driving with full kegs.. problems

over new years weekend about 10 friends and I are renting some cabins out in the hill country in texas.. anyway i want to bring some homebrew, i plan to bring 3 kegs. they'll be in the car for 4 hours.. so surely the beer inside will get tossed around some. they will be at least 80% full. we'll be arriving around 2pm, will the be good to drink by that evening? i don't filter so i'm wondering how 'dirty' they'll be and how long for them to settle..

anybody have any ideas?

metaltim said:

over new years weekend about 10 friends and I are renting some cabins out in the hill country in texas.. anyway i want to bring some homebrew, i plan to bring 3 kegs. they'll be in the car for 4 hours.. so surely the beer inside will get tossed around some. they will be at least 80% full. we'll be arriving around 2pm, will the be good to drink by that evening? i don't filter so i'm wondering how 'dirty' they'll be and how long for them to settle..

anybody have any ideas?

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They'll be fine, but if you're concerned about sediment, you could always do what I do when I serve kegs to non-homebrew friends "on the road". I let the kegs settle and condition, until they pour clear. Then, make a "jumper cable" out of two black quick-disconnects and about 4 feet of beer line. Give the receiving keg a little blast of co2, and then remove all of the QDs from that keg. Purge the keg with the beer in it, and reset the regulator to about 2 psi (just enough to push the beer). Place one black QD on the "out" of that keg, and then pull the pressure relief valve on the receiving keg and pop the second QD on the "out" line of the receiving keg. The beer should start flowing, and just pull the pressure relief valve on the receiving keg as needed to keep it flowing. When you're done, give the receiving keg a little blast of co2 (with a gray QD from your co2 tank in the "in" post) to ensure the lid is seated and it's at the pressure you need for serving. Disconnect, and you're all set! You can keep it refrigerated, or not, and it'll still be perfectly carbed when you chill it for serving.

That sounds complicated, but it took me longer to describe it than it would have taken to do it! Then, you can haul around the kegs without worrying about sediment being stirred up and the beer stays carbed up just fine.

huh sounds interesting, so you're basically transferring (slowly) beer from one keg to another? i'm guessing that leaves much of the sediment behind?

Yep. When you are pouring clear pints, they remain clear until the keg is disturbed. So by transferring then, you get clear beer. Sometimes you have to watch the last bit left as some sediment will follow the liquid level.

Personally, I don't care if the beer is cloudy or not. That said, I do enjoy serving a crystal clear beer to my non-homebrew friends. When it's cloudy, so people will automatically assume that homebrew is sub-par to BMC.

hmm well one is a wheat, so no worries there. and really, the couple of people there who drink my beers frequently drink craft brews, so it's not a huge deal if they are cloudy.
I guess I'm really just curious about how long it takes for sediment to settle after they've been shaken up. like i said, we'll be arriving around 2, so it will be ~6 hours before we pour the first.

Six hours should be enough in my experience.

(Not that I believe a six hour delay from arrival to tapping will occur.)

I find it takes a while for mine to settle after they're disturbed just a little bit, like being moved when I have to swap out another keg. It's usually a few days before they're back to clear. Not sure if that's a matter of time for settling or volume for dispensing. Either way, I'd highly recommend Yooper's jumper method. It takes a while to push a full keg at low pressure, but you would have no worries about rousing up any sediment.