Brew

My buddies 30th birthday is just around the corner. His wife rented a house at the beach for the weekend in Charleston. It's peanut butter jelly timeeeeee

I've had my sierra in the keg since saturday, and it's slowly picking up CO2. I want to make sure the 4 hour car ride doesn't produce a flat beer by the time we get there. Any precautions I should take? Obviously, I can't keep it cool that long, and storing it out there will be an issue. It'll get an ice bath as soon as we get there.

Of course...if its too complicated...I may just keep it all for myself at home

I would rhink about drilling out the caps to some 2L soda bottles and inserting a tire stem to make your own carbonator cap for cheap. Then tote along a couple to the beach.

I want to make sure I understand your situation... the beer is kegged and is was forced carbed?

And you're asking if you transport the keg, will it go flat??

I don't see how it would go flat at all. I'm confused.

Cape Brewing said:

I want to make sure I understand your situation... the beer is kegged and is was forced carbed?

And you're asking if you transport the keg, will it go flat??

I don't see how it would go flat at all. I'm confused.

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I figured it would be like a diet coke. If you drive around, and the liquid shakes a bunch, it loses its carbonation.

I suppose if I kept it hooked up to the C02 to keep the pressure up, that should mitigate any problems...

If you are worried about it then u can always look into one of these http://www.midwestsupplies.com/compact-co2-injector-ball-lock-fitting-compact-co2-injector.html

Hmmm... I've never seen an unopened can/bottle of soda lose carbonation from driving around.

If the keg is pretty much full, and it is carbonated, I don't see how it could lose carbonation by being bounced around. If anything, that'll HELP it get carbed.

When I force-carb a keg (like everyone else does), I put it under pressure and shake the living hell out of it for a few minutes... to get the CO2 INTO the beer.

oops!!!!

If the keg does n ot leak where would the CO2 go? Even if the keg is not connected to a CO2 tank the tank is still under pressure. As long as the keg does not leak it should stay carbonated.

If it gets warm, I can see how the CO2 would go into the headspace more. However, it's only going to be four hours, so it couldn't possibly gain that much heat for that volume of beer in such a short amount of time.

If you want to combat this just put like 20 psi in the keg before you leave, and then purge it and return it to serving pressure when you get to the beach.

ok... step back for a second..

You have a 5 gallon corney and you want to serve it this weekend somewhere that is a 4 hour drive away right?

How are you/did you carb the keg? What pressure for how long? And how carbonated is the keg right now? Does it need more carbing? Are you currently chilling it?

Give us a few specific details and I can tell you how to have to perfect for the weekend.

devilishprune said:

If it gets warm, I can see how the CO2 would go into the headspace more.

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Don't disagree but I can't imagine it would be noticeable and when you chilled it to drink it, what little came out should go right back in.

Cape Brewing said:

ok... step back for a second..

You have a 5 gallon corney and you want to serve it this weekend somewhere that is a 4 hour drive away right?

How are you/did you carb the keg? What pressure for how long? And how carbonated is the keg right now? Does it need more carbing? Are you currently chilling it?

Give us a few specific details and I can tell you how to have to perfect for the weekend.

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A) Yes, the keg is currently being slowly force carbonated.
B) Since last sat. night @ 7-9psi
C) Very little carbonation
D) Yes...it tastes freakin awesome...but definitely needs more CO2...barely any head at all when poured.
E) Yes...it is currently sitting about 40 degrees in the frankenkegorator

We leave a week from Thursday.

ok... cool...

7-9 ain't gonna cut it. It's gonna take you a month to get it carbed.

Hook up the CO2, jack it up to 25 PSI and shake the hell out of the keg until you can't hear the CO2 hissing into it any more at all, and then disconnect the gas.

Toss it back into the frankenkegorator and give it a day or two....

Friday, tap it, drop the CO2 pressure down to 10-12 (I run all of my tap lines at about 13) and release the pressure on the keg slowly until you hear it take in a little CO2 off the tank... pour and it should be perfect.

When you go to leave for the beach... take the keg out and put it in your car... and then drive. It won't lose pressure or carbonation... unless there is a leak in the keg..

and I don't think there is a leak in the keg because if you've had the gas connected since Sat. night, and there was a leak, your CO2 tank would be empty right now.

The keg will warm up a bit on the way... its fine... when you get there, toss a couple bags of ice around it and you'll be fine.

I thought all the brewing 'puritans' recommended carbonating at serving psi?

The dealio is that your keg probably won't be carbed in a week if you leave it that low. If you do it the fast way you do run the risk of overcarbonating though, so be careful.

jdlev said:

I thought all the brewing 'puritans' recommended carbonating at serving psi?

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We do, for a balanced system at home when you have time. It takes ~2 weeks to reach equilibrium. You don't have 2 weeks.
And even if you did, 7-9 psi at 40° is pretty low carb.

You're not going to overcarb the keg doing it the way I said... and if you do... release a little pressure. It's not a hard fix.

Topic for another thread (although I'm sure there are 5.9 million of em out there) but I don't understand the puritan view. Not saying it is wrong, just saying I don't understand it. I have guys in my club that place consistently in the nationals and I don't know anyone that doesn't force carb at high pressure over a day or two.

That's wonderful news to me! I'll force carbonate it tonight using the shake method you just mentioned at around 25psi.

Then I can enjoy at least some of it this weekend too

I was trying to do it the puritan's way because I had inconsistent carbonation on my first batch. It had a nice head to start with, but when I dropped it to 7psi...it went flat pretty quickly...granted...my temperature variations while I futzed with the refrigerator didn't help I'm sure...

The temperature variations shouldn't make that much of a difference.... I'm willing to bet it is the dropping it down to 7 psi that's making it go flat. I don't drop it down below 11 or 12 even on picnic taps.

7 is too low. I would try carbing it like Iw as saying and then only dropping it down to 11 or 12.... and see if that helps.