Keg Beer coming out at Mach-1

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kicary

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Holy Mount Saint Hellens batman!!! So here is the scoop:

1. I fermented mt Dunkelweizen for ~3 weeks.
2. Then I transferred the beer into a 5 gal keg with priming sugar for carbonation
3. It has been about 1 week and I wanted to "test" the beer to see if it was ready to put into the keggerator.
4. I hooked up my tap line and gave it about a 1 sec spritz of Co2 from my portable 16oz Co2 device.

What happened next can only be described at excessive alcohol abuse!! It was alcohol abuse because I must have dumped 6 glasses of...foam beer.

The pressure was INTENSE....the beer came shooting out of that pic-nic tap at a force and color that can only be described as explosive diarrhea! My keggerator has the squirts...bad!!

The beer shot out of that tap like it was on fire...it filled my liter glass in about 2 seconds and it was all foam beer...no liquid beer to be found.

I thought.....hmmmmm maybe there is too much pressure in that keg from the carbonation process, so when I tried to pure the pressure, foam beer came shooting out of that tiny valve and all over me, my kitchen and my cat!!

So I ask you....WTH did I do wrong????

- the keg was kept out of the refrigerator during the Co2 building process and I have not chilled it yet.
- I have about 7 feet of line coming from my keg to the tap
- the beer glass was room temp, but the lines were cold.
- I have purged the Co2 pressure from the keg right now.
 
Chill the keg, that's probably your biggest issue. You don't mention serving pressure, and i'm not sure what your portable CO2 device is, but you'll need a way to regulate the pressure in the keg and keep it constant. Temperature, pressure, and head loss in your serving line are what influence the pour.
 
There are a lot of variables at work. First, how much priming sugar did you put in the keg? Also, when it's carbing up at room temp to something like 2.5 volumes, the pressure achieved is around 30psi. On top of that, you apparently added more pressure from the CO2 charger (why?). You don't want to go purging pressure because the 30 psi at room temp is required for carbonation. After you chill the beer down to 35F, the pressure will drop to 10psi on its own and the pour will be controllable.
 
I used the amount of priming sugar that came with the kit...I am not too sure about the amount but it has never given me results like this before when I bottled the beer.

The portable Co2 charger I am using takes a 16g Co2 canister and attanches to the keg with the same ball lock adaptor for 5lb+ Co2 canisters.

I allowed the beer to sit in the keg at room temperature until I was sure it was carbonated. I generally wait 1-2 weeks...periodically testing one beer each week for carbonation.

When I hooked the beer line to the keg I gave it a 1sec charge of Co2...well, becuase that it what I was told I would have to do when I wanted to dispense my beer. Apparently I was given bad advice!

SInce I am new at this I "guessed" that the pressure was too much in the keg and it was forcing the beer out too fast giving me the foam beer, so I purged the Co2. Only AFTER I did this was I told NOT to do this becuase the Co2 pressure was what I needed to carbonate my beer. OK, So I was told to just charge the canister a little...leave the beer alone for 2 weeks and then put it in the refrigerator for 48 hours. The cold environment will decrease the pressure in the canister and the beer will pour nicely.

Is this correct???
 
I used the amount of priming sugar that came with the kit...I am not too sure about the amount but it has never given me results like this before when I bottled the beer.
You always use less priming sugar when naturally carbing a keg.


And yeah, you definitely need to make sure your beer is cold. CO2 stays in solution a lot better a cold temperatures. If it warms up the act of serving will cause the CO2 to come out of solution quickly due to the warm temps (i.e. foam.)
 
fyi- that CO2 charger doesnt have a regulator to reduce the pressure, and its internal pressure is around 800psi, so if you are just blindly blasting the keg with CO2, its fairly easy to overdo it.

also when you are naturally carbonating it, the beer will not be at the 'true' carbonation level until you chill it. the pressure will be much higher at room temperature, so you need to chill it for atleast a week before you can determine if there is actually too much pressure in the keg.
 
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