Unable to get carbonized beer from party keg

[nexy_sm]

Hi all guys,

I have several times unsuccessfully tried to condition my beer in mini 5l kegs, but it never turned out to be carbonized beer. I have read that one should use about one third of the sugar dedicated for bottling. Whenever I used one third the beer was flat. Last time I used the same amount as would be used for bottling plus I added 10g more sugar. In summary it was a lot of sugar inside. We opened keg about one week after priming. The foam was going out of the faucet for about 15 minutes, and the beer was again flat.

Why?

Cheer

 

[SleepyCreekBrews]

obviously a wet blanket for the party.

you've left out some details, but here's what I would do (assuming 5 gal batches)

Brew beer as usual, and ferment as usual.
mix your priming sugar for 5 gallons (4-5 oz?) with 10oz water and boil to dissolve .
Add to the 5 gallons of beer, and gently stir.
Fill all the kegs and bottles, cap, and wait 2 weeks.
One day before the party, chill the keg (35 degrees?), and keep it chilled until you tap it at the party.
I can't imagine why this wouldn't work .

 

[mongoose33]

Are you chilling the keg immediately after priming? That yeast needs warm temperatures to do its thing--room temperature more or less.

If you're chilling it immediately after priming, it might take months to carbonate, if it happens at all.

**************

Why not force carbonate the kegs? 35 PSI for 24 hours should get you close. You can even roll and tilt the keg while force carbonating and it'll happen even faster. The two reasons I went to kegging was so I could bottle without having yeast dregs in the bottom of bottles, and because I could force carbonate and have beer in 24 hours after kegging instead of waiting 2-3 weeks in bottles.

That you were foaming on dispensing tells me there was at least some carbonation in the beer. You'll tend to have foam when you go from cold to warm--that's why beer lines to towers are kept cold inside the tower.

You may also have agitated the beer a lot before you tried to dispense. Usually you want to settle them down a bit first.

As is, bottles take 2-3 weeks to carbonate at room temperature, so I wouldn't expect yours to work any faster.

 

[william_shakes_beer]

Even if you7 successfully carb your beer then chill it, the internal pressure would be equalized after the first our, the co2 would come out of solution and there would be no pressure to force the beer ougt of the keg.

Can you attach something like this to the keg?

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00OSNG7UM/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

If you're using something like a party pig there has to be a way of injecting co2 during service.

 

[WrQth]

If you are not going to prime the whole batch and transfer to the individual 5l kegs then in the priming calculator you are using you should put the liquid volume which is going into the 5l keg as the batch size (it shouldn't matter what the vessel is assuming it is capable/designed to handle the pressures of naturally carbonating). Also be aware of headspace in the 5l keg, too much headspace will not create enough pressure to carbonate to the calculated volumes of C02 given by your priming calculator. Keep the then primed vessel in a space with an ambient temperature of 68 to 72F for at least 2 weeks, longer for higher alcohol beers, but aim for 3 weeks. Then before checking the carbonation level chill it for at least a couple days to allow the CO2 to dissolve into the beer in your refrigerator.

 

[kh54s10]

How does the lid of the keg seal? If it is similar to a 5 gallon corny keg you probably need to add some co2 pressure to the keg to seat the lid and its o-ring. If it doesn't seal completely tight your beer will not carbonate.

 

[atom]

not seeing the problem...you don't want carbonized beer, that would be awful....you want carbonated beer.

 

[WrQth]

not seeing the problem...you don't want carbonized beer, that would be awful....you want carbonated beer.

Glad someone else said it, I didn't want to be the pedantic one