keg carbonation

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callisbeers

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With my extract brews, I have been fermenting in the primary for 2 weeks, secondary 2 weeks, and then force carbonating in the fridge for 1 week. The last 2 beers really improved over time. Can I force carbonate the beer at room temperature in a keg for a longer period of time, 2-3 weeks, then put in the fridge? Or am I fine as is?
 
Either way is fine, if you force carb at room temp, you'll have to set your pressure higher to achieve the same volumes of CO2. I think you've discovered the most important thing, most beers improve with time.
 
You can do it both ways. I would do a search for carbonation charts and you will see your temp and psi settings to get your desired volume of co2. Yeast will contine to work on your beer as it sits. I try to leave mine in primary for 4 to 5 weeks and only move to secondary if I am going to dry hop. Some are even saying to dry hop in the primary.
 
You can also prime in the keg with corn sugar if you plan to leave the keg at room temp. for a couple of weeks. You would use about half as much priming sugar when keg priming than you would use for bottle priming. About 2 to 2.5 oz should be enough.
 
While I don't agree with the recommendation to use half the priming sugar needed, once it's in a keg, it is a lot easier to add carbonation to a beer than to bleed it out. With the kegs I've naturally carbonated, amounts come up with by priming calculators have been just right.
 
I just checked the calculator in Beersmith and it recommended roughly half of the priming sugar when kegging compared to the amount needed for bottling. Not sure if this recommendation holds up for most recipes but it did for the one I checked.
 

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