Kegging Warm - Transfer to Growlers

[fatmarmot]

For obvious reasons, I'd like to start kegging and getting off the bottles. But right now I lack the space & money to buy a fridge for the beer and probably don't drink it fast enough to justify the extra cost.

Is it okay to carb in a keg in my cool basement or garage, pour into a growler and chill in the fridge?

For the next couple of months my garage temp should be fairly cool (I live in Maine), but come winter I would have to bring it inside. Any thoughts on the growler idea.

 

[StoneHands]

It can be done I would think, but at the expense of carbonation loss - not total loss, but a lot. If you took a properly carbonated keg at room temp and poured a beer with a standard (6-8') line, it would be 100% foam. In your situation, if your garage is cool (like 50 degrees or less I would think), and you had a longer beer line, you could probably keep some carb in it when you transfer, it still won't be perfect, but it'll be OK.

 

[fatmarmot]

Thanks for the feedback StoneHands. I hadn't thought about the temp that much (exothermic vs endothermic) but it makes perfect sense. I better look for a fridge or keep bottling. I am working on a porter right now that will probably benefit from 6 - 8 weeks conditioning, so bottling might be a good idea.

Cheers

 

[dinertime]

I tried this approach for a while, but it never worked out right. I was using a picnic tap with a 5' hose and then running it through a 3' racking cane into the bottom of the growler. The beer was usually about 70 F. I would only get a half-full growler with the rest being foam, and the beer would never be carbonated enough (in order to get a good 2-2.5 vol of CO2 at this temp, you have to carb at over 30 psi). Long story short, just bought a Danby 440BL mini fridge to serve as the kegerator, though I plan to also continue bottling a good portion of my brews.

 

[HopOnHops]

firstly id suggest scouring craigslist for a 5.4 cubic foot mini fridge. I scored mine for 70 bucks. Perfect for keg conditioning and even crash cooling. However it took me upwards of 3 months of looking on CL here and there.

If youre really desperate id measure the temp of your cool basement/garage. Look up the carbonation level vs temperature and set your regulator to that. Prior to drinking cool down in some ice and set to serving pressure. Doing this id be weary of further conditioning of your beer.

Also you could naturally carbonate, which requires to you have the keg at relatively room temp. When fully carbed up, cool it in ice and drink it.

However if you dont want to drink it fast id say stick to bottling, doing this kind of kegging would probably work out but is'nt ideal for long term storage of your beer