Can I carbonate 2 gal of beer in a 5 gal corny?

First ever post, so excuse my newbness. Is there a way to carbonate 2 gal of beer in a 5 gal corny keg?

Sure!

Yeah - just do it. It will work fine.

I figure I will set the tank to 30-40 psi, purge out the oxygen, and then force carbonate it. any other recomendations?

Sounds like a good plan.

you could just set it to serving pressure around 12. and not have to worry about over carbing. also will give the beer a week or two to condition. that is unless you have a good reason to rush.

rycov said:

you could just set it to serving pressure around 12. and not have to worry about over carbing. also will give the beer a week or two to condition. that is unless you have a good reason to rush.

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Very good advice. When it comes to force carbing it is very easy to over carbonate. However, if you are in a rush and want to force carb then be sure to check the beer fairly often in order to try to prevent over carbing.

ttk420 you read my mind. I was just thinking this same thing. I'm brewing a 5 gallon IPA and wanted to split it into 2 kegs. Then drink one as is and experiment with some keg hopping on the other and compare them.

What are the drawbacks to using a 5 gallon keg for a smaller batch? All I could think of is using up more CO2 since the headspace is larger and taking up an extra keg instead of having 2 full ones.

summerofgeorge said:

ttk420 you read my mind. I was just thinking this same thing. I'm brewing a 5 gallon IPA and wanted to split it into 2 kegs. Then drink one as is and experiment with some keg hopping on the other and compare them.

What are the drawbacks to using a 5 gallon keg for a smaller batch? All I could think of is using up more CO2 since the headspace is larger and taking up an extra keg instead of having 2 full ones.

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I can't think of any drawbacks, except they take up more space than 3 gallon kegs.

yeah. other than using more co2 shouldn't be any. with the keg there shouldn't be any oxygen so no risk of contaminating of oxygenating the beer. and im not positive, but it seems like over carbonation would be easier with less beer. (or happen faster, not really sure how to word it) just seems like it wouldnt take as long to carb. but if your going with what i said earlier there's no chance of that. should be fine either way. hope it all works out.

UPDATE! after learning how to take apart the corny keg, clean and sanitize it, I got the 2 gal of ipa in the keg late last night. I put 12 psi in it and set it aside. the only thing I almost forgot was to purge the oxygen but alas, I got. wish me luck and thanks to all who posted. I love this site.