fermenting and serving in the same keg

[madscientist451]

I just added to my Corny keg collection, fermenting in the keg and then transferring to a serving keg has been on my list for a long time.
But why not just use the primary keg for the serving keg?
I was going to cut off the dip tube anyway for fermenting.
So the yeast cake won't be an issue.
Anyone try this?

 

[doomy86]

I have done a transfer many times but never served directly from the primary. Mostly because i have to move the kegs before serving. This would stir up the sediment.

I think your approach would work great if you keep the kegs at the same place for cold crash and serving. I would not even cut the tube, just dump the first few pints. Maybe think about adding a stainless steel mesh filter if you add alot of hops.

 

[beersk]

Depending on how fast you intend to drink it, autolysis is an issue with large amounts of yeast in the keg.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

What beersk said. Also, I find the amount of trub differs from batch to batch, (style to style) so depending on where you cut your dip tube, you may waste some beer or pull a glass of trub depending on the beer.

 

[hezagenius]

I've never served from the primary but I have transferred to the a secondary midway through fermentation and served from that after fermentation was done. I used a Clear Beer Draught System to pull beer from the top of the keg since I had a crap ton of dry hops in the keg. Worked fine and tasted OK, but I find I like the beer better when rack to a clean keg after dry hopping and serve from that.

 

[Hopping4Hops]

I would like to wake up this thread, as it has been burning my mind to get a do it all keg. I'm mostly into NEIPAs, so transferring beer is very off-putting for me. Also you can get from grain to glass in just a week if you keep some of the CO2 from primary fermentation. Autolysis is not an issue if by the end of the week you keep the keg in serving temp and have it kick in two to three weeks. Has anyone been successful in trying this method yet?

 

[Sadu]

Serving from primary works great so long as you don't move the keg and stir things up. Have a look at getting a fermentasaurus floating dip tube so the beer is pulled from the top of the keg. I have done this a couple of times and its super quick and easy, no oxidation issues to worry about.

 

[stickyfinger]

I'm using a Clear Beer Draught System now to serve my NEIPA. I fermented, dry hopped, carbonated and am now serving from the same keg. The CBDS has been in there since I pitched the yeast. I'm very pleased. It hasn't been in the kegerator more than a week though, so I might eventually be disappointed with the flavor with all of the yeast and hops in there (but I doubt it )

 

[enormous13]

I'm using a Clear Beer Draught System now to serve my NEIPA. I fermented, dry hopped, carbonated and am now serving from the same keg. The CBDS has been in there since I pitched the yeast. I'm very pleased. It hasn't been in the kegerator more than a week though, so I might eventually be disappointed with the flavor with all of the yeast and hops in there (but I doubt it )

Any update to this?

 

[stickyfinger]

Any update to this?

i’ve done several beers this way. i cant taste any off flavors. i’d recommend trying it

 

[enormous13]

i’ve done several beers this way. i cant taste any off flavors. i’d recommend trying it

Thanks for getting back to me, I definitely will try this on an upcoming batch. This is like a new level of simplicity for fermenting/serving.

 

[kigerbrewing]

Bumping this back up since i have a few questions about this. How are you handling blow off during fermentation? Are you using a different lid with a blow off tube and then switching it out for a normal pressurized lid? When are you doing the switch? Are you then using a spunding valve to naturally carbonate the beer? Thanks.

 

[stickyfinger]

you can take off the keg gas fitting and slip tubing over it then put on a traditional spund setup once it calms down. also, use antifoam.

 

[kigerbrewing]

Thanks. At what pressure do you initially set the spunding valve after things calm down? Can too much pressure kill the yeast?

 

[stickyfinger]

i do like 5 psi and then ramp up to 30 psi at the end. I haven’t seen yeast issues with pressure

 

[Shoggoths]

I'm using a Clear Beer Draught System now to serve my NEIPA. I fermented, dry hopped, carbonated and am now serving from the same keg. The CBDS has been in there since I pitched the yeast. I'm very pleased. It hasn't been in the kegerator more than a week though, so I might eventually be disappointed with the flavor with all of the yeast and hops in there (but I doubt it )

Sorry to bump this thread again.

Could you explain how you dry hop please ?

Do you remove the tubing, dry hop and put your spunding valve to finish fermentation ?

 

[stickyfinger]

Lately I've been using a blowoff tube out of the gas-in port for 48 hrs just to be safe, then, pop open the lid with low CO2 flow through the gas in, dump in the dry hops, close up, purge 6x at 10 psi, pressurize to 10 psi to seal and put on spund valve and let rest at 27-30 psi at 70F until putting into keezer.

