Wow. Big difference keg vs. bottle

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Ol' Grog

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Since my Sooners were off this weekend, I decided to do some of my home brew comparisons. Had about 4 different styles I have been working on and much to my amazement, the bottled brew ALL tasted far better than the kegs. These were all conditioned the same way. I mean, they even smelled so much better and a had a definent different mouth feel. Why is that? Is it the carbination? The bubbles on the bottles were a lot finer. Do I need to crank up the CO2 on the kegs or something? I mean, they are carbinated and they are not flat, but wow, what a difference. I mean, you'd barely noticed the hops with the keg. Maybe kegging is for session drinking and bottling is for the "good stuff."
 
i have thought that also since i started kegging, maybe with the keg since the dip tube is at the very bottom you are just getting all the yeast and Shi7 that falls out of the beer lol.

i have noticed that my keg beers seem waterie compared to beers i bottled. another thing i noticed about kegging is i cant keep out of the beer untill it has fully conditioned lol.
 
blefferd said:
i have thought that also since i started kegging, maybe with the keg since the dip tube is at the very bottom you are just getting all the yeast and Shi7 that falls out of the beer lol.

i have noticed that my keg beers seem waterie compared to beers i bottled. another thing i noticed about kegging is i cant keep out of the beer untill it has fully conditioned lol.
Maybe they dont taste as good because you are drinking them green :)
 
So you're comparing identical beers that were both bottled and kegged from the same batch right? Did you warm condition the keg just like you did the bottles? I find it does take a while for my kegged beers to reach full potential and two of the reasons were touched on. First, it takes a good long time for the bottom end of the keg to reach full carbonation. The headspace is way up on top where the CO2 is coming from. Second, for the first 8-10 pints, you're pulling in whatever yeast settle out after getting it into the cold. It's gonna start tasting better when the batch is half gone. I'm making it a point to cold condition my secondary (if I use one) for at least a week before going to keg.
 
It's all in your mind ;). One thing I noticed was my kegerator was too cold. The beers I was pulling were just not the right serving temp whereas, putting a few bottles in the fridge for a night, they would come out just right. I since turned my temp up on my kegerator and I can't tell a difference. In fact, the head seems creamier on my kegged beers than my bottle conditioned.
 
Bobby_M said:
SI'm making it a point to cold condition my secondary (if I use one) for at least a week before going to keg.

I just put my stout that is in secondary in the fridge this morning for this specific purpose. I can let you know how it turns out in a couple of weeks, but I would imagine that it will help a lot.

As for the original topic of this thread, my experience has been the exact opposite. My beers taste much better out of the keg. Probably has more to do with I am just becoming a better brewer, and my beers are better in general, but the beers I drink out of keg, are certainly better than the ones that are in bottle.

I would be willing to bet that you are drinking them green as someone else mentioned. With a keg, your beer can be 'ready' in just a couple of days. However, it still wont realize it's full potential for a couple of weeks, maybe even a month or more. I can just about guarantee you that your last pint will be the best one.
 
Hmmmm, interesting responses. They were conditioned all the same way, 4 weeks after coming off the primary. I haven't noticed a change in quality when I'm at the end of a keg. I do know that there is still some sediment in the bottom of the kegs when I go to clean them, but then again, there is some sediment in the bottom of the bottles as well. Temperature variation, will have to check into that one as I store my bottles in a different refrigerator than I do the kegs. I mean with the bottles and carbination, if you look after your pour it, the bubbles are physically smaller than the keg. Maybe brews just don't age well in stainless steel tanks......
 
Ó Flannagáin said:
It's all in your mind ;). One thing I noticed was my kegerator was too cold. The beers I was pulling were just not the right serving temp whereas, putting a few bottles in the fridge for a night, they would come out just right. I since turned my temp up on my kegerator and I can't tell a difference. In fact, the head seems creamier on my kegged beers than my bottle conditioned.
Definitely...I had the same problem. I made my thermostat a little warmer, and I sometimes wait a few minutes to let the beer warm up a bit....good beer tastes better as it warms up a bit :)
 
Bobby_M said:
First, it takes a good long time for the bottom end of the keg to reach full carbonation. The headspace is way up on top where the CO2 is coming from.

