is kegging worth it?

[UnkleKunkle]

right on. thanks for all the replies guys. thats what i keep hearing from everyone that its just a luxury to have beer on tap at your house. and actually its the first time ive heard that you can carb up with priming sugar and yeast while still having it on tap... interesting. ill need someone to elaborate

 

[Walker]

It's pretty simple.

Just like you do on bottling day.... mix up some priming sugar solution, put in the keg, rack the beer into the keg, put the lid on the keg, hit it with some CO2 (20-30 psi?) to get a good seal on the lid, disconnect from gas, and let it sit at room temp for a couple of weeks.

I use less sugar for this than if I were priming with the intent to bottle... 3 oz sugar for a 5 gallon batch. I try to be conservative there because if the sugar doesn't carb it well, I can always just stick it on the gas later to finish the job. I'd rather be a little undercarbed after the sugar is done than overcarbed.

 

[Baja_Brewer]

I bottled 1 batch and bought kegs offline from pedalbiker the next day, never looked back!

 

[goose1873]

I've actually never used a capper...1L ez-caps (3 cases) and kegs...cleaning 50+ bottles just seems like too much work. Now I only Bottle Ciders and Dubbels. kegs are just too easy and save alot of time...

 

[saturng]

Yes! Kegging is defiantly worth it. Costs can be high, but quick searches through CL and you can find some good deals. Just saw 3 5# CO2 bottles for $25 and also saw a regulator for $30, very good deals... And you can aways bottle your kegged beer with a beer gun, or with a picnic tap and some MacGyvering...

 

[saturng]

Oh yea, a good trick for browsing for CO2 cylinders on CL is "CO2 -paintball" in all of for sale because if you just search for CO2 98% of it will be paintball stuff...

 

[ILOVEBEER]

yes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Hoppus_Poppatopolis]

As I sit here drinking my house ale from my tap I have to add my emphatic "yes".
You can get into kegging without dropping a lot of cash if you're patient, and you must have SOME patience if you're a homebrewer. I picked up a CO2 tank, fridge, faucet and a few other odds and ends for $50. My buddy had two cornies from a restaurant that was closing which he gave to me. I replaced the faucet with a SS one and got into kegging for less than $100.
That's probably a little exceptional but the fact remains that deals are out there if you look.

I haven't noticed any difference in taste from keg conditioning vs bottle conditioning. It's just two different ways of putting CO2 into your brew.

 

[SweetSounds]

As I sit here drinking my house ale from my tap I have to add my emphatic "yes".
You can get into kegging without dropping a lot of cash if you're patient, and you must have SOME patience if you're a homebrewer. I picked up a CO2 tank, fridge, faucet and a few other odds and ends for $50. My buddy had two cornies from a restaurant that was closing which he gave to me. I replaced the faucet with a SS one and got into kegging for less than $100.
That's probably a little exceptional but the fact remains that deals are out there if you look.

I haven't noticed any difference in taste from keg conditioning vs bottle conditioning. It's just two different ways of putting CO2 into your brew.

+1
I bought a fridge with 2 shanks, 2 faucets, a dual regulator, and a 20# tank for $25 on CL.

I kept the reg and the tank, trashed the olive green fridge, and gave the shanks and faucets to Yoop for her kan/kegerator (Or whatever they decided to call it )

The deals are out there! Just gotta find them and tank advantage of them. My morning routine on CL is like this:
"keg"
"kegs"
"kegerator"
"chiller"
"cooler"
"brew"
"home brew"
"homebrew"
"nikon"

Sounds like a PITA, but it's literally saved me hundreds, and I've only been in this crazy obsession for 7 months

 

[fugazzi]

So I guess the consensus is that it's worth it if you have a bunch of cash, an awesome CL with great deals, or a bunch of friends that are getting rid of exactly what you need.

 

[Pivzavod]

Once you go keg you'll never go back. I do plan to bottle some batches (havent done since switching yet) that will age for several months. I have one batch aging in a keg for more then a month and I will let it age for 3 months total, including the time in the primary. I only have 4 kegs with 2 of them in the kegerator and I think enough bottles for 2 batches. I hope to brew a Belgian Dubbel this weekend which will be aged for 3-4 weeks in primary, 1-2 months in secondary and then at least 6 months in bottles.

 

[NewBrewB]

right on. thanks for all the replies guys. thats what i keep hearing from everyone that its just a luxury to have beer on tap at your house. and actually its the first time ive heard that you can carb up with priming sugar and yeast while still having it on tap... interesting. ill need someone to elaborate

I stopped skimming when I read this and started my reply. I made two batches of the exact same beer (Belgian White). One, I carbonated with CO2 and one I allowed to carb with priming sugar (you still use CO2 to pressurize/vent/pressurize/vent the head-space to get the Oxygen out AND DONT PUT IT IN YOUR KEGERATOR YET). I had a couple of social gatherings and conducted multiple blind taste-tests. Everyone agreed, at least with this recipe, that the sugar-carb was the best.

