Carbonating a Keg?

I have kegged a few beers now and there carbonation has turned out good but after some searching on HBT I just want to make sure that I am doing it right.

I have read about using a priming sugar in a keg, I have never done this. I just hook it up to the CO2 set it at the recommended carbonation for the style of beer and wait (and wait… and wait). If I don’t shake the keg it takes about 10 days to carb.

Use sugar? Shake keg? What does everyone do?

I've only done one keg so far, and I did the 30psi for 3 days, bleed off and reduce to 10-12 psi and it worked well.

I usually set it for 24 hours @ 30 psi to give it a jump start. Then dial it down to serving pressure and let it balance out. I'll taste it daily but don't really drink it for a week or two. Usually starts to please after 3 weeks, what's the rush?


There really is no right way.

samc said:

There really is no right way.

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That's up for debate. I'll give you a wrong way, set it to a ridiculously high psi, roll and shake because your to impatient to wait. Then come on here and ask why your first pour is all foam.

wildwest-
I was hoping you would chime in on this topic. do you just set to the desired psi and wait? Was what i read about priming sugar not regularly used?

takedown said:

wildwest-
I was hoping you would chime in on this topic. do you just set to the desired psi and wait? Was what i read about priming sugar not regularly used?

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I set it and forget it. I've never personally used priming sugar, but many do. Nothing wrong with it, I personally don't see the point. I can get perfectly carbed beer in the same amount of time or faster, with no additional work, or infection risk.

thats what i thought, thanks

How about set it to 10-12PSI, let it sit for a week and dont shake it and save sugar for when you bottle.

Pivzavod said:

How about set it to 10-12PSI, let it sit for a week and dont shake it and save sugar for when you bottle.

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I do this but usually dont touch it for about two weeks, and at three weeks its even better.

wildwest450 said:

That's up for debate. I'll give you a wrong way, set it to a ridiculously high psi, roll and shake because your to impatient to wait. Then come on here and ask why your first pour is all foam.

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Gee, I must be doing that technique wrong, then, becasue I don't get foam.

Denny said:

Gee, I must be doing that technique wrong, then, becasue I don't get foam.

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Well, head over to the bottling/kegging forum and help the hundreds that can't seem to do it.

The OP seems to be doing great. No reason to mess with Priming sugar when using CO2. Set it and forget it for ~2 weeks.

I set at the proper pressure and leave it for a week or 2. I have used the shaking and it really speeds up the process. My problem with the shaking is that it makes it very cloudy. Any yeast that had settled in the keg gets kicked up and something about the CO2 makes it hang in suspension forever. So I just set it and wait to keep things clear.

I have used priming sugar in the past. Priming sugar works but it not as reliable as force carbing. With the force carbing you can dial in whatever volume of carbonation you want for that style and get a very consistent and reliable result. For my IPA, and other American ales I use 2-2.5 volumes. For my German wheats and Belgian ales I go higher at 3-3.5 volumes.

I'm going to use the priming sugar first from now on. The temptation to sample the carbed green beer is too great.

I just bought myself a second tank and regulator so I can precarb beer in my basement before it hits the keggerator. Otherwise, I drink flat beer for a week.

sirsloop said:

I just bought myself a second tank and regulator so I can precarb beer in my basement before it hits the keggerator. Otherwise, I drink flat beer for a week.

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You will need to compensate for the temp that the beer is stored at. More pressure is required at higher temps.

I use priming sugar for 99% of my kegs. I always use 3/4 cup of corn sugar and wait about 3 weeks.

steinsato said:

I use priming sugar for 99% of my kegs. I always use 3/4 cup of corn sugar and wait about 3 weeks.

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Some styles taste better with more or less carbonation. Depending on what style your brewing you should consider increasing or decreasing the amount of priming sugar to get the proper carbonation for that style. Give it a try and see if you can taste the difference.

maida7 said:

You will need to compensate for the temp that the beer is stored at. More pressure is required at higher temps.

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yah man... im all over it.

sirsloop said:

yah man... im all over it.

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I figured you were but there are lots of people reading this and they may not have been aware of how that all works.

steinsato said:

I use priming sugar for 99% of my kegs. I always use 3/4 cup of corn sugar and wait about 3 weeks.

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Do you also keep the keg under pressure with CO2 while you are waiting the 3 weeks? I just filled my first keg yesterday (used 3/4 cup priming sugar) and right now have 10 psi of CO2 on it. Is this necessary? I did it for 2 main reasons.

1. To make sure the keg gets sealed

2. So I can vent the O2 off.

But I am unsure if I need to keep the preasure to it.

Thanks

dae06 said:

Do you also keep the keg under pressure with CO2 while you are waiting the 3 weeks? I just filled my first keg yesterday (used 3/4 cup priming sugar) and right now have 10 psi of CO2 on it. Is this necessary? I did it for 2 main reasons.

1. To make sure the keg gets sealed

2. So I can vent the O2 off.

But I am unsure if I need to keep the preasure to it.

Thanks

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It's either one or the other.

What temp is it at?

To carb from the priming sugar then It needs to be at a warm temp for fermentation like 70F. To carb from 10PSI of gas it needs to be at a cold temp like 40F. If your using priming sugar I would not keep it hooked up to gas. I'd hook it up to the gas one time to purge the O2 and flush the seals then take it off the gas and put it someplace warm so the yeast can eat the sugar and make CO2.