 

[Shoggoths]

Lately I've been using a blowoff tube out of the gas-in port for 48 hrs just to be safe, then, pop open the lid with low CO2 flow through the gas in, dump in the dry hops, close up, purge 6x at 10 psi, pressurize to 10 psi to seal and put on spund valve and let rest at 27-30 psi at 70F until putting into keezer.

Great, thank you very much for the reply.

 

[happyduke]

All good stuff guys, I'm eager to try this method as well since I've already got a CBDS and it works really great for keg dry hopping. Hopefully will update on this in a month.

 

[brew703]

I'm another thinking about fermenting and serving for same corney.

If one does everything in one keg and use the Clear Beer Draught System, would the floating dip tube not get clogged with hop debris and cause an issue with pouring?

If I were to use the CBDS would the dip tube have to be cut to attach the tubing or would you just attach from the bottom of the dip tube without having to cut?

As for a blow off tube, I would probably remove the gas fitting and attach a tube there for the first 3 days of fermentation then I would add a spunding valve. At what pressure would you set the valve to at day 3 in order to naturally carb the beer? I do not really want to add any priming sugar so I would want to go natural for the carbing process.

 

[happyduke]

I use CBDS version with a screen filter at didn't have any of such issues after heavy NE IPA keg dry hopping, so I think it should be just fine for fermentation. I think fermcap and pressurised fermentation might also help to avoid clogging.

You don't need to cut dip tube, CBDS is a complete alternative to it and comes with all the parts needed.

Also wondering about pressure during fermentation, I'm not concerned about carbonation since I've got a co2 tank anyway but rather of its effect on the fermentation process and the result beer.

Cheers.

 

[brew703]

I use CBDS version with a screen filter at didn't have any of such issues after heavy NE IPA keg dry hopping, so I think it should be just fine for fermentation. I think fermcap and pressurised fermentation might also help to avoid clogging.

You don't need to cut dip tube, CBDS is a complete alternative to it and comes with all the parts needed.

Also wondering about pressure during fermentation, I'm not concerned about carbonation since I've got a co2 tank anyway but rather of its effect on the fermentation process and the result beer.

Cheers.

Thanks for the info. I have a CO2 tank as well but just wanted to try naturally carbing, especially lagers or when I dont have space in my keezer. I would like to be able to have three kegs ready at any given time so naturally carbing would help since my keezer is only two taps at the moment.

 

[stickyfinger]

just put in the spund valve when fermentation is winding down, after 48-72 hrs seems to work. To set the pressure just look up in a chart the appropriate pressure for your fermentation temp. 30ish psi at 70F is a good ballpark.

 

[skleice]

Following!

I've been thinking about how to limit cold side oxidation and have been weighing my options. I'd settled on fermenting in kegs because I usually brew 3.5 gallons. Serving from the same keg would be amazingly easy and would of course keep out CO2. I'll probably pick up a cbds and give it a try.

Please post your results

 

[stickyfinger]

Honestly, I've had absolute BOMB results from fermenting in the keg, cold crashing for a couple days and then pushing it over to a purged keg as well. The purged keg can be purged with fermentation gas.

 

[happyduke]

Few questions about using gas fitting as a blow-off – Do you remove the post with the dip tube or just the post alone? What size of tubing you're using to make a tight seal? Thanks!

 

[stickyfinger]

If you are careful and don't overfill the keg, you can get away with leaving keg intact completely. Just hook up a gas QD fitting to the post with a piece of tubing on it. Extend that tubing into sanitizer or extend it over to the beverage in post on another keg/serving keg and put the blowoff line on serving keg gas post to purge it during fermentation.

If you are getting some blowoff or are worried about clogging the poppets, I have had success taking off the ball lock fitting on the keg and just putting a piece of tubing over the threads on the keg. I used a hose clamp to make sure it wouldn't fall off.

I have also taken out the poppets on both the keg and the QD fitting and done a blowoff that way.

One more thing, I have gotten some leaky keg posts when they get a little clogged from blowoff. That can be fixed by just blasting some CO2 into the keg a few times to clean it out.

Few questions about using gas fitting as a blow-off – Do you remove the post with the dip tube or just the post alone? What size of tubing you're using to make a tight seal? Thanks!

 

[cmac62]

Following

I'm getting everything ready to start fermenting and serving in the same keg, I'll have to check out the cbds and maybe that is a quick option for the dip tube issue.

