from sanke to corny

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stevecaaster

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Hey everyone, can anyone give me some semi-detailed instructions on how to transfer commercial beer from a sankey into three corny kegs? I mean, what length hose should I use? do i need a bleeder valve? I really want to know what the procedure is precisely before I screw a whole 15 gallons of good commercial brew. I cant fit a whole sankey in my fridge so I would have to break it up into 3 cornys. thanks
 
Line length isn't really that big a deal - use a few feet of 3/16" beverage line. You need to take the Sanke "beverage out" line, and attach a liquid (black) ball lock fitting to the end. The Sanke "gas in" line gets attached to gas at about 5 psi (low pressure to avoid foaming). Sanitize the Cornies. To be 100% sure of no oxidation, purge each Corny with a shot of CO2 before filling it (not required, but desired). When you're ready to transfer, tap the Sanke keg, then attach the ball lock fitting to the Corny "beverage out" side. You can either put the lid on the Corny and pull the relief valve, or leave the lid off entirely. If you elect to leave the lid installed, you may have a hard time gauging the fill level.
 
this is a great way of getting commerical kegs. me and a friend do this all the time. with 5 taps, its hard to keep up with the brewing. we just finished of a keg of Stone Ruenation
 
The only thing I did differently from what Yuri described is that I prefer to have the destination cornie keg sealed and purged with the same pressure that is being used to push the beer out of the sanke keg. Flow is completely controlled by slowly relieving pressure in the cornie keg by actuating the pressure relief valve or gas-in ball-lock. This ensures minimal out-gassing in the beer (thus no foam) and it never comes in contact with air.
True, the only way you know it is full is when beer starts coming out the relief valve, but that was a lot less messy than I thought it would have been and progress is easy to track by the condensation levels on the outside of the cornie keg (assuming your commercial beer is cold to start with).
 
MrFebtober said:
The only thing I did differently from what Yuri described is that I prefer to have the destination cornie keg sealed and purged with the same pressure that is being used to push the beer out of the sanke keg. Flow is completely controlled by slowly relieving pressure in the cornie keg by actuating the pressure relief valve or gas-in ball-lock. This ensures minimal out-gassing in the beer (thus no foam) and it never comes in contact with air.
True, the only way you know it is full is when beer starts coming out the relief valve, but that was a lot less messy than I thought it would have been and progress is easy to track by the condensation levels on the outside of the cornie keg (assuming your commercial beer is cold to start with).
That technique sounds like it'd work quite well.
 
great idea to split a commercial between a few homebrewers. What about going from sanke tap to sanke tap? My 5 galloners have sankes
 
IrregularPulse said:
great idea to split a commercial between a few homebrewers. What about going from sanke tap to sanke tap? My 5 galloners have sankes

The sanke coupler on the destination keg would need to have a valve on the CO2 end to allow you to bleed off pressure in the keg to slowly let beer in. Other than that, the operation would be the same.
 
The only thing I did differently from what Yuri described is that I prefer to have the destination cornie keg sealed and purged with the same pressure that is being used to push the beer out of the sanke keg. Flow is completely controlled by slowly relieving pressure in the cornie keg by actuating the pressure relief valve or gas-in ball-lock.

This is exactly the info I was looking for, I think. So talk to me like I'm 2 because I'm completely new with kegging stuff...

I'd purge to target corny with CO2 and pressurize to something like 5#. Then I'd attach a ball lock fitting to the OUT post with 3/16 inch tubing, and the other end of the tubing to the beer out from the commercial keg. For bleeding the pressure from the corny, is THIS THING PICTURED HERE a good thing to use on the gas post on the corny? If I'm pushing the beer from the commercial keg at 5#, then I set that valve at 5#? Will it be essentailly foam free?

Or do I need a valve like that at all? It's only 25 bucks and I'm going to be doing this a lot, I think. Helpful or no?
 
Not necessary. Just release a bit of pressure at a time. The ideal situation is to have the destination keg at 1psi less than the donor keg but it's not necessary to be that exacting. Just keep the CO2 on the donor constant at like 5psi. As beer flows to the destination keg, the pressure in that keg will creep up to 5psi also. Vent it, more beer will flow. Repeat.

A spunding valve (automatically opens at a set pressure) would be a nice hands free way of doing it but... not free.
 
If your cornie keg has a manual pressure relief just pull the ring(or flip the lever) as appropriate to manually release pressure slowly. If it is one of the ones that does not have a manual release you could press down on the middle of the gas poppet to release pressure.
 
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