But...Here is Reason #1 why you switch to carbonating...*drumroll*... You don't give as much of it away to second-tier friends. You know what I'm talking about... the annoying guy at work that sits right near your buddy and always seems to pop-up when you're talking about the last beer you gave your buddy to try. Every single person that asks to try your beer (that you DON'T want to waste it on) can be turned-away without their feelings hurt, with a simple "Oh, yeah I didn't bottle anything from the last couple of batches so it's all keg'd and hooked up to my kegerator at home. Then, if they press the issue, get a mean dog (or at least a nice dog that looks mean) and then UNFORTUNATELY, you can't have most people over to try it from the keg because of your dog.

 

[UnkleKunkle]

I stopped skimming when I read this and started my reply. I made two batches of the exact same beer (Belgian White). One, I carbonated with CO2 and one I allowed to carb with priming sugar (you still use CO2 to pressurize/vent/pressurize/vent the head-space to get the Oxygen out AND DONT PUT IT IN YOUR KEGERATOR YET). I had a couple of social gatherings and conducted multiple blind taste-tests. Everyone agreed, at least with this recipe, that the sugar-carb was the best.

But...Here is Reason #1 why you switch to carbonating...*drumroll*... You don't give as much of it away to second-tier friends. You know what I'm talking about... the annoying guy at work that sits right near your buddy and always seems to pop-up when you're talking about the last beer you gave your buddy to try. Every single person that asks to try your beer (that you DON'T want to waste it on) can be turned-away without their feelings hurt, with a simple "Oh, yeah I didn't bottle anything from the last couple of batches so it's all keg'd and hooked up to my kegerator at home. Then, if they press the issue, get a mean dog (or at least a nice dog that looks mean) and then UNFORTUNATELY, you can't have most people over to try it from the keg because of your dog.

Dude...epic reason to consider the keg. haha. so both of the batches were on gas and in the kegerator to pour a pint, but one was left out of the kegerator to prime with sugar while the other was put on the gas and in the kegerator to prime? if thats true then i think i got now.

i do think that bottled beer tastes a bit better (most of the time) because of living carbonation. obviously talking about nicer beers, nothing like all the mass production light beers.

 

[Hypnolobster]

Less oxygenation (almost none if you're crafty in your racking methods), no lightstruck beer, clearer beer due to sitting in a cold environment constantly, longer lasting beer due to cold temperatures.

Not to mention being a thousand times easier than bottling. Less sanitization to worry about as well. Throw in 2.5 gallons of water, 1/2 oz of starsan, throw the lid on the keg and shake it up, take the lid off and get it wet with foam, then disassemble and reassemble the keg with the foam on the parts, dump it out then rack the beer in.


You also get a perfect vessel to use as "bright tanks." After you rack in, don't carb right away and let it sit in the fridge for a week or two, then add gas.

e: To add a little more, doing sugar carbonation in kegs is really not especially worth it. You end up with a fiddlier process and no benefit. If you had a slight problem with your process, the extra late yeast activity may help to clean up some off flavors, but in all honesty, if you had a good healthy fermentation you shouldn't worry about that at all. The same general benefit can be had by leaving the beer in the fermenter longer and raising the temp a couple degrees after activity drops off.

 

[mkorpal]

I am making my keezer right now, and can tell you, that it is quite enjoyable. It is going to look sweet, and is going to be quite fun. I think the ladies will find the presence of a keezer dispensing my world class brews quite a turn on.

 

[robertbartsch]

I started brewing 10 years ago and I used bottles. After the first few batches, I bought some large quart sized bottles with stopper tops. Even with larger bottles, the cleaning, storage, and mess from bottling made me give up brewing.

This year I started brewing again with kegs. It eliminates about 50% of the work and mess.

One other reason I did this is to avoid recycling store-bought bottles which I find to be a royal pain. Our town refuses to pick up garbage with bear bottles buried inside.

 

[david_42]

I would not have lasted six batches bottling. Did mini-kegs for the first 4-5 batches, then went the full monty.

 

[WilliamstonBrew]

Our town refuses to pick up garbage with bear bottles buried inside.

Is there a recycling transfer station nearby? Here in Michigan, even if the labels are gone and we miss out on our sweet 10 cent deposit (unless you meant your bottles are actually shaped like bears... which would be SO COOL...) we have a strong recycling ethic. I have a Waste Management transfer station just down the road where I can dump my recyclables free of charge.

Throwing out glass gives me the feeling I used to have as a kid on the last Sunday night before school started at the end of summer.