 

[balrog]

Just did this, using Williams Brewing Top Draw; only made 2.5g in 5g corny; gas out fermkeg to liquidout of 2.5G keg to purge during fermentation; dry hopped just opened lid and tossed in; used the $5 Williams Brewing inline check valve for 10psi spund after that; closed loop xfr from fermkeg to servkeg. The top draw was not clogged. Cleaning fermkeg was not difficult. Hopefully this makes my first attempt at a citrussy hoppy beer a good, long shelf life experiment. But honestly, I've nothing to compare to yet. I'll try an altbier next ferm in keg, xfr closed, and see if I can notice anything in malt flavor or hop aroma/flavor stability.

 

[happyduke]

If you are careful and don't overfill the keg, you can get away with leaving keg intact completely. Just hook up a gas QD fitting to the post with a piece of tubing on it. Extend that tubing into sanitizer or extend it over to the beverage in post on another keg/serving keg and put the blowoff line on serving keg gas post to purge it during fermentation.

If you are getting some blowoff or are worried about clogging the poppets, I have had success taking off the ball lock fitting on the keg and just putting a piece of tubing over the threads on the keg. I used a hose clamp to make sure it wouldn't fall off.

I have also taken out the poppets on both the keg and the QD fitting and done a blowoff that way.

One more thing, I have gotten some leaky keg posts when they get a little clogged from blowoff. That can be fixed by just blasting some CO2 into the keg a few times to clean it out.

Thanks. And what about your batch size vs keg size? Is it possible to yield say 4.5gal of beer in a 5gal keg (assuming I attach blowoff tube, add fermcap and stuff)?

 

[stickyfinger]

I usually fill my keg to 4.25G and then add in about a 1L starter, so it's close to 4.5G. That usually works pretty well with just a little bit of manageable blowoff.

Thanks. And what about your batch size vs keg size? Is it possible to yield say 4.5gal of beer in a 5gal keg (assuming I attach blowoff tube, add fermcap and stuff)?

 

[stickyfinger]

If you get some yeasty blowoff into your SK that you are purging with fermenation gas, you can inject in some star san solution using another keg and co2 pressure with a jumper and then swirl it around some to loosen up the yeast and much and let it blow out through the gas in post a few times. works well.

 

[happyduke]

Honestly, I've had absolute BOMB results from fermenting in the keg, cold crashing for a couple days and then pushing it over to a purged keg as well. The purged keg can be purged with fermentation gas.

And do you feel any differences comparing it to not transferring to the purged keg and just serving from the primary one?

 

[stickyfinger]

i would need to do more comparisons honestly. i didn't do any side-by-sides on this, but i did have some batches of serving off of the primary fermentation that i didn't really like. since transferring off of the yeast i've liked all of them. i think it might be possible to get some yeast and hoppy unpleasant flavors when leaving all of that sludge in the keg and serving off of it. i'm not certain though.

it is just so easy to purge a keg when fermenting (no matter what kind of primary vessel you use!) that i have been doing it on every batch and transferring over within 48 hrs or so of cold crashing the primary. i really don't think there is any loss of hop character on going from the primary vessel to the fermentation-purged secondary vessel if you purge it with fermentation gas. you can also do a water/star-san purge of your serving keg if you want and get excellent results. i don't really even think you need to spund it at this point either. just ferment out your primary and attach the blowoff to the serving keg to purge it, soft crash a bit to drop yeast and then dry hop, and finally, cold crash 24-48 hrs to drop the large hop particles and then rack over to the purged keg. easy and it assures no off-flavors.

 

[hopjuice_71]

So I recently did my fermenting/serving in same keg experiment. I acquired two 10 gallon kegs that I kitted out with top-draw devices, both with fine SS filters over the intake tubes. In one I fermented 30L of pilsner and in the other 20L of an NEIPA. Both kegs are still sitting in my fermentation chest freezer (now sitting at about 2 deg C). These beers are so delicious straight from the fermenter, even after 2 months, that I find my self ignoring the beers in my kegerator, which were packaged (quite fastidiously) with starsan purged kegs. The NEIPA is even still sitting on a crap ton (300 g, over 10 oz) of dry hops. I would never have guessed...

 

[happyduke]

Ok, so I've done two batches with this method (NE IPA and DIPA) and think I can make a small review.

Overall this method works perfectly for me since it simplifies a lot of things – fermentation, dry hopping and serving are all done from the one vessel. The total price tag is about $100 for a keg and $50 for CBDS (with a filter), that's why I could easily recommend trying it out.

Regarding any off-flavors – after 3 days cold crashing the beer was great. The reason why I've said 3 days is that I did notice strange grassiness after 1 day in my first batch and I'd say something between yeastiness and astringency in the last. Nevertheless, I think it was rather because of me and not because of the method. Anyway, it was all gone after 3 days cold crash and the DIPA is still great after about a week in the kegerator.

