kegged beer won't carbonate

[Arrogant]

I have a golden ale that has been in the keg at 30 PSI and 45 degrees for about three weeks, and it is nearly flat. It pours with a very nice head but then there is almost no carbonation in the beer as I drink it. Others who have tried it agree. I have other kegs on a secondary in the same fridge that are fine at about 12 PSI.
I got another pressure gage hooked up to an IN coupler and checked the pressure just to be sure I wasn't being fooled, and it read 30 also. I am stumped.

 

[DustyTheBrewer]

Try giving it a shake. I force Carb mine by setting it to 50 psi and give it 100 shakes. It increases the surface area in contact with the gas (Boyle's law).

You will need to give it a few hrs to settle down before drinking

 

[lumpher]

keg might have a slow leak

 

[devilishprune]

What length are your lines? 30 PSI for 3 weeks should give you soda carbonation. The only thing I could think of is short lines knocking out all the carbonation on the way to the glass. Especially at 30 PSI, you would need like 25-30 ft lines.

 

[davefleck]

Agree with Lumpher, do you use keg lube?

 

[DustyTheBrewer]

If there were a leak great enough to have 30 psi not carb his beer, he'd be out of gas long before 3 wks.

 

[Arrogant]

Thanks, all. Leak is not the issue, because I checked the pressure actually in the keg using the second gage attached to the in tube (removed the gas line and put gage in its place). I use a 5' 3/16" line, and maybe that is too short. Big head, lots of gas when I pour, but maybe I just lose it because it is coming out too fast. Will give it a try.

 

[MeatyPortion]

5' is enough, I use about 4' and the head pours perfectly. That's weird though, if anything the beer should be waaaaaay overcarbed.

 

[tmurph6]

You're way over carbonating your beer by leaving it at 30 PSIG. You should set it at 30 PSIG for 24 hours then dial it down to serving pressure (around 12 PSIG for most ales, refer to carbonation tables for your desired pressure). Your beer line is too short as well. When serving at 12 PSIG, you need about 10' of 3/16 line. If you want to keep your beer line at 5', you should purge the keg and dial down the serving pressure to around 5 or 6 psig when you're ready to drink. After your done drinking for the evening, turn it back up to 12 PSIG to keep the carbonation from gassing off and lowering your carbonation level.

Basically what's happening is all the carbonation is knocking out of the solution due to the drastic change in pressure from keg to atmosphere. That's why your pours are all foam, and what you're left with is flat beer. What you're going to need to do now is disconnect the gas and keep purging the keg to lower the carbonation level in the beer, then hook it up to serving pressure at let it sit for awhile until your beer equalizes (maybe a couple of days on the gas). Hope this helps...

 

[r8rphan]

Thanks, all. Leak is not the issue, because I checked the pressure actually in the keg using the second gage attached to the in tube (removed the gas line and put gage in its place). I use a 5' 3/16" line, and maybe that is too short. Big head, lots of gas when I pour, but maybe I just lose it because it is coming out too fast. Will give it a try.

When you agitate the beer, it loses carbonation.. I use a 13' line at 14PSI, and it works great.. When I first put a keg under pressure in the kegerator, I shake it a few times morning, afternoon, and again before I go to bed.. I do this for several days, and the beer is usually sufficiently carbed to drink within 4 days or so...

Overcarbing can be cured by running gas at the final desired pressure in through the dip tube and out through the gas inlet (slowly)...... a few blasts of a few seconds each will usually do the trick.. wait for the bubbling sounds to stop between bursts.....

Or you can do it the getto way (like I do) by turning the keg upside down with a party tap connected to the outlet, and then letting gas in at the desired pressure through the gas inlet...

Every time you release some gas via the party tap (which is 'above' the liquid because the keg is upside down), gas is released up through the beer from the bottom, agitating it and releasing gas from it up to the desired pressure... So you release some gas, wait for the bubbling to stop, release some more, wait again, etc. a few times, and your beer is then perfectly carbed...

This is a great technique because it allows you to fast carb a beer by push 40PSI or so into it while shaking the crap out of it a bunch of times for a couple hours or so, and then bringing the carb level down to the desired amount within a couple minutes..

I've gone from un-carbed to ready to drink (with a pre chilled keg) in less than two hours using this method....There's a thread somewhere on this site detailing all this with pictures....

Kind of a PITA, but it works.. Eventually, I'll rig up a separate regulator with a beer out ball lock specifically for this purpose.. Then I can just hook gas up to the beer out, the regulator with a valve to the gas in on the corny, and let it do it's thing...

That's where the real money goes with this hobby.. all the little special purpose 'make it easier' accessories...

 

[DustyTheBrewer]

That seems a bit unnecessary. All you need to do is pre chill the keg, ramp up the pressure, and shake (rock back and forth) for a few mins. After two or three hours once the beer has settled a bit, relieve the pressure and dispense.

No upsidedownness needed.

 

[r8rphan]

That seems a bit unnecessary. All you need to do is pre chill the keg, ramp up the pressure, and shake (rock back and forth) for a few mins. After two or three hours once the beer has settled a bit, relieve the pressure and dispense.

No upsidedownness needed.

If you have carbed your beer for three weeks at 30 PSi, I highly doubt that releasing the gas, and waiting a couple hours is going to help much.. It's gonna take a 'lot' of two hour waits, and releases.. a 'lot' of them... It takes time for all that gas to be released from the liquid.. 'unless' you agitate it...

Don't knock it if you haven't tried it.. Like I said, I can bring a highly overcarbed beer to perfect carb level through and through in 'minutes'...

If the beer is chilled already, I can take a completely uncarbed beer, and have it 'perfectly' carbed in an hour or two...

 

[Arrogant]

Brew Like a Monk says 3-4 volumes, and I know that the bottle conditioned golden and tripels that I have made to that level were much better than keg/bottled beer at lower carbonation. At my kegorator temp of about 44F, that requires something in the neighborhood of 30 PSI. I have run 3/16 lines as much as 15' and still get foamy beer, even after a week of stabilization. I am thinking about a restrictor faucet, anyone have any experience with that?