Benefits/drawbacks of aging in keg?

[thrstyunderwater]

Basically are there any drawbacks? I have 10 gallons of a 2 week old porter I want to keg. I can cold crash it over night and keg it tomorrow.

I realize I CAN put it in a keg, force carb it, and then leave it to age, but will it be dramtically different than if I let it age in the primary or racked it to a secondary?

I have a lot of empty kegs but am about out of fermenters and want to make 25 gallons this weekend so......?

 

[MalFet]

Totally fine, and a very standard practice (so long as your fermentation is actually complete). If you age it in a keg, that keg will basically be your secondary.

 

[kpr121]

I dont think there is a better vessel to age your beer in than a keg. Its light proof, sealed, virtually indestructable (so you can throw it in the back your closet and not worry about someone breaking it with the vacuum cleaner or something), and you can purge and or carb with C02 for virtually no O2 entering.

If you have the extras go for it! Do not let it be the reason to not brew 25 gallons this weekend! I have a few extra kegs that just never seem to make it into rotation and I will be brewing up some big beers that are going to need time so I can make use of them. I also have a batch of Amarone and Apfelwein that have been sitting quietly in back of my cellar for weeks/months in cornies.

 

[MalFet]

what kpr121 said.

In fact, I don't own anything but kegs. I ferment in them, I age in them, and I bottle from them.

 

[Double_D]

You ferment in your kegs? I wouldn't have thought there's enough head space.

 

[944play]

If you're going to age the beer in the keg at room temp, you might as well naturally carbonate it. Active yeast will take up oxygen, metabolize acetaldehyde and clean up diacetyl.

 

[MalFet]

You ferment in your kegs? I wouldn't have thought there's enough head space.

I used to just make 4gal batches, but lately I've been doing pressurized ferments. 5 PSI and a few drops of fermcap keep the krausen quite compact. Once in a while I get a small amount of blow-off, but rarely much and often none.

 

[bubbachunk]

I love aging mead/wine in kegs, especially because they are so portable. This was a huge advantage for me due to moving fairly frequently and the fact that if the stuff is in a keg I am much less likely to touch it at that point.

 

[kpr121]

You ferment in your kegs? I wouldn't have thought there's enough head space.

Yep I ferment in kegs under pressure as well. I usually do 10 gallon batches, and no chill directly into two kegs. I pull off about 3/4 of a gallon for a real wort starter (RWS) from the kettle, cool it quickly, and get a starter going. Put the kegs into the ferment chamber and set my temp controller to desired pitching temp. Depending on how long it takes for the starter to kick up, I pitch within the next day or two, at the same time adding fermcap and oxygen.

I sometimes have blowoff but it all gets blown into my water filter housing that I have connected before the spunding valve, and its usually not much.

I usually end up with about 4.5 gallons to serve per keg. Recently I have been thinking about fermenting at a a slightly higher gravity, then topping up with water when it comes time to serve.

 

[JuanMoore]

You ferment in your kegs? I wouldn't have thought there's enough head space.

Keep in mind that kegs come in many sizes. Lately I've been brewing ~13 gal batches, and either splitting it between 3 corny kegs or two sankey 1/4 bbl kegs to ferment in. I've done 10 gal batches split between two cornies before with a spunding valve and ferm-cap as others have described.

 

[kmat123]

I also ferment in cornies and usually fill them up with wort to just below the gas in dip tube. I then pull off the gas IN poppet and fit a 5/8" length of nylon tubing over as a blow off tube. I end up with about 1 quart of blow-off using this system with most beers.

 

[carltjones]

I just picked up some corny keg fermentation lids (pressure valve removed to fit a #3 bung and airlock/blowoff). Previously picked up a dozen of those 9.99 kegs (w/o lids) so this seems like an economical choice to go "all stainless". Corny keg volume measured about 5.5 gallons so I'm planning to use this as a 4-week primary with Fermcap before siphoning to keg for serving. Next step is to brew more than I consume so I can age some of them.

Any other handy tips?