Hmmm...hadn't thought of that before. I'm flipping my newest keg upside down tonight!
 
Ol' Grog said:
Hmmmm, interesting responses. They were conditioned all the same way, 4 weeks after coming off the primary. I haven't noticed a change in quality when I'm at the end of a keg. I do know that there is still some sediment in the bottom of the kegs when I go to clean them, but then again, there is some sediment in the bottom of the bottles as well. Temperature variation, will have to check into that one as I store my bottles in a different refrigerator than I do the kegs. I mean with the bottles and carbination, if you look after your pour it, the bubbles are physically smaller than the keg. Maybe brews just don't age well in stainless steel tanks......

I notice the exact opposite with my carbonation bubbles.
 
Ol' Grog said:
Hmmmm, interesting responses. They were conditioned all the same way, 4 weeks after coming off the primary. I haven't noticed a change in quality when I'm at the end of a keg. I do know that there is still some sediment in the bottom of the kegs when I go to clean them, but then again, there is some sediment in the bottom of the bottles as well. Temperature variation, will have to check into that one as I store my bottles in a different refrigerator than I do the kegs. I mean with the bottles and carbination, if you look after your pour it, the bubbles are physically smaller than the keg. Maybe brews just don't age well in stainless steel tanks......

Maybe it's because the bottled beer has more yeast and other byproducts in it left over from the natural carbonation process?
 
Ol' Grog said:
Since my Sooners were off this weekend, I decided to do some of my home brew comparisons. Had about 4 different styles I have been working on and much to my amazement, the bottled brew ALL tasted far better than the kegs. These were all conditioned the same way. I mean, they even smelled so much better and a had a definite different mouth feel. Why is that? Is it the carbonation? The bubbles on the bottles were a lot finer. Do I need to crank up the CO2 on the kegs or something? I mean, they are carbonated and they are not flat, but wow, what a difference. I mean, you'd barely noticed the hops with the keg. Maybe kegging is for session drinking and bottling is for the "good stuff."

By conditioned the same way, did you mean you primed all the beer and then transfered into kegs and bottles? I'm assuming you did. I have noticed my keg beer isn't as aromatically hoppy as it used to be when I bottled, but as far as taste and everything else:confused: I don't know. I am a huge advocate of not force carbing my beer. I have had too a few volumes until I got my system dialed in, but I feel it makes for better carbonation (taste/finer bubbles).

:off: On another note, it is nice to see another SOONER FAN. I have to say that they are not a national championship team even if they end up winning it this year, but you better bet I am hoping everyone else screws up more than us and we win it anyways :)
 
Ok, here's a question. Are your serving lines well balanced? If your lines are too short, you could be losing a lot of your carbonation during the pour. Most of my kegged beers have an amazingly fine and persistent head that laces the glass like crazy.

Cheese, I'd guess it would make sense to give the keg a little shake 3-5 days after putting them on the gas just to distribute the carbonation a bit. Of course, you'll want to let any sediment resettle for a day before drinking.
 
I haven't kegged my first beer yet, but I'm on my way and part of the reason is because everyone claims how much better the kegged and carbed with CO2 beer tastes...

Just throwing out another idea - are your serving lines clean? Not sure it would have the effect you are describing (e.g. less aroma, etc), but could be another culprit if you are running through dirty lines?

I don't know, just spitballing ideas...
 
my bro-in-law and i just tasted our first kegged beer tonight and it was great, hooked it up about a week ago at 12psi shook it for about 15 min and let it set at 12 psi for a week and boy did it taste good. we did filter it, could that make a difference?

Nick
 
There's a guy I met at my local brew shop who has convinced himself (and others) that bottling is the way to go. He has tried both over the course of many years, and he believes that natural carbonation yields a much more aromatic and full bodied beer. Kegging produces a much more watery "Budweiser'ish" beer.

This is an interesting topic. I was just about to purchase some corny's .... maybe I'll hold off a while.
 
It seems to me the only way to do a true comparison would be to naturally carbonate both the bottled and the kegged beers. Since most folks that keg also force carbonate that might make the difference.

