It's Kegging Time!

[BeakedRiot]

Cheers mate, I guess when I set mine up I will have to use the calculators more as a guide than as concrete answers then. I think initially I will have mine set up just with a beer gun sitting on top of the keg inside the keezer anyway which I am pretty sure will take some experimentation of its own with line length etc. (Long term I might build a wooden collar as I have seen people do and add some taps to that. I don't want to go through the top at this stage.

 

 

Thanks for the thread by the way, it's been a good resource while trying to plan my own setup. I finished setting up my freezer with an STC1-000 and a small fan this afternoon and have a ton of stuff which should be arriving this week as well as a pretty big order from craftbrewer I will probably pick up on the weekend. Feels like I am getting close!

 

I have been pouring over threads from a ton of forums in regards to building a portable setup for the 19L corny kegs lately and will start building that soon as well - I will post the build in a thread here when I am done as I haven't seen anyone do one the way I intend to yet so it will hopefully prove useful to someone else trawling through forums doing research. