All Foam... please help!

Hello,
I brewed my first batch of beer and kegged it a couple weeks ago and it is now pouring all foam. Let me give you the back story. I had a friends brown ale in a corny hooked up to my kegerator before I kegged my brown ale. I was getting perfect pours every time with his ale. I kicked that keg and siphoned my beer from my carboy to my keg. I turned the pressure up to 30 overnight and when I poured a beer the next day it came out very fast because of all the pressure but it was actually a very good pour. I turned it down to 8psi for 3 days and then I poured another glass... no head. So I called my friend (needed beer for thanksgiving!) and asked him what to do. He said to turn it up to 30 and leave it there until thanksgiving. I did... now every time I pour it is just pure foam.

Keep in mind this is my first beer... and I very possibly screwed something up that affects the head of the beer. His beer poured fine... mine even poured fine after the first night at 30.

I have 5 feet of tube (I know I should probably have 6) and I flushed the system with B-Brite and Star-San then regular un-sanitized tap water before kegging my brown.

(It is set at 4psi now and temperature is regular fridge temp or colder)

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Vent ALL pressure, pour a few.

Your beer is HOPELESSLY overcarbed.

REMOVE the gas hose and pour a couple.

Wait. Time is the only thing that will fix it.

Kill your friend.

I'm no expert at this but you have extremely high pressure for chilled beer with short lines...

I either force carb mine (warm) at 30psi (rolling and shaking until the bubbles stop) and then when it goes into the kegerator i have it set to 12-14psi with 10ft runs for lines...

30psi at 5ft is just blasting the hell out of the beer from the keg. burp your keg to release the high pressure, set your regulator to 8-10psi and let it sit for a day or two... this should repair everything...

you have been bouncing from one extreme to the other, from 3-4psi to 30psi... there is a whole range in the middle that works

I vented... turned off gas... vented again... going to work... I'll pour some and vent more when I get back. Thanks for the advice. I hope I didn't waste a ton of gas from over-carbing it.

hammy48 said:

I have 5 feet of tube (I know I should probably have 6)

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Folks have already given you very good advice about dealing with your overcarbed beer - but on your line length, the sweet spot is really more in the neighborhood of 8-12 feet. Shorter will give you a slightly faster pour, but still occasionally a little more foam, while a little longer will be less foam but a slightly slower pour. (My lines are 8 feet, and I rarely have significant foaming problems, except with one commercial keg for the first few days before it settled down.)

Also, to avoid this in the future, if you can afford the time, just leave the beer to carb up at serving pressure. I find my kegs carb up nicely at 11psi in 10-14 days. If you really MUST force it, never leave it on 30psi for more than 24 hours, or you'll risk running back into the same situation you find yourself in now!

stratslinger said:

Folks have already given you very good advice about dealing with your overcarbed beer - but on your line length, the sweet spot is really more in the neighborhood of 8-12 feet. Shorter will give you a slightly faster pour, but still occasionally a little more foam, while a little longer will be less foam but a slightly slower pour. (My lines are 8 feet, and I rarely have significant foaming problems, except with one commercial keg for the first few days before it settled down.)

Also, to avoid this in the future, if you can afford the time, just leave the beer to carb up at serving pressure. I find my kegs carb up nicely at 11psi in 10-14 days. If you really MUST force it, never leave it on 30psi for more than 24 hours, or you'll risk running back into the same situation you find yourself in now!

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Good advice but there are faster safer ways.

I pressurize my chilled full Keg to 54PSI and disconnect the gas (and the tap for that matter)

I let that sit cold for 3 days. I hook the gas back up at 15 PSI and the beer is fully carbed in 5 days total. No shaking or rolling.

Sounds easy, Demon. I am going to stick to my 5 foot lines for now because I don't want to buy more hose... It worked with the first keg... If I run into foaming issues ill opt for longer lines. So most people serve at 10psi or so? I served the first brown at 4 and it worked fine.

I serve my beer at about 12 or 13 PSI usually. 4 is really low. You may have got it carbonated to start with but as time goes on, drinking beer, the carbonation will drop very low is left on 4 PSI