It also seems to me that a naturally carbonated beer would be slightly drier than a forced carbonated beer. So the difference might also be the dryness vs the sweetness of a force carbonated beer.

I don't think that this is a matter of bottled tastes better than kegged or
vise-a-versa.

But rather what suits your personnal preference. I have a cousin that absolutely loves Bud so there's no accounting for taste.
 
Wow. Thanks for the responses and Wortmonger....KEEP THE FAITH. This has been without a doubt the most interesting college football year by far. No one thought the Sooners would win it all in 2000. Hey, stranger things can happen. I agree, we are not "there" yet, but with Sam, I think we're heading in the right direction.
OK. The serving line is a cobra tap, about 5 feet long. Discharging PSI is about 8 to 10. I do clean out the serving line every other keg and all the hoses and stuff stay inside the kegerator hooked up all the time. By conditioning, I'm refering to aging, I guess. On bottles, that would be priming and then storing for 4 to 6 weeks and on kegging, it's simply racking to keg, hit it with CO2 to get rid of the air and letting it sit out for 4 to 6 weeks and then at least one week in the kegerator for carbing at around the same exit psi. Have one regulator and a two way splitter so psi stays the same. I get a good pour and slight head with anything other than the weizens, that requires a little more psi. My LHB has said the same thing, that the brews seem better out of a bottle. Now, my serving temperature is a little on the cold side. Interesting side note form abracadabra, I too have thought that my bottled brew could use some sweetning up, but the kegs have been a lot better. I know I have to drink some water with the bottled brews after 3 or 4 of them but not so with the keg. Now, CO2 is CO2, correct? Whether is man made or yeast made, but there could be different sizes. Maybe the smaller CO2, found in bottles, has an affinity for water, and since there would be more surface area with lots of smaller bubbles versus the larger bubbles????
Man, I'm surfing here..................
 
Bobby_M said:
First, it takes a good long time for the bottom end of the keg to reach full carbonation. The headspace is way up on top where the CO2 is coming from.
Do you have any evidence to support that? I am not an expert on the matter but that doesn't sound right to me, no offense intended. Diffusion of solids/liquids in a liquid happens in a matter of minutes (think of a drop of food coloring in water), and I don't see why the diffusion of a dissolved gas would be that much different.

My friend, who's a mechanical engineering undergrad (some background in fluid mechanics) also thinks the diffusion would be rapid, and I've got another friend who's an ME grad student, I'll ask about it when I see him next.

If what you say is right, then the "set-and-forget" method of force-carbing would be improved dramatically by simply taking the keg out once or twice a day and gently tipping it upside down and back, to mix it. So, now I'm interested in finding out the truth, one way or the other...
 
I think this is getting more into PV=nRT formula. I know from experience this weekend that I put a keg of my newest stuff in the kegerator Thursday evening. Charged it up to 15 psi and let it sit. Come Friday night, it was flatter than stale bread. Also, there are a lot of folks whom describe the quick carb method. Super charge the keg, 30 to 40 psi, roll it around some, charge it up again, etc.etc. Within an hour of doing this, should be fully carbed. So, with that in mind and reading your comments on fluid mechanics, wouldn't the keg be literally fully carbed within minutes?
 
Brew Dude said:
There's a guy I met at my local brew shop who has convinced himself (and others) that bottling is the way to go. He has tried both over the course of many years, and he believes that natural carbonation yields a much more aromatic and full bodied beer. Kegging produces a much more watery "Budweiser'ish" beer.

This is an interesting topic. I was just about to purchase some corny's .... maybe I'll hold off a while.

You can natural carb in the keg. Lots of people do. It's just cheaper and I can't tell a difference to force carb.
 
Ol' Grog said:
So, with that in mind and reading your comments on fluid mechanics, wouldn't the keg be literally fully carbed within minutes?
My comments were specific to the diffusion of already-dissolved CO2 throughout the fluid. The diffusion of gas into the liquid is a whole different ball game, it depends heavily on the surface area of the liquid - by shaking the keg vigorously you are getting foam/bubbles of CO2 which have significantly more surface area and thus dissolve more quickly. That's the same reason why using a carbonation/oxygenation stone (which creates millions of incredibly small bubbles) dissolves gas into solution way, way faster than just bubbling CO2 through the solution through a larger tube, creating larger bubbles which hardly dissolve at all before reaching the surface.

