SOS minikeg bombs panic!

[mChavez]

Hi All,

I have recently bottled a duvel clone, with 2 gal going into minikegs and 3 gal into glass bottles.

The beer has been in primary for 3.5 weeks and due to my laziness and stupidity I only took one FG reading.
O/g was 1068 and FG was 1011 so I decided that the reading was reasonable and the beer should have fermented out.

I added table sugar aiming for 2 vol CO2.

When bottling, I noticed that the beer was very cloudy but didn't worry about it too much.

2 days after bottling, I noticed that that two of the caps on the bottles did not have the capper imprint and I decided to release the gas to see if the bottles are overcarbing. The 2 bottles was gushers. So were the rest of them.

The beer is clearly overcarbed and while I'm ok de-gassing the bottles every 2 days, I have no idea what to do with the 2 minikegs. I don't want them to explode!!! Are there any good ways to de-gas a minikeg with a 2-piece bung?
Only thing I can think of is to slide an awl between the 2 pieces?

Thank you!

 

[Mozart]

Are there any good ways to de-gas a minikeg with a 2-piece bung?
Only thing I can think of is to slide an awl between the 2 pieces?

Thank you!

I 'bottle' in recycled mini kegs as well. You mean the 5 liter variety, correct?

I've never run into this situation before of needing to degas one, but if I had to, here's what I might try:

Gently turn the mini-keg upside down, bung on the bottom, and try to vent some of the gas by opening the little serving spigot.

Again, never tried this before, but it's what I can think of without having to mess with the bung, and those spigots are designed to be opened and closed again.

Good luck, and if you try this, let me know how it works in case I'm ever in a similar situation.

 

[mChavez]

I wish I had easy kegs (the ones with a tap) but mine only have 1 hole to be used with a tapping system =(

Any other suggestions?

 

[mChavez]

Ok, here's what I did:

I took a marking awl (long tapered), sprayed it with starsan, covered with vaseline and carefully wedged it between the middle plastic bit and the outer rubber bit of a 2-piece bung, trying not to damage the rubber. As soon as I hit the bottom of the plastic bit, gas starter coming out. Pressing a bit harder releases slightly more gas per second.

So far it looks like the bungs are not damaged at all and I've managed to release the minikegs. I'll update this post if anything goes wrong.