Need help with force carbing

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Craig5_12

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I just got finished racking an Oatmeal Stout into a 5 gallon keg and bottling the rest. I've never tried to force carb before and decided to do it with this batch. I don't want to shake up the keg and would rather just leave it on the CO2 for a few days instead. Should I just pressurize to serving pressure and leave it there until it's ready? (even it takes a week thats okay) Next, what should the serving pressure be?
 
If the lines are 3/16'' and about 6 feet long, pressurize it to between 10 and 12 psi and it will take about a week to carb up.
 
Cool, thanks for the heads-up. I think I can handle drinking this in a week!

EDIT: It is 3/16th line but about 15 feet of it as I run it through the coils in a jockey box.
 
Then you will need to increase the pressure. If you used that in the calculation, then the 18 PSI sounds about right.
 
Perfect. I've left it at about 16 for now and will just check on it as time goes by. Wow is this easy compared to bottling or even using corn sugar in the keg as I've done in the past.
Do you ever bottle your already carbed beer?
 
It is easy to bottle your carbed beer. You just need a beer gun :) or a counter pressure filler... Like they say, you can keg -> bottle but never bottle -> keg

:mug:

*PUI - Drunken rambling may cause death*
 
Shake it baby. :ban:

I racked my APA to keg last night at 7:00.

By 10:00 it was chilled so I cranked it up to 30PSI and gave it about 4-5 minutes of shaking-pausing-shaking-pausing.

Set the PSI back to serving and went to bed.

This morning I repeated the process and tonight after work I expect to draw off a cold glass of fresh HB.

I've had good success force carbing.
 
right on, ya kegging is a breeze compared to bottling.
I tried my first crack at counter pressure bottle filling last weekend. it was awesome I was amazed. i made a wicked little counter pressure filler too (cheap) and all Stainless steel, I'l try to figure out how to post a pic. it worked awesome!!
My guests were amazed too at a "Homebrew" bottle with no sediment, clear as a bell, and perfect carbonation to boot. It definatly, to me, seems like the way to go..
 
Oh ya, I'm a shaker too. my approach is 30PSI shake or roll on my lap for 100 shakes. put it to rest in the fridge. 1 hr later drinkable and carbed. 1 day fine and nice carb, 1 week perfect, longer than that even more perfect. Its definately a quick way to carb up. and quite forgiving too. the 100 shake rule seems to work fine for me.
Cheers.
 
Thanks for the heads-up. Try and post that picture of your home made beer gun...I'd like to check it out and it'd be a great DIY thread...
 
I do the lap roll as well with mine. I chill the keg, then hook up the CO2 tank, allow it to fill, then crank up the pressure, and gently roll it back and forth on my lap. If you do this in a nice quiet room, you can listen to your keg and tank, and after the initial addition of CO2, you can roll it about 10 - 20 times, stop, and hear some CO2 passing into the keg. When you hear it stop, and roll it again awhile and stop and you will hear more CO2 passing into the keg and stop again. So rolling definately helps get the CO2 into the beer, and speeds up the carbonation times.
 
It seems like that method will work really well, the only part I'm aprehensive about is that you can't tell if you over-carbonate your beer....Have you ever had issues with this? Or is the 100 shake method, pretty solid?
 
I've kegged two batches. The first I forced carbed using the shake for a count of 100 with 30 psi. It was way over carbed and even a week later at serving psi (9-10) I would waste about 1 glass of beer in foam for every 2 I got. Now, about 3 weeks later it is just getting to were there is more beer than foam in the glass. The second I put at serving pressure and left it a week, it was perfectly carbed. I'm afraid to try the shake method again.....
 
Thats what I was afraid of. My garage is a pretty constant 60, so I've just left it in there for now and will check it this evening I think. I guess I'll play around with it and see where it gets me. Seems like there are lots of ways to force carbonate.....anyone ever use a diffusion stone?
 
Tony said:
I do the lap roll as well with mine. I chill the keg, then hook up the CO2 tank, allow it to fill, then crank up the pressure, and gently roll it back and forth on my lap. If you do this in a nice quiet room, you can listen to your keg and tank, and after the initial addition of CO2, you can roll it about 10 - 20 times, stop, and hear some CO2 passing into the keg. When you hear it stop, and roll it again awhile and stop and you will hear more CO2 passing into the keg and stop again. So rolling definately helps get the CO2 into the beer, and speeds up the carbonation times.

You're like a keg nanny then?:D
 
JnJ said:
...I forced carbed using the shake for a count of 100 with 30 psi. It was way over carbed...

I let the bubbles talk to me. 8 or 9 shakes left and right and then wait...listen...

When the gurgling stops do it again.

About a 5-6 minute session and set it back in the fridge and wait. Taste in an hour and decide it you need to repeat. This way you step-up to the carb level you want for that batch.

Some brews I want a bit more fizz. Others (Porter) I want a little less fizzy and more creamy.
 
When I kegged my apfelwein, I definatley over carbed it. But the solution to that is very simple. Disconnect the gas, release all the pressure using the safety release. Then shake like hell (like you are carbing it) then just release all the pressure again, step it up to serving pressure and just let it sit. IT worked a CHARM!

:mug:
 
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