An analogy might be dropping food coloring in a glass of water - it will diffuse throughout the whole glass within seconds or minutes. Even if the concept of dissolved gas diffusing through a liquid is harder to visualize, you should be able to even think about it the same way as that example: a liquid (beer with lots of CO2 dissolved in it) diffusing into another liquid (beer with less CO2 dissolved in it).
 
I'm certainly not an expert either and my background is not science but I don't think the dispersion of dissolved Co2 in a still column of liquid is anywhere near instantaneous or "fast". I guess you'd have to consider small eddy currents from the temperature stratification of a typical chest freezer/fridge, the density of the new carbonated molecule (carbonic acid; H2CO3) compared to the density of beer (is H2CO3 heavier than beer? If so, it will settle to the bottom?). I know once the pCO2 gets the carbonation to its equilibrium, you'll get to full dispersion in some time and it will stay that way but I'm guessing its somewhere between 10 minutes and 2 days. Any scientists in here? I realize I blatently stated my theory as fact and I'm wrong there.
 
Bobby_M said:
I'm certainly not an expert either and my background is not science but I don't think the dispersion of dissolved Co2 in a still column of liquid is anywhere near instantaneous or "fast". I guess you'd have to consider small eddy currents from the temperature stratification of a typical chest freezer/fridge, the density of the new carbonated molecule (carbonic acid; H2CO3) compared to the density of beer (is H2CO3 heavier than beer? If so, it will settle to the bottom?). I know once the pCO2 gets the carbonation to its equilibrium, you'll get to full dispersion in some time and it will stay that way but I'm guessing its somewhere between 10 minutes and 2 days.
In what you just said however, it doesn't sound like you're considering diffusion at all, even though it's exactly what I'm talking about. Diffusion has nothing to do with any eddy currents or heavier molecules sinking, only on a difference in concentration of a substance with respect to position:
Wikipedia said:
...diffusion is the spontaneous net movement of particles from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. For example, diffusing molecules will move randomly between areas of high and low concentration but because there are more molecules in the high concentration region, more molecules will leave the high concentration region than the low concentration one. Therefore, there will be a net movement of molecules from high to low concentration. Initially, a concentration gradient—a smooth decrease in concentration from high to low—will form between the two regions. As time progresses, the gradient will grow increasingly shallow until the concentrations are equalized.
Going back to the food coloring example, even if you added the drop of food coloring to the water in such a way that no movement/currents were generated, it would still diffuse throughout the solution rapidly. I don't see any reason to think that the diffusion of carbon dioxide would be significantly slower than the diffusion of food coloring in water, certainly not by a factor of as much as hours/days vs. seconds/minutes. (as it turns out, carbonic acid isn't that significant, only a small fraction of the CO2 in solution forms H2CO3)
 
Ol' Grog said:
Hmm, then why don't they put the "in" line all the way to the bottom of the keg instead of in the head space??

I answered that above:
Funkenjäger said:
That's the same reason why using a carbonation/oxygenation stone (which creates millions of incredibly small bubbles) dissolves gas into solution way, way faster than just bubbling CO2 through the solution through a larger tube, creating larger bubbles which hardly dissolve at all before reaching the surface.

If you inject CO2 in through a dip tube that goes to the bottom, it is only in contact with the beer during the second or so that it takes for the bubble to reach the surface. For a large bubble like you get from a dip tube, the amount of co2 that's going to dissolve during that second or so is pretty small. For millions of tiny bubbles, the same amount of CO2 will have thousands or millions of times more surface area, and a lot more of it will dissolve before bubbles reach the surface.

There ARE people who attach carbonation stones to a dip tube that goes to the bottom of the keg, and by doing so they are able to carbonate their beer very quickly without any shaking, but it's an expensive upgrade compared to the cost of the keg itself.
 
Ol' Grog said:
……much to my amazement, the bottled brew ALL tasted far better than the kegs…

Taste is obviously a subjective thing.

