Regulator Setup and Carbing Questions

[lee_smn]

So my keezer is almost finished, the collar is built and i have 2 of my three taps ready to go! Right now I have a primary reg with a double manifold and 2 picnic taps. I have everything I need to hook up the 2 new faucets, too. The keezer will have three taps and i have room for two more cornies inside for carbing/aging or to put on picnic taps. So 5 total that could be hooked up to gas

My questions are about the regulators and handling different pressures. I'm thinking i'll get at least a dual-body secondary regulators, as well as any manifolds that i'll need. Will this be practical for having several kegs on the same serving pressure on one reg and carbing on the other? Or will I wish I had gotten a trip or quad reg down the road? Beverage Factory, which is will call form me, has doubles at $72 triples at $103 and quads at $140 from taprite and the manifolds seem expensive to me for a reduction in control. Currently the most I've had on tap is two at the same serving pressure.

Also, after I've carbonated and lower to serving pressure, will the carbonation eventually drop, when an equilibrium from the new lower pressure is reached?

In the meantime, not being too worried about syle specific carbonation, would setting my pressure to 10-12ish allow one to carbonate and one to be served without any problems, assuming the serving one doesn't foam alot from the higher pressure.

Any help will be appreciated, even if off topic, I've done alot of searching on kegging and still feel pretty far from confident.

Thanks,
Lee

 

[barrooze]

If you plan on getting secondary regulators, then all you need is a single body primary regulator. If you're going to have 5 kegs in your kegerator, you might want to consider getting a manifold that can carb 5 kegs at the same CO2 volumes. If you want to serve the kegs at different volumes, then you'll need the secondary regs to do that.

When carbonating at a higher pressure, then serving at a lower pressure, what you are doing is getting it carbed faster than if you were to leave it on the lower pressure for 3 weeks or so. You don't want it to actually carb higher than what the lower pressure would carb it to, just faster. If the carbing does go above what the lower pressure would give you then the carbing will eventually drop. If you wanted to carb and serve at a higher volume, you will need longer beverage tubing to balance the system, otherwise you'll be getting a lot of foam.

If you want to just carb and serve beers at a typical volume of 2.5, setting the regulator to 10psi with your kegerator set to 35F, you'll be set. Having Bev tubes at 6ft in length will be good for these pressures.

want to do is put the beer on the higher pressure for a couples days to more quickly

 

[JoshuaW]

I would at least have a dual manifold, but that many kegs you might want to go tripple. You could have one set for higher pressure (faster carbonation), one for service pressure, and one for an alternate serving pressure (serving soda or stouts comes to mind)

 

[barrooze]

I've got mine set up similar to how Joshua describes it. I have a dual body primary regulator. The higher pressure is set at 25psi and has a wye connection, allowing two kegs to be at that pressure. I typically serve wheats, Berliner Weisses, and pops at that pressure. I can also use that to carb faster.

On the lower side of the primary, I keep it at 10psi and have a 5-way manifold. Most of my beers are carbed at 2.5psi, so I wanted a way to be able to keep all the kegs in my keezer at that pressure (I have a 5 keg keezer). You just need to do what works best for you.

 

[lee_smn]

barrooze, you serve your beers at 25? i thought you'd carb a beer like that at 25 then lower it when you are ready to serve it? With my picnic taps, if i try serving at like 15 it's all foam.

 

[barrooze]

It's all about balancing the system. If serving at higher pressures you need longer lines to get enough resistance in the lines so you can serve without having excessive foam.

 

[lee_smn]

ahah, so i can just pick an average carb level, set the pressure for the right equilibrium, then balance the system for that higher pressure. that makes so much more sense then carbing and lowering to serving pressure. so really i only need different pressures if i want to carb more quickly or if i have beers that i want at different carb levels. man, i can't believe i didn't figure that out from reading, thank you.

now that i know that, what would you recommend, for the long run? i love stout so i should probably have at least two pressures and can be impatient so a third to quick carb? so probably go from primary reg into my dual manifold. one line for quick carbing other line into dual body secondary, one reg set for average beers one set lower for stouts with as many splitters/manifolds as i want from those?

 

[lee_smn]

you even explained it in your first post and i didn't pick it up, i feel stupid now!

 

[barrooze]

No need to feel stupid. I just got into kegging mid last year and didn't know anything about it until then. All you have to figure out is how many different pressures you want to serve at and how many lines of those pressures you want. From there, you can determine what kind of regulator you need. If you need more than 2, you probably want to have a single-body primary reg and 3 secondary regs off that. If you're just going for 2, then a dual-body works just great.

This is the CO2 Carb volume chart I use, if you don't already have one. Determine what temp you want your beer served at (and what you're keeping your kegs at), find the volumes you want for your kegs, then set your pressures accordingly. Hope that all helps!