Also, I used the no blow-off method first time (with the spending valve) because it was 3g batch, the second time I brewed 4.5g + 1L starter batch and I just removed the gas post (leaving the dip tub inside) and put the 1/2" hose using the hose clamp to secure it. Both methods worked pretty well. I did use FermCap, though, so the blow-off losses were minimal (about a few cups).

A few other things, during dry-hops addition I connected a gas line and run about 3-5 psi to prevent any oxygenation as it was recommended earlier in this thread. That seemed to work well, at least I feel better doing that I also noticed that I saved a lot of CO2 since I don't need to purge keg for closed transfer and I can slightly naturally carbonate once the fermentation is finished.
Regarding pressurized fermentation, you need to take into account that the higher the pressure is the slower the fermentation (the Tilt's guys have an experiment on this).

I think that all I can share for now but overall I probably won't get back to 2 or 3 vessels ever again.

 

[Carolina_Matt]

I've tried this on my last three batches, and overall I really like it. I forgot fermcap on one batch and had a lot of blowoff, but used it on the other two batches and didn't notice blowoff. I filled between 4-4.5 gallons, from what I recall, and I used a spunding valve after the first few days of fermentation. I set it at around 25 psi, and the beer is definitely carbonated - although my newest beer had more foam than I expected.

I didn't use a floating dip tube because Williams has been out of their Top Draw for the last several months. Instead, I curved my dip tube so that it was about an inch from the bottom of the keg. IMO, the floating dip tube would make a big difference. I must have pulled about 10 pints out of my Blonde Ale, and there's still sediment in every glass. I took a sample last night - the first sample in 4 days for that beer - and it was almost pure sludge. So I need to either bend the dip tube more, or get the floating dip tube. With 5 kegs, the CBDS isn't an option for me due to the cost.

I hooked up my most recent batch on Friday, and tried it Sunday. It's a Columbus IPA. The first pint was tossed, as expected. The next pint was a lot more clear and it tasted fantastic. Yesterday, all of the samples had too much sediment in the glass.

It's a learning experience, but I'm definitely on board with the process because I can see how the results would be amazing once all of the kinks are worked out.

Edit: I just saw the Torpedo Keg Buoy Floating Dip Tube at Morebeer for $17.99. I'll order a few of them today to see how they are. They look like the Williams version.

https://www.morebeer.com/products/floating-dip-tube-1.html

 

[Carolina_Matt]

Update: I received my floating dip tubes from Morebeer today. I put one in an existing keg - I drank well over a gallon of the beer, and it was still pulling a ton of trub with each pour. As an added bonus (depending on your perspective), my farts have been awful the last week and I assume it's because of all the trub/yeast I've been drinking!

Anyway, an hour later I pulled a pint and it was as clear as I hoped for. Instant success!

By the way, I know I shouldn't open up a keg - it defeats the point of fermenting/serving in the same keg, because of the O2 exposure - but it was a Blonde Ale with less than an ounce of hops so I'm not worried about oxidation with it. It was a little tricky getting it installed because the silicone tubing is a very tight fit over the dip tube. Even after putting it in hot water, it still took a couple minutes of finagling. But I finally got it installed, and I plan on using these with each keg going forward. I'll add a few more to my next Morebeer order.

 

[luckybeagle]

Dumb question but I can't seem to find the answer:

If I primary ferment in my keg, don't rack to secondary, do nothing with the standard dip tube, and just hook it up to gas in its place after cold crashing, can I just draw off trub through the tap until the beer is clear, or will it clog up the tube?

No dryhopping on this one.

I'd love to ferment 4 gallons of a Trappist Single in a 5.5g corny keg, crash, hook up to gas, draw off the sludge, then carbonate and serve when ready. Do I really need to use a floating dip tube or anything else?

 

[balrog]

Dumb question but I can't seem to find the answer:

If I primary ferment in my keg, don't rack to secondary, do nothing with the standard dip tube, and just hook it up to gas in its place after cold crashing, can I just draw off trub through the tap until the beer is clear, or will it clog up the tube?

No dryhopping on this one.

I'd love to ferment 4 gallons of a Trappist Single in a 5.5g corny keg, crash, hook up to gas, draw off the sludge, then carbonate and serve when ready. Do I really need to use a floating dip tube or anything else?

If you use a lightly compacting yeast, you will continue to pull yeast for a long while. If however you use a compacting yeast, you may be in luck using the method you describe. Someone smarter than I am will have to help you determine the compacting qualities of various yeasts, which is as I understand it, different than the floccing qualities.