When I started doing 10-gallon batches, I thought I’d save gas by priming one keg…setting aside for 4-5 weeks and then tapping. Three straight batches, those primed kegs were “different” tasting than the gas-charged kegs. Not bad…they just had a yeasty bite to them. Not as clean. Some people might find the extra yeast flavor that comes with sugar priming to be desirable. I didn’t.

It’s no coincidence…the old saying…”the last pint drawn from you keg will be the best”.
 
So, having the carb. dip tube, the "in", above the liquid, what size of bubbles would that equate to? I mean, by using pressure to dissolve CO2 into the brew, wouldn't that require the CO2 to be relatively small? I mean, you don't get burping kegs. I can understand the dip tube being in the bottom and then bubbling up, like a air hose in water. But if relying on pressure to force the CO2 gas into the liquid, wouldn't that be rather tiny in size? Maybe I'm doing it all wrong, I thought the dip tube was to never be submersed in to the brew.
 
Ol' Grog said:
So, having the carb. dip tube, the "in", above the liquid, what size of bubbles would that equate to?
It doesn't 'equate' to bubbles at all, when you're force carbing by just letting it sit, the contact between the gas and the liquid is simply the liquid surface - in a cornelius keg that's 8 inches in diameter, it's a circular area, roughly 50 square inches. The way it works is exactly the same whether it's gas diffusing through the liquid surface or bubbles working their way through the liquid, again, it's just a matter of surface area - in one case, the surface area of the liquid at rest, in the other case, the surface area of the insides of all the bubbles.

Whether you put your dip tube above or below the liquid surface isn't going to make much difference. When the liquid dissolves a bit of CO2, the headspace pressure drops a bit, and as a result, more CO2 flows in from the regulator. If you put the dip tube under the liquid surface, but, the co2 will have to bubble up to to the headspace, but the amount of CO2 that will dissolve from the bubbles in the short time that bubbles spend rising to the surface is negligible because the total surface area of the few bubbles that will flow at a time is much, much smaller than the surface area of the liquid surface at the top of the keg. You simply don't get enough benefit to bother using a different dip tube setup if you're only going to be getting large bubbles from it.

If, however, place the dip tube below the liquid level AND you add a carbonation stone so all the CO2 comes in the form of incredibly tiny bubbles, then even a small amount of CO2 flowing in will form thousands or millions of bubbles, and the total surface area of all those bubbles will be huge (much bigger than the surface area of the liquid at the top of the keg, even), and so a significant amount will dissolve before the bubbles reach the surface and go into the headspace.
 
I guess I can't get the "bubbles" out of my head. If the gas diffuses through said liquid, on top and keeping the pressure constant, it will eventually diffuse throughout all the liquid given time, correct? OK, once that equilibrium has been met and the desired volume is reached, what form is the CO2? I thinking bubble form. And with that, I thought that this size of bubble is somewhat smaller than those bubbles formed from bottling.
 
Ol' Grog said:
If the gas diffuses through said liquid, on top and keeping the pressure constant, it will eventually diffuse throughout all the liquid given time, correct? OK, once that equilibrium has been met and the desired volume is reached, what form is the CO2? I thinking bubble form.
Ah, I think I see where your confusion is. When the CO2 is dissolved in a liquid, it has gone beyond the point of bubbles, it's down to individual CO2 molecules swimming about in the beer. The reason you see bubbles when you open a bottle of beer is that when you release the pressure in the head space (by opening the top) CO2 comes out of solution rapidly, and all the CO2 molecules that come out of solution join together and form bubbles which rise to the surface. That's why when you have a sealed bottle of beer, you can't see any bubbles or anything in it. (unless of course you shake it, which is different)

(off-topic) Interestingly, if you open a carbonated beverage in space, there's no gravity so bubbles don't rise - they simply form and stay where they are. Image from NASA of a glob of soda:
coke2.jpg
 
FWIW, Last night I went home after work (walked right by the SWMBO and straight into the brew shop).

I got to thinking about an earlier post suggesting a quick tip-o-the-keg to help distribute the level of carbonation. I decided to do a quicky experiment with two separate batches (SNPA and an Oktoberfast) that had been on the gas for about 5 days.

First I drew a small glass (after purging the lines) to taste. Good, crisp but definitely not there yet. No discernable head to speak of.

