Carbonating at 20 PSI

I looked around and all i could find on this is the two methods.

1. set it to servinge psi and leave for a week.
2. set it to 30 psi and shake it a bit.

Is there another method that we can use for a three day turn around?

2nd question... has anyone tried to load the keg to 20 psi and disconnect the Gas supply and leave the keg alone? would that work?

Don't shake! You'll end up with overcarbed foamy beer.

If you're in a big big hurry, you can set the psi at 30 psi in the fridge for 48 hours, then purge and reset to 12 psi. Don't go longer than 48 hours! You can check it after 36 hours, but sometimes it takes the full 48 hours. This works very well in a 39 degree fridge.

If you give it 20 psi, and then take it off of the gas, the gas will be absorbed into the beer but it's not enough to carb up. You must leave the gas on to force carb.

Yooper said:

...you can set the psi at 30 psi in the fridge for 48 hours, then purge and reset to 12 psi.

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Okay thats great info.. my fridge is at 40 and i'm kicking down to 39 tonight. What are you saying to bring it down to 12 psi? is that the serving psi?.. i plan on serving at 2-5 psi max.

I carb at 20 and let it sit for 5-7 day. Works great. You have to leave the co2 hooked up.

Dr1nkBeer said:

Okay thats great info.. my fridge is at 40 and i'm kicking down to 39 tonight. What are you saying to bring it down to 12 psi? is that the serving psi?.. i plan on serving at 2-5 psi max.

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Why? If you balance your system, you keep it the same all the time. Otherwise, you'd have to go up and down every time you served out of it. The beer will go flat at 2-5 psi.

okay that makes sense... trying to make sure i'm doing it right... so I set the PSI to 20 and a few hours later its down to 10... then i set the fridge to 39 and the PSI to 30 and this morning its down to 20 psi...

Does this mean its carbonating?

Dr1nkBeer said:

okay that makes sense... trying to make sure i'm doing it right... so I set the PSI to 20 and a few hours later its down to 10... then i set the fridge to 39 and the PSI to 30 and this morning its down to 20 psi...

Does this mean its carbonating?

Click to expand...

Are you turning the gas off at the tank each time? If yes, then yes, it's absorbing co2...but you should leave the gas on the whole time to force carb. At this point, turn it to 30 and leave on for another 12-24 hrs, purge, then turn down to 10-12, as yooper said.

Turning down to 3 for serving will definitely de-gas your beer over time, so i would suggest you get longer beverage lines (3/16") to be able to pour at the correct psi. Bev lines are cheap, less than 10 bucks for 10 feet.

Okay.. so i'm thinking I may have a bad Regulator... I have a four keg manifold and right now i have only one hooked up to keg. The knob on the bottle is turned all the way out.. and the high pressue is reading just above the "red" zone i think its like 500 or so psi. thats normal.

When i turn "in" my low pressure regulator the needle moves to 30 psi just fine but shouldnt it move back down on it own when i turn "out" the regulator? I'm finding that i need to release the CO2 from an unused port on my manifold in order to get it to turn down. I thought the regulator should do that automaitically?

I'm not shutting down the tank at all... its wide open and the low pressure regulator is sitting at 30 psi... thats where i stoped turning "in" the valve. I got about 6 feet of beer line running from my keg to the shank but i didnt hook that up yet. Gonna wait for high pressure to be purged out first.

I'm not sure what you mean by the in and out valve as I don't use a manifold, but if you set your PSI to 30 and then try to turn it down to, say, 12, it won't go down unless you purge the keg of co2. If you don't purge it will take an extremely long time for the co2 to come out of suspension. So when you want to bring the PSI back down to the serving pressure, you can turn off the gas, purge the keg, and then set the PSI to 12 (or whatever PSI you want it at). But you may have to keep repeating the purging process until it comes all the way down....Hope that makes sense.

okay so that is normal behavior.. good.

The IN and OUT i mean the Low pressure regulator KNOB.. it goes in to raise the psi and out to lower it.

Dr1nkBeer said:

okay so that is normal behavior.. good.

The IN and OUT i mean the Low pressure regulator KNOB.. it goes in to raise the psi and out to lower it.

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Sounds normal. You just need to purge the keg to get it down to 12. Pull the release valve on the keg if you have one.

Dr1nkBeer said:

When i turn "in" my low pressure regulator the needle moves to 30 psi just fine but shouldnt it move back down on it own when i turn "out" the regulator? I'm finding that i need to release the CO2 from an unused port on my manifold in order to get it to turn down. I thought the regulator should do that automaitically?

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Okay so this is my understanding:

You are force carbing at 30 psi. By turning your regulator pressure down you didn't release any pressure in your keg or lines so that pressure will stay at 30until you purge your keg using the pressure relief on the cap. Or if you don't have a pressure relief you can unhook the gas and carefully push down on the gas port releasing CO2. Don't release all of the pressure just a little, hook the gas back up and see what your regulator says until you are at your serving pressure.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

yeah.. just about... but my concern was that after setting the psi to 30 i woke up the next day and checked it and it was at 20. i didnt touch anything. My guess is that the beer absorbed the CO2 until the Gauge reached where it was actually set.

Basically i'm having some brain fart adjusting my regulator. Seems i need to release some CO2 from the keg after setting my PSI to see where the gauge lands. I'm sure i'll get it at some point.

