Overcarbed ALL MY BEER

[shortyjacobs]

Apparently my bastard regs were feeling really twitchy recently. Normally they change with big temp changes, but normally I'm also watching them pretty well.

I was sick for about a week, didn't drink any beer, didn't look at my kegerator. The temp rose, must have risen nearly at the start of the week, and my regs climbed from 13 to 24 PSI, (like I said, REALLY twitchy, this is a bigger swing than usual).

So my beer sat at 24 psi and 37F for seven days. 6 kegs. Damn.

(Oh, and it's now fizzy as hell, has a huge carbonic bite, and is pretty much undrinkable. To drink it, I cut the bottom of a straw in half, so it forms a Y, and spin the straw in the half full glass of beer to make it foam like crazy and drive off most of the CO2....it's an imprecise science, but at least I can stomach it then).

Edit: To try and solve the problem, regs are turned down to about 10 PSI, fridge shut off. Currently at 55F. Probably take at least a week to bring them back down...

 

[Golddiggie]

So?? Equalize the pressure now and give it time... If you're really concerned, vent what's in the kegs and let it fill at the correct pressure to carbonate properly again...

Personally, if the regulator(s) I was using was what THAT twitchy/unstable, I'd simply replace it and not need to worry about it anymore.

 

[shortyjacobs]

Yah, that's what's happening now...I just wanted to ***** because I don't have any good beer to drink anymore....at least not for a while.

They're cheapo regs from Kegconnection.....I don't think they are all that uncommonly twitchy....there are about 500 posts on this board of people putting their regs in the fridge and the pressure dropping to 0 on them. This was a really big swing though, as I said....but then again I've never gone a week without looking at my regs...

 

[Flomaster]

I over carb'd a hefe my instant fix was to follow the advice in this thread.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/overcarbed-keg-heres-instant-solution-127655/

in about 30 minutes I was drinking prefectly carb hef again. now you have six kegs and would be going through a lot of CO2, but for me I'd rather blow through CO2 then wait 2 weeks for the carbonation to equalize.



-=Jason=-

 

[beninan]

mine have been rather twitchy as well, and they are cheap regulators. I've gotten into the habit of checking on them every day or every other day, just to make sure they are still the same. I've never as big of a swing as you had, but 5 psi or so seems to make a big difference in the violent-ness of the pour.

 

[shortyjacobs]

mine have been rather twitchy as well, and they are cheap regulators. I've gotten into the habit of checking on them every day or every other day, just to make sure they are still the same. I've never as big of a swing as you had, but 5 psi or so seems to make a big difference in the violent-ness of the pour.

Yeah, normally I check them nearly daily, and as you said, it's very easy to tell when your pour is suddenly too fast/slow. Being sick for a week though, I never noticed it. My wife complained of a "bad taste" in a beer, and said she didn't like it anymore...it is a blonde, figured either the dry hops had started to be in there too long or she was nuts, but really it was the carbonic acid bite. Then she kept coming in with beers that were half foam, but she sucks at pouring, and OFTEN comes in with half foam beer...so again, didn't think much of it. Both of these things should have been warning signs.

As for decarbing, right now I'm just doing it passively. Thanks for the link Flojet, but instead of wasting CO2 if I did this I could just shake the kegs...same purpose is accomplished, (CO2 through the "Out" tube only agitates beer, same as shaking). Of course, I don't know what's worse, shaking 6 kegs or wasting the CO2 for 6 kegs!