possible carbonation problems in keg.

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breweRN

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Hello friends.
I kegged my first beer 2 days ago naturally. I thought by now that there would be some pressure built up in the keg. I wanted to know, so I tested it....and....no pressure. I thought maybe a leak in the seal. I added a shot of CO2 and I heard a quick (about 2 second) hiss from the seal. After adding a little more CO2, the hiss did not occur and the keg seems to be holding pressure. So, should I worry that the beer will not be carbonated enough when it is finished? If so, is there any way to remedy it? By the way, I don't have a CO2 tank, but use the injectors.
 
In 2 days you likely didn't consume much of the sugars added for carbonation, but you did lose some. People typically give 2 weeks to carbonate so you might have lost ~20% of the possible CO2. I would take a look at a CO2 chart and see what dropping the volumes by 20% would do to it. How long do the cartridges in the injector hold when not used? If it is going to leak out anyway you might as well force carbonate a bit to make up for vented CO2.

In the future it is always best to hit them with a shot of CO2 when kegging in order to get the o-ring to seal.
 
Check those seals with a squirt of starsan solution of something. If they're leaking even a tiny bit, you might come home to an empty tank.
 
If you're not already, it's also a good idea to get some keg lube and use it on the o-ring to get a better seal. And on other parts of the keg like the poppets and such.
 
Thanks guys. I will moisten/lube the seal in the future. Also, giving a shot of co2 to help seal it is a good idea also. Right now, I'll add a bit of co2 to make up for lost sugar/carbonation. I'll have a better process next time, but for now, I'll just wait 2 more weeks in hopes that the current seal stays.
 
Is this a 5 gallon keg?

Those injectors ARE NOT designed to force carbonate a 5 gallon keg. They don't have nearly the consistent pressure rating or sheer size to do so, they can just add a bit of serving pressure.

Like everyone else said, it just takes a good 2-3 weeks to naturally carb (longer if high ABV!), so you need to be more patient. Don't look for a quick fix, you need to let it sit and carb and stop messing with it :)
 
In the end it's probably a good thing that the OP was fiddling with his keg in the first place or else he wouldn't have noticed the keg was not sealed properly. Then the yeast would have eaten his priming solution and the CO2 would have slowly leaked away instead of pressurizing the keg.
 
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