Can a Flat Keg Make Foam?

[Stiffy]

I just kegged my fourth batch of beer (4th kegged batch) which is an ordinary english bitter. This one, as with the previous three, were force carbed at 38 degrees F. The first three went ok at best as they seemed to go from flat to over carbed when I checked a few hours apart. They always poured faomy even with almost no pressure on them. This one, however, wont do anything but foam. I put about 35lbs of pressure on it for about 2 days and all I could get was foam. Thinking I over carbed, I have shaken and vented it until it is nearly flat and it still comes out as foam. It's foam in the line already, so its not my tap or line. I even vented it and took off the gas post to re-clean it and it was foaming out of the dip tube! I took that out and re-cleaned it checking for kinks and reinstalled it. I put a few pounds of pressure on nearly flat beer and it still comes out as foam. I have used all of the setup before with one of my previous three batches (same keg, posts, dip tube, line, tap, pressure, temp). I even tried a picknick faucet to eliminate the tap faucet and it yielded the same results. What's going on? The keg was washed with bleach water and then starsan. Was it not clean enough? The lines and faucet were flushed between batches. I can't figure this out. Beersmith tells me to use 12.something lbs to carb, but that doesn't carb the beer, so I went with the 30-35 I found on youtube. I'm using about 3 feet of 3/16" I.D. Perlic beverage hose. The dip tube o-ring isn't great, but worked last time. I don't have "spitting" foam, it's more of a thick flowing some that turns mostly to flat beer once it rests. I didn't give the keg time from carb to pour except for the 4 days I have been fighting with it hoping to coax a pint out of it.
If anyone can help I'd greatly appreciate it!

Thanks,
Stiffy

 

[Firewalker11]

Cheeshead, there is no such thing as a shortcut in making beer, well, except for pressure fermenting but I regress. Use 20 feet of line for dispensing the beer and for gosh sake, go get a Perlick.

 

[Stiffy]

20' of line in a dorm fridge? And I have a Perlick faucet on the fridge. The picknic faucet was only tried to eliminate the perlick as the problem. I can try more line. I have 10' in stock, but that doesnt explain why there's only foam in the line or foam coming out of the bare dip tube, does it?

 

[LLBeanJ]

It just sounds overcarbed to me. 3' of liquid tubing is too short unless you've got flow control faucets. It will work, but will take a lot less carb to foam than, say 10'. Continue to vent CO2 from the keg until you can get a decent pour. You might want to increase your line length to 10' since you say you have some tubing on hand.

 

[Stiffy]

I have one model down from a flow control faucet. Ok guys, thanks for the help. I'll let it rest a bit venting periodically (not building much pressure anymore) and throw my 10' piece on. What might I be doing wrong that the beersmith 12-something psi doesn't seem to carb a keg? How long should it take at that pressure? Should I be letting it rest a while at a few psi before serving?

Thanks again,
Stiffy

 

[maf58d]

Maybe check for a pinhole or crack in the upper section of your dip tube. Came across one a friend had that was fine for the first two gallons, then foam, found a flaw that had gone through to become a pin hole at that level.

 

[LLBeanJ]

12 PSI should most definitely carb your keg. How much time did you give it? Flat beer will take 2-3 weeks to carb fully at serving pressure (10-12 PSI).

 

[Stiffy]

I gave it 30-35 psi at 38 degrees for 2 days per brewing tv on youtube. If it takes as long to force carb as it does to krausen, why is force carbing seen as a better method?

 

[Gameface]

I gave it 30-35 psi at 38 degrees for 2 days per brewing tv on youtube. If it takes as long to force carb as it does to krausen, why is force carbing seen as a better method?

Maybe you have a faulty regulator and you're using a lot more than 35PSI?

If you can get your hands on a pressure gauge that you can attach to your keg after you've added 35PSI from your CO2 tank then you could rule that out.

Another possibility is that, for whatever reason, that's too much pressure and/or too much time at that pressure. Try cutting the 35PSI time in half and see what you get.

Also, once you're done with the high PSI period, are you venting off the excess pressure before reducing to ~12PSI? If not, try that.

CO2 doesn't come out of solution all at once (although if it did that would make a good youtube video). If you're overcarbed then you'll need to vent multiple times over a couple days.