Then I got my sanitized mash paddle, shut off the gas manifold, released the pressure valve and removed the lids, dipped in the paddle and gave a gently stir of the beer (kind of an up and down all around motion). I only did this about 4-5 rotations until it appeared the beer was going to foam.

Re-capped the kegs, re-opened the gas manifold and let sit for 30 minutes.

Another taste test and a world of difference. Beer had that familiar “head-gathering” during the pour. Much more crisp and a nice 1/8” thick head. Nice effervescence and lacing all the way through.

This beer definitely tasted different. Very much closer to a finished product and definitely servable.

This CO2 “layering” may explain why my last two gallons are always great…but on the verge of being slightly over-carb’d.

Just thought I’d share…
 
Interesting. Now if only someone had a keg with a dip tube that could be raised or lowered in the keg from the outside then it would be REALLY easy to test if the carbonation is stratified at all. Quick, someone go fab it up :)

Regarding stirring the kegs, it seems like simply shaking it would be a lot easier than opening them up - I would think that even taking one out of the fridge, standing it upright on the floor, holding it by the handle and just shaking it by tilting it back and forth would suffice if the mixture is indeed stratified. Heck, in a front-loading kegerator (rather than top-loading keezer) it would be easy to do this without even taking the keg out.

I might have to try and duplicate the experiment that way, though I only have room for two kegs in my kegerator and the scottish I just put in there yesterday was tasting so good flat that I'm not sure I can wait several more days for it to slowly force-carb... But I'll try.
 
BierMuncher said:
This CO2 “layering” may explain why my last two gallons are always great…but on the verge of being slightly over-carb’d.

Just thought I’d share…

I have another completely unscientific theory on this one as well. I think it takes an undisturbed "set and forget" keg a LOT longer than a week to reach equillibrium. Let's say the beer goes in at 40F and you want 2.5 volumes so you set the reg to 12psi. I think after about a week, you're probably well into the 1.8-2 volumes area and you probably think it's about right and you start drinking. It probably takes another good week before it starts inching up the the actual 2.5 volumes. Now you might start thinking it's overcarbing based on skewed perception. Maybe a week later (if it lasts this long), it starts getting near 2.8 volumes. How? Your thermo probe is probably about midway up the chest freezer set at 40F but the bottom of the chest (where that last gallon of brew is in the keg) is actually near 35F or less.

I don't know. I'm just thinking out loud. A lot of people have claimed that the increased headspace is what overcarbs towards the end of a keg but I like my theory a lot more.
 
Funkenjäger said:
Interesting. Now if only someone had a keg with a dip tube that could be raised or lowered in the keg from the outside then it would be REALLY easy to test if the carbonation is stratified at all. Quick, someone go fab it up :)

I know Yuri can do it. You'd have to put a compression fitting on the keg to hold a seal on the tube and then you'd need to weld threads to the top of the dip tube to screw the connector post onto it. Now you can dispense from any level in the keg. This would be awesome for getting the clearest beer at any given time.

Other than that, you could put a "racking" bulkhead in the side of the keg about 5" up from the bottom. In this arrangement you could vary the feed height from the bottom to about 7" above the bottom.
 
Bobby_M said:
I don't know. I'm just thinking out loud. A lot of people have claimed that the increased headspace is what overcarbs towards the end of a keg but I like my theory a lot more.
You know, I never thought of it that way. I don't really believe that when the keg is full that there would be a very significant temperature stratification in the beer because the liquid should conduct heat well enough to keep it somewhat constant throughout, even if the air temp outside is stratified. But you make a good point that everything changes as the beer level drops - it only makes sense that the beer temp is near the average of the air temp around it, so as the level drops it would ONLY be contacting the colder air at the bottom and thus the beer would likely get colder than when it was full, thus get more carbonated.

Sounds like something I can pretty easily experiment with, I've got a couple of remote-probe thermometers and two kegs in the kegerator - one is full, one's probably half empty. Should be able to measure differences in air temp between top and bottom, and differences in beer temp between the two kegs.

If this little theory of yours turns out to be true, it would be a relatively simple matter to place a couple of small computer fans in a kegerator to help circulate the air and keep the air temp more constant throughout.
 
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