could some one tell me how to force carbonate?

Guys,

I must be doing something wrong. I wish to make a batch of Ginger Beer soda, and instead of having 4 gallons of refrigerated soda, I want to carbonate it in a corny keg, and then use my Beer Gun to bottle. I have tried this once before with 2 batches of beer and one batch of root beer, and it always is flat when i open the bottle. It seems that the CO2 is pushing the beer out of the keg, but is not absorbed into the product. No one really taught me how to carbonate in this manner, and I know that this is child's play to many of you, so I urge you to tell me how, what pressures, etc. I must be doing something wrong.

Is it at the desired carb level before bottling?

To force carb, I just set it at serving pressure and temp for a week. You can double the serving pressure and shake it twice a day for two days and get the same results (it still needs to be cold), but you typically need to let it age a bit anyway.

You're probably not waiting, is the main thing.

The function of the beer gun or a coutner pressure bottle filler is to take already carbonated product out of a larger vessel and put it into a smaller vessel with limited loss of carbonation.

Thus, your beer needs to be fully carbonated to start with. The instrucitons above are about as good as they get, as far as that goes.

When filling with the beer gun, less headspace is better.

I never wait. Shake and bake every time. Put it at 25 psi then shake the crap out of the cornie(for 3 to 5 mins.) 3 times a day for 2 days. Will be carbed fast.

lostforatime said:

I never wait. Shake and bake every time. Put it at 25 psi then shake the crap out of the cornie(for 3 to 5 mins.) 3 times a day for 2 days. Will be carbed fast.

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Just out of curiosity, why the big hurry? Do you drink beer after such a short aging period?

rdwj said:

Just out of curiosity, why the big hurry? Do you drink beer after such a short aging period?

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I was thinking the same thing, but maybe he ages the keg for a few weeks outside the fridge before the mad scramble carbing. I kegged my IPA right out of the seconday and carbed. No way I'd drink it immediately. It has to mellow for another couple weeks.

Using higher pressure, colder temperatures and shaking the keg is an acceptable way to carbonate your beer.

My observaion is that there is a steeper learning curve to this techinque (as opposed to set and forget) and a greater percentage of those that use this practice, at least initially, post threads about overcarbonated beer, foaming, serving problems, etc.

As to the OPs question:

Soda should be carbed at a higher pressure then beer. I ususally overcarb soda at 30 psi. Before you bottle, you should be satified with the carbonation level as it's tapped. Once it is sufficiently carbed, you can use your beer gun to dispense into the bottles. Make sure your bottles are as cold as the dispensed soda or beer. Use very low pressure to dispense. The CO2 is in solution, so you don't want to agitate it or you will lose fizz.

My guess from your post is that your beer/soda is't carbed enough and you are bottling too soon.

Bottom line is that it must be at the desired carb level before you bottle.

That's exactly what I meant by 'not waiting'. As in: not waiting for the beer to be carbed before trying to use the beer gun.

kornkob said:

That's exactly what I meant by 'not waiting'. As in: not waiting for the beer to be carbed before trying to use the beer gun.

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I got what you were saying. I meant to ITA your post, but given the subthread about aging... I didn't want to mudddy the waters.

Can someone give me some pressure numbers to force carbonate? I was always trying to do it at 14 psi, and never shaked the keg at all. Maybe that was my issue!

Force carbonation is pretty much the act of pushing ANY pressure of co2 at beer and waiting for it to carbonate.

You can either:

a) apply the amount of carbonation you want your beer to have and wait for a week or so till it is fully carbed.

or

b) exceed the target pressure by about double and try and speed the process further by rolling it around, using a carbonation stone and other 'tricks' (knew a guy once who woudl nearly freeze his beer to get that process to go faster).

14psi is fine-- it'll just take a while.

You need to consult a carbonation table. SEARCH the forum, search google, its out there. It will give you the pressure needed for your desired volumes of CO2 given your storage pressure (as the ammount of dissolved gas in a liquid is dependent on temperature and pressure).

Use this formula to determine the PSI needed. T is the temperature of the beer/soda, V is the volumes of CO2 desired:

pressure = -16.6999 - 0.0101059 * T + 0.00116512 * T^2 + 0.173354 * T * V + 4.24267 * V - 0.0684226 * V^2

I was under the assumption that soda was best carbonated at close to 30psi. Thats what I would shoot for. And if you loose some in the bottling, no biggie at all.

olllllo said:

Using higher pressure, colder temperatures and shaking the keg is an acceptable way to carbonate your beer.

My observaion is that there is a steeper learning curve to this techinque (as opposed to set and forget) and a greater percentage of those that use this practice, at least initially, post threads about overcarbonated beer, foaming, serving problems, etc.

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I will attest to this (see a recent post of mine about uncontrollable foam). However, I did have a 50% success rate in that the rapid force carbonation method worked PERFECTLY for me on a full keg, first try. But on another keg that was only half-full keg, I grossly over-carbonated the beer. Took two days of fiddling to get it down to a proper level.

Next time, I will just set it at serving pressure and wait a week. That extra time in the keg will be good for the beer anyways.

Here is what i will try, and you guys tell me if a good idea.

1. Keg the soda, and pressurize with CO2 to 30 lbs. Shake the container for 3-5 minutes ( rolling it around i guess) and but it in my lager freezer at around 40 degrees.

2. Shake it a few times each day, checking that it still is pressurized.

3. In a week or so, test it.

It seems that i never considered temperature of the beer having anything to do with the absorption of the CO2. Now maybe i can get back to using the beer gun right!

Does this sound like a plan?

I found this in a google serch. Its and excel sheet with a carbonation calculator. Its great. Download the excel sheet . It has the chart with the optimal temps highlitghted

http://sdcollins.home.mindspring.com/ForceCarbonation.html

Mutine Bullfrog said:

I found this in a google serch. Its and excel sheet with a carbonation calculator. Its great. Download the excel sheet . It has the chart with the optimal temps highlitghted

http://sdcollins.home.mindspring.com/ForceCarbonation.html

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Dennis has some great stuff on his site including HERMS info and building a kegerator using top-knotch fittings.

He aslo sells the HopStopper among other things.