pouring bottle conditioned bottled beer into a keg?

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chainsawbrewing

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first of all i wanna say i hate the three letter search thing. "keg" for example is too short for a search.

anyways, stupid question, i have a batch of beer i bottled, and carbed with corn sugar, and is over 3 weeks bottled, and is sufficiently carbed, and tasty. can i simply open some bottles, and pour it directly into a keg, and put the co2 at serving pressure, and drink away? i' m looking for ease, and comfort for some guests. i'd rather empty out all the bottles at once, put them into the dishwasher at once, and clean them all at once, and plus i got a party coming up, and only have one beer kegged in my triple tap kegerator.
 
Well, that'll work, but you run the risk of oxidizing your beer that way. If you know it will be consumed within a day or two of kegging that way, it's no problem. Otherwise, I think you're taking an unnecessary gamble.

I hate to ask the obvious, but why didn't you just keg it in the first place?
 
Yuri_Rage said:
Well, that'll work, but you run the risk of oxidizing your beer that way. If you know it will be consumed within a day or two of kegging that way, it's no problem. Otherwise, I think you're taking an unnecessary gamble.

I hate to ask the obvious, but why didn't you just keg it in the first place?


buying my kegs, and building a kegerator were pretty spur of the moment. i decided to keg, and two days later had a kegerator built, triple tap tower, three kegs, and co2 hooked up. the beer was already bottled before i even thought about getting kegging gear.
 
brian williams said:
buying my kegs, and building a kegerator were pretty spur of the moment. i decided to keg, and two days later had a kegerator built, triple tap tower, three kegs, and co2 hooked up. the beer was already bottled before i even thought about getting kegging gear.

Okay, now that's awesome. I've been planning and building for months now and you do it in two days. How is that possible? You buy someone else's setup?
 
Hook up your Co2 bottle, set the regulator at 2 or 3 pounds. Leave it running slowly, and hook it up to the keg, with the cap off, for a few seconds.

Now, uncap your bottles, hold the mouth inside the keg, and pour. (It will work better, if you SLIGHTLY tilt the keg, so you can pour through the Co2.)

Yes, you are going to waste some Co2, but if you insist in kegging this stuff, that is better than oxidising your beer.

If you can, refrigerate the keg and beer bottles before you attempt this transfer. When the beer is cooler, (and the Corny) the foaming will be less.

steve
 
Oh, you're going to lose some carbonation, and will need to do some force "re"carbonation.

steve
 
thanks for the replies guys, and knarfks, thanks for the smartass stupid remark. fingers: no i just lucked out and found the perfect chest freezer, and live close to my LBHS who had all the "other" equipment needed. once you have all the equipment, the "building" of the kegerator is simple and quick.
 
Another option to quickly get some brews on tap is to go buy a 1/4 keg of something nice. You can pick up a sanke connector and tap directly off there or do a transfer to your corny. You can still pour brews out of the bottles too, but I think you're negating all your bottling work if you dump them all into a keg.
 
skou said:
Hook up your Co2 bottle, set the regulator at 2 or 3 pounds. Leave it running slowly, and hook it up to the keg, with the cap off, for a few seconds.

Now, uncap your bottles, hold the mouth inside the keg, and pour. (It will work better, if you SLIGHTLY tilt the keg, so you can pour through the Co2.)

Yes, you are going to waste some Co2, but if you insist in kegging this stuff, that is better than oxidising your beer.

If you can, refrigerate the keg and beer bottles before you attempt this transfer. When the beer is cooler, (and the Corny) the foaming will be less.

steve

I've performed this procedure with an Imperial Stout that would not carbonate in the bottle. I should have added some yeast when I bottled it becuase of the extended secondary, but I didn't. After a year in the bottle it tasted absolutely wonderful, but it was completely flat!

My choices were; open every bottle and attempt to add the right amount of yeast to each, or pour every bottle carefully into a keg under a CO2 blanket and hope for the best. It's been a couple of months since I did this and so far so good. I don't notice any appreciable effects from oxidation.

If a beer was oxidized, what off flavors should I expect to notice?
 
just wondering to the OP, if you did this, how did it turn out?

I just got a kegging set up in the last few days and i'm looking at a couple weeks wait before any new batches are ready to be kegged. However, I have half a batch of chocolate stout bottled that tasty but seriously under carbd.

If I poured all the bottles (chilled) into the keg, and then turned on the CO2 and bled any remaining 02 with the top valve, would that prevent oxidization?
 
If I poured all the bottles (chilled) into the keg, and then turned on the CO2 and bled any remaining 02 with the top valve, would that prevent oxidization?

No. The pouring is what would oxidize the beer. If you carb it up and drink it really quick, before you can taste the oxidation, it'd be ok.
 
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