Balancing Nitro

[daveooph131]

I'm getting nitro for my stouts. What is the appropriate line length needed? I'm using 10ft for my beers on co2.

Also I've read you should carbonate with co2 at a low volume and then use the nitro to serve usually around 15-20psi is this accurate?

 

[JuanMoore]

I'm getting nitro for my stouts. What is the appropriate line length needed? I'm using 10ft for my beers on co2.

Also I've read you should carbonate with co2 at a low volume and then use the nitro to serve usually around 15-20psi is this accurate?

Line length is relatively unimportant, since virtually all of the resistance comes from the restrictor plate in the nitro faucet. I'd just use the same length you're using for your other beers so that you can use all of your lines interchangeably if need be. Nitro faucets typically work best with carb levels between 1.0 and 1.8 vol. Anything beyond 2.0 vol will just create a foamy mess. It's much faster and cheaper to carb with CO2 and then serve on beergas, but it can be carbed with beergas too. Serving pressure will depend on carb level, beer temp, gas blend (25/75 vs 30/70 etc) and size/number of holes in the restrictor plate, but in general will fall around 25-40 psi. Many people claim to have good luck at 30 psi, so that's probably a good starting point.

 

[mattd2]

Also with carbing on beer gas I have seen the recommendation to purge the keg every day (the CO2 get absorbs and leaves only N2 in the headspace, need to bleed that out and get a CO2/N2 blend back in the headspace so more CO2 can dissolve into the beer). Note that that is just what I have heard since I am not lucky enough to actually own a nitro setup