Last idea, is there a large temperature differential from the bottom of your keg to the top, or are your beer lines exposed to heat, or are your taps hot? Heat causes CO2 to come out of solution. If you can try to keep the temperature the same from the top of the keg to the bottom, try to keep the 10' of beer the same temp and in a neat coil with the path of beer taking as few twists and turns as possible, and try to keep that taps cool (longer shanks are beneficial here).

Is this a problem over multiple kegs and/or batches? Is this your first kegged batch?

Maybe there's no point to keggin if you can't have carbed beer in two days, that's for each brewer to decide for themselves, but the set and forget method is far less prone to error, so maybe try that next time and use that to work out the bugs in your "CO2 bursting" method.

P.S. I frequently set the PSI higher for the first couple days. I've also used the shake the hell out of it method (if you really need carbed beer fast that's the way to get it) and have had decent success along with a few overcarbed beers. Correcting for over carbonation is MUCH more trouble than waiting for a beer to carb.

 

[Stiffy]

Thank for all the help guys. It's gradually getting better. And thank you, Gameface, for all the pointers! This is my 4th kegged batch and it went worse than the others. The others were overcarbed too, but not to this extent. I will make a pressure gage and check that to verify my regulator. I guess I just trusted an instrument with no redundancy. My temp is even over the keg and line and the shank goes through the door, so theres no warm tap tower. I will try the longer lines as well, and probably invest in a flow controll faucet as soon as I can. When I put on what I think is 35psi, I also shake the hell out of the keg fgrequently. Perhaps I should try one or the other once I get my regulator straightened out.

 

[Bobby_M]

Use that 10 feet of tubing you have for starters. 3 feet is guaranteed foamy pour even if you're not overcarbed. Let me ask you this.. once the foam settles down, how clear is the beer? Is it cloudy? The fine particles that make it cloudy are also nucleation points that cause CO2 to come out of solution more than it would in a beer that is dropped clear, fined, or filtered.

 

[pablosbrewing]

I gave it 30-35 psi at 38 degrees for 2 days per brewing tv on youtube. If it takes as long to force carb as it does to krausen, why is force carbing seen as a better method?

IME, It takes about 7 days at pressure from this table, and beer has really cleared at that point as well.
http://www.kegerators.com/carbonation-table.php

The correct hose length is the key, I suffered through this in my early picnic tap days

 

[Stiffy]

Bobby M, This batch claered fairly well. I used Irish moss in the boil as the only fining agent and moved the carboy to my cooler basement for the last few days, but didnt really cold crash. I dont see any particulates, but I do believe I have some chill haze, as best I understand it.

Pablo, I'll take a look at the link and try a different method and try not to rush it.

Thank you both for your help!

P.S. Once it settles down, the beer tastes good. The girlfriend likes it too even though it's hoppier then my first batch. It is an ordinary English bitter.

 

[Gameface]

Thank for all the help guys. It's gradually getting better. And thank you, Gameface, for all the pointers! This is my 4th kegged batch and it went worse than the others. The others were overcarbed too, but not to this extent. I will make a pressure gage and check that to verify my regulator. I guess I just trusted an instrument with no redundancy. My temp is even over the keg and line and the shank goes through the door, so theres no warm tap tower. I will try the longer lines as well, and probably invest in a flow controll faucet as soon as I can. When I put on what I think is 35psi, I also shake the hell out of the keg fgrequently. Perhaps I should try one or the other once I get my regulator straightened out.

Oh! If you're starting out by setting the pressure to 35psi and shaking then leaving it at 35psi for a couple days you are definitely overcarbing. Especially if you don't follow that up with venting off the excess before setting to serving pressure.

When I do the shake method (not often) I set the pressure to 30PSI and shake for a couple minutes then vent and set pressure to 12PSI. It's usually 90% carbed at that point.

When I do the set it high for a couple days method I set it somewhere between 20-30PSI and make sure I don't let it go long. It's a PITA dealing with an overcarbed keg.

 

[Subdivisions]

I agree with gameface. Set it to 30psi for 36 hours then vent and set it to serving pressure (12 psi or so). It will be fully carbed a couple days after that. I recently forgot to vent the keg even though I turned the pressure down and it was overcarbed after 48 hours.

 

[Stiffy]

I just want to thank you all again for all of your help. Apparently Youtube isn't the source of all knowlege in the universe. I don't know what to believe any more Anyway, I'll try carbing the next batch a little more conservatively next thursday after verifying my regulator.