Great. That's what I was thinking. I have it at 65-68 degree's F. Same room as my fermenter.

Yesterday I put 10 PSI into the keg, bled off some O2, put another 10 PSI bled this off and a third time put another 10 PSI on it and turned the CO2 tank off. I'll bleed it again when I get home and let it sit.

When I use priming sugar, I do purge the tank of O2 a couple times then I do put a little bit of pressure back in to make sure the keg is sealed nicely. I do not leave CO2 connected to the tank during those 3 weeks though. Just enough to seal it up. I would say leaving the 10 PSI on the keg is fine, just put that pressure into the keg and take the gas line off completley. Stick it in a closet for a few weeks and yoiu should be good to go.

How many kegs are you guys getting per co2 tank? I've just got one 5lb tank right now. I did the shake & roll on my first keg since I wanted something to drink, and then my second keg I just hooked up at 12 psi. I'm already down to 600psi on my tank from ~800 after refill.

Papazian uses 1/3 cup of sugar in his kegs. just fyi

I used half of what I would for bottling (~3/4 cup or 2.5 oz). We'll see if that works.

I've heard of people using less priming sugar for kegs but have never understood why. It's still the same amount of beer whether it goes into bottles or a keg. Why would you change it?

steinsato said:

I've heard of people using less priming sugar for kegs but have never understood why. It's still the same amount of beer whether it goes into bottles or a keg. Why would you change it?

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Good question, I thought the same thing, but just went with what the experts say.

I would like to know the reason too.

kcbrewman said:

How many kegs are you guys getting per co2 tank? I've just got one 5lb tank right now. I did the shake & roll on my first keg since I wanted something to drink, and then my second keg I just hooked up at 12 psi. I'm already down to 600psi on my tank from ~800 after refill.

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Ignore that high pressure gauge. It's not telling you how much liquid CO2 you have left. Think of it as a hard to read temperature gauge.

Bobby_M said:

Ignore that high pressure gauge. It's not telling you how much liquid CO2 you have left. Think of it as a hard to read temperature gauge.

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The only thing that gauge is good for is to tell you when the tank is 99.99999% empty.

Sucks for people who have to drive a long ways for a refill. My local paintball store is less than 2 minutes away.

Coming from the priming sugar side, I did my first keg using priming sugar and a hand pump. Only waited about 10 days and it is great. Trying to decide if the CO2 set up is worth it, since I have a wheat ready to keg. Is there a cask condition area on HBT?

Cpt_Kirks said:

The only thing that gauge is good for is to tell you when the tank is 99.99999% empty.

Sucks for people who have to drive a long ways for a refill. My local paintball store is less than 2 minutes away.

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Ok, it just seemed like a big drop for only two 5G kegs. It's been a while, but I thought I used to get 6-8 15G kegs when I used it for commercial kegs. I wasn't sure if force carbing was really soaking up that much.

It is also now in a fridge reading 600 compared to 800 when at room temp, so I suppose the drop in temp is what caused the big drop in pressure as well.

Robbajoe said:

Coming from the priming sugar side, I did my first keg using priming sugar and a hand pump. Only waited about 10 days and it is great. Trying to decide if the CO2 set up is worth it, since I have a wheat ready to keg. Is there a cask condition area on HBT?

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No, there isn't a cask conditioning forum. That's a good idea, though!

Do you have a beer engine? That would be great for a low carbed style, but I think a wheat beer really needs to be fizzy. I guess if it's drunk quickly the carbonation would stay, but I really don't know anything about it. Please let us know how it works out!

If you pump air into your kegs to serve them, you really should drink them FAST! The oxygen will make a cardboard flavor if it's left for a length of time. If you can finish your keg in a weeks time it's probably OK. Anything past a week and the CO2 system is the way to go.

YooperBrew said:

No, there isn't a cask conditioning forum. That's a good idea, though!

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In the meantime, there's one on the AHA forum...

http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/forum/index.php?board=30.0

How much CO2 do you guys go through while trying to carb? I kegged my beer tuesday with a full 5lb CO2 tank and the gauge is already down into the red area where it says it getting low on CO2. Is this normal? Also I have the 5lb tank in the kegerator, does that effect this at all?

That is not normal at all. You must have a leak or your guage is whacked. I can carb many many kegs before I run out CO2 and I also keep my 5# tank inside the kegerator.

XpeedeeX said:

How much CO2 do you guys go through while trying to carb? I kegged my beer tuesday with a full 5lb CO2 tank and the gauge is already down into the red area where it says it getting low on CO2. Is this normal? Also I have the 5lb tank in the kegerator, does that effect this at all?

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If you're talking about the second gauge that is supposed to tell you how much co2 is left, please ignore that. It's useless. Co2 is liquid, dispensed as gas, and will read in the red in the fridge, at about 500 psi, until it's completely gone and will drop to 0 in seconds. Most people find that covering that gauge with tape helps, so they can't see it.

If you really want to know how much gas you have, there is a tare weight stamped on the tank. If you weigh it without the regulator, when it's full it should be 5 pounds heavier than the tare weight, since it's a 5# tank. If you weigh it and it's 2.5 pounds heavier than the tare weight, it's half full.

Yes the gauge that tells you how much gas is left is what i am talking about. But that makes me happy that it does that because I was freaking out.