I see, yes that might happen. The gauge is reading the pressure in the line and corny. So after you turn down the pressure, bleed the keg and let it charge the keg. the guage will correctly then.

Hooked up the beer line and pulled my TAP for the first time WOOOHOOO!... what a feeling! We got carbonation!...

Thanks Guys!...now i need to brew a few more!

Dr1nkBeer said:

Hooked up the beer line and pulled my TAP for the first time WOOOHOOO!... what a feeling! We got carbonation!...

Thanks Guys!...now i need to brew a few more!

Click to expand...

Sweet...yeah, commercial kegs are tricky, especially with wheats...cheers!

The check valve in your manifold is why you have to purge gas. With no check valve, the regulator should act as you expect; the low pressure (secondary) side of the regulator would go down as you turn the knob. However, since most regulators have a check valve at the out put (plus the check valves at your manifold) the gas can only travel one direction. IE the gas in your keg and lines cannot travel out through the regulator when the secondary pressure is lower than the pressure downstream of the check valve. That is why we must purge gas manually when lowering the pressure.

I find this quite obnoxious, and am considering removing the check valves in my system. I am aware of the risk of beer back flowing into the regulator, but this shouldn't happen as long as kegs are not over filled.

No check valves here, and no problems. I don't fill my cornies past the weld line near the top.

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so basically... you think its the check valve at the end of the manifold? I'm guessing you seen this in my build pics?... i do have one on the regulator and one on the manifold.

I've had to mess with the regulator all day yesterday could not get it set right. I use a regulator for my airbrush and it adjusts as i need... without needing to release pressure...

Should i just by a "plug" for the valve on my manifold? Or actually i'd like to add a third port for carbonating.

heferly said:

Sweet...yeah, commercial kegs are tricky, especially with wheats...cheers!

Click to expand...

I'm using corny's..

Dr1nkBeer said:

I'm using corny's..

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Sorry, meant to post in a different thread!

For what it's worth, i have check valves and don't have a problem...when i want to drop down from 30, i end up shutting the valve on my tank, bleed the corny (should bring reg to zero), back out reg screw, turn on tank, and adjust up to serving pressure. Some regs do creep, so you might be stuck there

I set to 30 psi and I have drinkable beer in 3 days. I don't shake or push the gas into the dip tube or anything weird, I just keg the beer, set to 30 psi and wait three days.

Dr1nkBeer said:

so basically... you think its the check valve at the end of the manifold? I'm guessing you seen this in my build pics?... i do have one on the regulator and one on the manifold.

I've had to mess with the regulator all day yesterday could not get it set right. I use a regulator for my airbrush and it adjusts as i need... without needing to release pressure...

Should i just by a "plug" for the valve on my manifold? Or actually i'd like to add a third port for carbonating.

Click to expand...

Some regs are self-venting and some are not. If it's not self-venting then you have to vent it whenever you reduce the pressure. My old cheapo CO2 reg is not self-venting. A check valve will prevent a self-venting reg from venting all that line downstream of the check valve.

When adjusting a non-self-venting reg, always start low (venting if you have to) and adjust 'up' to your desired setpoint. And try to make regulator adjustments with the outlet valve closed, then open the valve once it's dailed in.

SpanishCastleAle said:

When adjusting a non-self-venting reg, always start low (venting if you have to) and adjust 'up' to your desired setpoint. And try to make regulator adjustments with the outlet valve closed, then open the valve once it's dailed in.

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Didnt try that.. so your saying to shut the valve to the corny all together adjust the regulator to my serving psi and then open the valve to the corny. it should stay there?

I just noticed a slight leak in my serving line... seems my clamps (metal clamps) came out of round when i tighten down. ugh!.. another problem.. one day i'll get to just plug in my lines and go.

Dr1nkBeer said:

Didnt try that.. so your saying to shut the valve to the corny all together adjust the regulator to my serving psi and then open the valve to the corny. it should stay there?

I just noticed a slight leak in my serving line... seems my clamps (metal clamps) came out of round when i tighten down. ugh!.. another problem.. one day i'll get to just plug in my lines and go.

Click to expand...

Yes, when adjusting the reg it's best to take everything else 'out of the equation'. It should stay there unless you're connected to a keg (with valve open) that has been over-pressurized. If a keg has stabilized (i.e. carbonation level) at a higher pressure then that keg will tend to cause the pressure to creep up (because the beer in the keg is off-gassing and the reg doesn't self-vent).

Your serving lines should be 3/16" ID. You should have to heat the ends of the tube in boiling water in order to get it to slip over the barb and once it cools you almost don't need the clamps (but use them anyway). Doing that it is almost impossible to have a leak (the only reason I'm mentioning this).

SpanishCastleAle said:

Your serving lines should be 3/16" ID. You should have to heat the ends of the tube in boiling water in order to get it to slip over the barb and once it cools you almost don't need the clamps (but use them anyway). Doing that it is almost impossible to have a leak (the only reason I'm mentioning this).

Click to expand...

Thats what i figured... i just went out and picked some up when i test fitted them to the barbs i couldnt remove them!.. i'll put the whole thing in hot water to soften them up so i can clean/sanitize them before hooking them up to the keg.

For what its worth... this works much better when i have more than one keg hooked up.. its seems to be more consistent.