Yet another carbonation stone post....

[jlb307]

Sorry for posting about what has likely been beaten to death, and I did a search through the forums but I was just hoping for a bit more input.

I plan on kegging for the first time coming up, and I snagged a couple diffusion stones off the 'bay for $6. I figured for that price, why not.

I don't have the separate carbonation lid for a corny, so if I end up using them, it's going to be using the "in" dip tube and a length of tubing. This is telling me that once carbonation is complete, unless I want to reach in to the keg and remove the stone/tube, it's there until the keg is empty.

So my question to those who have used or currently use a carbonation stone, is it problematic without the carbonation lid? Is serving going to be an issue?

 

[Jerome Sidley]

The way you describe is the way I am set up. the only problem I could see is if you were pouring many beers at the same time you might run out of pressure, this hasn't happened to me yet. One thing I do is after racking to the keg I hook up the CO2 to the liquid side to pressurize the tank to seal then leave it on the gas side.

 

[V-Fib]

I have no personal experience with this but a problem I see is using it as the full time gas line also. When kegs are over carbed people have added gas through the out post. The gas starting at the bottom starts a cascade effect of molecules running into each other and knocks the "extra" carbonation out of suspension.

 

[coonmanx]

My keg has a carbonation stone in it and it makes force carbonation a lot faster. The method I used was to start at 5 psi right after putting the beer in the keg and before cooling it down. Then after the keg is cold I start upping the pressure a few psi at a time about once every couple of hours until I reach 20 psi. After that I let it sit on the gas for a couple of hours and then disconnect the gas. A keg with a carbonation stone can be fully carbonated in 24 hours or less. No problem with leaving it in there. I usually run serving pressure at 8 to 10 psi and I don't always leave the gas on either. I generally use that small stopcock on the regulator to only add in CO2 as needed during serving. A carbonation stone is very effective. However, I now simply prime my kegs and no longer do force carbonation.

Also when I clean the keg I simply fill it with the Star San acid sanitizer and leave the stone in there. I do not boil the stone.