Kegging without CO2

[Sadu]

So I just bought my first keg, and a pressure fermentor for good measure.

I was going to keg the current lager batch to free up the fermenting fridge so I can put down a fresh brew on the weekend. Problem is there's a delay on the CO2 tank, might not happen until next week.

Am I ok to rack the brew into the keg anyway and purge the headspace when the CO2 arrives next week? Or better off leaving the lager in primary on an extended d-rest, out of the fridge?

I was going to force carb but I guess the other option is to throw some priming sugar in the keg and let it make it's own CO2.

 

[schatzke]

Personally I would either leave it in the primary or keg it and add priming sugar.

 

[derekcw83]

Keg it later, it's safer in the primary than in a keg with o2 for a week

 

[pvpeacock]

I would wait as well. While adding priming sugar will carbonate the beer over time, you can't guarantee a good seal without pressurizing it after you fill it and you can't purge the head space with CO2, so it will be exposed to oxygen.

 

[jabba11]

I would leave it in the fermenter I think unless I was simply willing to deal with some possible oxygen exposure. It will probably be okay to prime it, I mean it wont be undrinkable or anything, but if you were lagering and have already waited this long wait a little longer if you can.

 

[Sadu]

Thanks for the replies, I was thinking leaving it in primary might be best.

And this might be a dumb question but here goes anyway - with natural priming in the keg or bottle, I was under the impression that you add the sugar, the yeast wake up and any oxygen in the headspace gets eaten up by the active yeast and replaced with CO2.

Is this not the case? Do the yeast only eat oxygen that is in solution?

 

[Ruint]

I don't believe that the oxygen in the head space is utilized by the yeast. The addition of the sugar does wake the yeast up, yes, but the resulting co2 they produce eating the sugar would help to displace the oxygen out of the head space. There is a lot of debate on how much actual air would be displaced by that, suffice it to say that it most likely would not be enough...and who wants to run the risk of infection this close to finishing?

 

[jabba11]

Im not sure hes running any more chance of infection by doing this IMHO (priming in keg). Ive done it. Plenty of people bottle don't they? They aren't purging their bottles or bottling buckets with Co2. There is oxygen exposure for sure. How damaging it is could be debated ad naseum. Personal experience says its negligible but occurs and should be limited as much as possible. You of course boil the priming solution though just so we are clear.

 

[Dcpcooks]

You don't want o2 on top of a lager for a week. Cardboard on a beer you spent time to lager is silly talk.

 

[Sadu]

woop woop, gas bottle arrived. Beer is sitting in the keg now, force carbonating. Loving these things already.