Keg Conditioning

[WrongCoastBrewery]

As you can see from the number of posts and my join date, I am a noob on here. So I apologize if this has been answered before.

At the advise of one home brewer that my mother knows, I was told to skip bottles and go straight to kegs. Makes sense really. I have read up on force carbonation and understand it. So here is the question. At what temperature should an ale be conditioned in the keg and about how long after it has been carbonated?

Thanks in advance for the help. Cheers!

 

[ArcaneXor]

It really depends on what your process is. You can use the keg as a replacement for a secondary (bright tank), as a lagering vessel, just as a serving tank, or any combination of the three.

Generally speaking, I don't rack to the keg until the beer is "done" and, carbonation excepted, ready to drink. Carbonation takes anything from 10 minutes to 3 weeks, depending on what method you use.

 

[WrongCoastBrewery]

This is my thought process so far:

Primary for minimum time required, Secondary 1-2 months, Rack to keg and carbonate, condition in keg for 1-2 months and then drink and/or bottle.

As far as carbonation goes, I was going to go with the 40psi for 24hrs, 20 psi for 24hrs, 2-5psi for 24hrs.

Please let me know if my logic is off. I want this beer to be awesome.

 

[cruckin78]

On my force carbing I subscribe to 36-48 (36 is beer is cold from secondary, 48 if warm from secondary) hours on 30psi, purge, 2 more days at 12psi. Severing range is from 10-12psi much higher then that your in foam hell.

 

[WrongCoastBrewery]

Arent you worried about over saturating your beer with CO2? 30psi for 36 days seems like an aweful lot of pressure. I have read that it takes roughly a week for beer to absorb a given amount of CO2 based on how many volumes you want in your beer.

 

[hal2814]

Holy crap that's a lot of time at 30psi. I usually do 30 psi for two days then dial it back to 10-12psi. At that point, the beer is slightly undercarbed for what I like but not by much.

And personally, I picked up a lot of cornies cheap last year so I use them for bright tanks, too. I paid less than $25 per keg shipped so I have 6 of them now. That was almost as cheap as Ale Pails plus airlocks.

 

[cruckin78]

There seems to be some confusions from my post...because of my typo!
**corrected original post**
36-48 HOURS at 30 PSI

 

[Jubilee]

You need to read this thread if you haven't already!

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/keg-force-carbing-methods-illustrated-73328/

I'm a n00b kegger, just kegged my first batch and it's turning out fantastic.

My 2 pesos: Why rush the carb process? Just set at your desired serving pressure (according to the carbonation charts) and forget it for a few weeks. It's the easiest way to go with no worries about over or under carbonation.

 

[cruckin78]

You need to read this thread if you haven't already!

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/keg-force-carbing-methods-illustrated-73328/

I'm a n00b kegger, just kegged my first batch and it's turning out fantastic.

My 2 pesos: Why rush the carb process? Just set at your desired serving pressure (according to the carbonation charts) and forget it for a few weeks. It's the easiest way to go with no worries about over or under carbonation.

yeah I followed the blue line and was perfect after 4 days

 

[Jubilee]

yeah I followed the blue line and was perfect after 4 days

Exactly! No crazy pressures or shaking/rolling the keg necessary. I don't see any reason to get impatient with the force carb process after trying to be so careful up to that point.

I pushed 20psi for about 26hrs from Mon to Tues this week, then backed it off to 10psi the rest of the week. It's been getting better each day, and I hope to have it where I want very soon!

It's gonna be a homebrew-tastic weekend.

 

[samc]

Make the conditioning process part of the carbonation process by setting your pressure to serving pressure and let it sit with the gas on for a few weeks. Most of my ales are served at 45F and therefore condition at that temperature. Usually I can drink them after a month but they start to taste "right" at the 6-8 week mark. That's for IPA's, as the stronger the alc % the longer it usually takes for them to age.

As to skipping bottling, I am an avid kegger but I'd want to learn how to bottle just to know the process.

 

[Chemiker]

This is my thought process so far:

Primary for minimum time required, Secondary 1-2 months, Rack to keg and carbonate, condition in keg for 1-2 months and then drink and/or bottle.

As far as carbonation goes, I was going to go with the 40psi for 24hrs, 20 psi for 24hrs, 2-5psi for 24hrs.

Please let me know if my logic is off. I want this beer to be awesome.

Since you're conditioning for so long in the keg anyway, why don't you just prime with sugar and forget it? 1-2 months is plenty of time to carbonate, and you avoid all of the fiddling.

I've force carbonated by the two methods: the high-pressure accelerated way and the serving pressure normal way. As a noob myself, I have found the serving pressure method, while longer in duration, to be more fool proof. The accelerated way is finicky if you don't know what you're doing, mainly in that it takes time to reduce the carbonation if you overshoot - you'll be drinking mostly foam for several days.

 

[Hethen57]

You are much more patient than I am. My general timetable IPA's and Porters is 1 week primary, 2 weeks secondary, keg and carb for 2 weeks at 12 psi and enjoy. I usually take a tug off the keg after 1 week of carbing and it's not quite ready...but it never hurts to check. The breakfast stout I did required a few more weeks of conditioning in the keg at fermentation temps to ripen.

 

[Jubilee]

You are much more patient than I am. My general timetable IPA's and Porters is 1 week primary, 2 weeks secondary, keg and carb for 2 weeks at 12 psi and enjoy. I usually take a tug off the keg after 1 week of carbing and it's not quite ready...but it never hurts to check. The breakfast stout I did required a few more weeks of conditioning in the keg at fermentation temps to ripen.

Not to derail the thread, but a quick question:

Are you guys using the terms "conditioning" and "aging" interchangeably? The reason I ask now is, I'll be brewing a breakfast stout this weekend. After cold-crashing should I keg it and purge the oxygen, then just let it set at fermentation temp? ...or keg/purge and begin carbonating at serving pressure, leaving it for a few weeks at 38F before serving?

 

[Hethen57]

That's the way I understood it. I age my meads, but don't typically "age" beer...they are for drinking as early as they taste good (which in my experience has been about 6-8 weeks). As you get into imperials and barley wines, you probably get more benefit from aging because they are a little harsh at first and they will mellow over time. If I make a beer that sits for more than about 6 months from start to finish, I must have done something wrong. The good ones go quickly, even with light recreational drinking. Plus, I like my beers hoppy and they start losing that fresh hop flavor over time.

 

[Jubilee]

That's the way I understood it. I age my meads, but don't typically "age" beer...they are for drinking as early as they taste good (which in my experience has been about 6-8 weeks). As you get into imperials and barley wines, you probably get more benefit from aging because they are a little harsh at first and they will mellow over time. If I make a beer that sits for more than about 6 months from start to finish, I must have done something wrong. The good ones go quickly, even with light recreational drinking. Plus, I like my beers hoppy and they start losing that fresh hop flavor over time.

Thanks. Say hello to north ID for me...lived in Cd'A for 4 years, in Seattle now.