First time to keg

[DrVertebrae]

Well guys, its nearly time for that first kegging. A couple of questions:

Is there a significant difference between carbing (taste wise or otherwise) with high pressure CO2 and priming with sugar, of course, giving time for the carbonation to build up? It seems that pressure carbing would also spend your CO2 supply rather quickly and I only have a five lb tank.

I wanted to do this for ease (avoiding bottling) and also hoping to get that draft beer taste and feel that makes draft beer so much better than bottled. At least its been my experience that the draft forms of beer have always tasted better than the bottled versions.

Additionally, I use iodophor exclusively. I really don't care if the lines are stained and I have read that if I rinse immediately after with water that the lines won't stain. Anyone else have any other experience with it? And what is that stuff PBC, or what not that I see mentioned in the threads used in addition to starsan and iodophor for sanitizing?

 

[Shoppy]

I just kegged my first about 3 weeks ago on a 5lb tank. From what I've read you should be able to carbonate and feed five or so kegs on a single tank. Mine was a mild so it had little carb to it. (2.4 Vols) It did seem to have a more draft like quality to the beer and the bubbles seemed smaller than bottle conditioned beer.

 

[DrVertebrae]

So the five kegs rule for a 5 lb CO@ charge includes both pushing the beer out of the keg and carbing it too? Good.

 

[audger]

since
-1mol of CO2 weighs 44grams, and takes up 22.4L of volume
-1lb = 454 grams
-22.4L = 5.92 gal

1lb of co2 = 61 gallons of volume at atmospheric pressure (14.7psi).

so as an example- if you set your regulator to 14.7psi, (29.4 psi absoloute), you could fill around 30 gallons, or 6 corney kegs, with one pound of CO2.

 

[solbes]

The difference with sugar prime vs CO2 tank carbonation is time, sediment differences, and cost. Sugar priming will take 3 weeks which is fine if you have extra kegs and brew ahead of what you are drinking. You can carbonate from a tank in as little as 2-3 days, but 2 weeks protects you from overcarbing (set and forget method).

With sugar priming you are creating more yeast. Never really bothered me though. If your beer was relatively clear at racking it might take only a half pint to get pretty clear beer with CO2 tank carbonation. With primed kegs, it will usually take 2-3 pints to clear out.

As to cost, it's usually $20 to refill or exchange a 5 lb tank. You can usually get 5-7 batches through if you tank carbonate. If you use the tank to dispense only you can get roughly double that. I prime my kegs if I'm ahead and force carbonate if my last keg has kicked.

 

[DrVertebrae]

Thanks guys. Nice to have numbers to work with.

@audger - I checked your numbers. Not bad. I don't know if you adjusted for STP but I would imagine it would be pretty close at any rate.

 

[badbrew]

Priming with sugar increases the alcohol a tad due to the additional fermentation. It also decreases the amount of trips to the gas store you will need by a lot since most of the co2 is used when carbing the beer and not a lot is used pushing it. My goal is to carbonate with wort 100% and right now my keg fermented batch is sitting on 30 psi for 2 weeks doing just that.