Slow Force Carbonation

I have been doing some digging, really I have and everyone seems to have their own way to FC. Most of what I have read talks about doing it fast as people want to get that first beer poured. Don't take this the wrong way but I am not in a hurry. Sure I want to taste it but I am going to be out of town for the holidays and my first beer has been kegged for about a week now and I have another two weeks that it is going to sit. I figure I might as well go the slow method.

So, I have an Autumn Amber Ale that is kegged in a new Ball Lock and hooked up to my CO2 on the in side. It is in my keggerator at 37* +/- 2* (with a digital Johnson Controls Thermostat). The low pressure setting on the CO2 is at 10psi and is hooked up to the gas side. I have read where people hook up to the out side so the CO2 bubbles up through the beer but to be cautious about pushing beer into the regulator. I have also read that hooking up the wrong coupler to the wrong side can wreck the coupler. I have the black and gray version. Since I have the ones with the screw on fitting if this is desireable I guess I could hook a black coupler to the gas line for FC. I have a feeling most of this is for the quick method. I will likely be using this with my next batch but for now I am going slow so I think I am fine with just hooking it up normally and letting it sit.

I should mention that I have two ball lock kegs of Leinekugel's Sunset Wheat as well. I transfered them from a 1/2 barrel a week ago as well into ball locks so I had room for my first home brew as my fridge is only big enough for one 1/2 barrel or 4 corneys. I noticed that they were a little flatter so I have them hooked up as well at the same temp and 10psi as a little FC won't hurt them.

So, am I good at 10psi for two weeks or should I bump it up a bit? Over time I assume that it should carbonate just fine. I am sure many will say don't worry about it, it will be fine. I would rather it be good when I get home rather than find it over carbed or under and have to mess around later.

Thanks

Should be fine - carbonation is just getting CO2 to dissolve into the beer. At higher pressures, it happens faster. At 'normal' pressures, may take longer, but will happen. Just 'burp' the keg a few times to get mostly pure CO2 in the head space above the beer.

I do 2-3 weeks at serving pressure and temperature. There's TONS of people on here that use this method. You might have seen more posts about people doing the rapid method, mostly because they have more issues with getting stable, desired, carbonation levels.

As for increasing the CO2 pressure feeding the keg, you can tweak it as you want to hit the carbonation level. The numbers don't mean much if you don't have a reference point to compare against.

I don't hook my gas feed up to the liquid side to try and rush things. I have enough kegs in rotation, with three taps on the brew fridge and room for four kegs. So, one is in the carbonating spot while three are on tap. Makes things a lot easier that way.

Look up how to purge the headspace in a keg (properly). Don't cut corners at this point since you've gone through all the time and effort to brew something. It would be a shame to F it up now, due to over carbonating, or oxidizing it due to cutting corners.

Yeah, I left off the part about purging head space. I did that when kegging the HB as well as purged the air from the two kegs before transferring from the 1/2 barrel to the two ball locks.

Like I mentioned, this is my first run so I am excited but I have time. I currently have 5 ball lock kegs. My Beverage Air fridge has a 3 tap tower and has room for 4 ball locks so I can also have one doing the FC in the fridge while the other three are serving. I did pick up a cobra tap with a black coupler so if I wanted I could have 4 going. The Bev Air that I have is a club model with a sliding top so I could slide it open and grab the cobra to serve that 4th beer if I wanted without much hassle.

You guys are confirming what I though though. Dial to serving pressure and given time the CO2 will saturate into the beer. Up until now I have been running commercial beer through my fridge. Once I get back I will start my next brew. I wanted to start one before leaving but I knew it would be ready for kegging and I didn't have any free at the time. Then Midwest had that special on ball locks. I couldn't pass them up at $25 so I picked up two more making 5 on hand now. Had I known that I would have brewed a week ago. Transfered to secondary and would be ready to keg once I got home and start FC. I have two extract kits waiting to be brewed right now. Irish Red Ale and White House Honey Ale kits from Midwest.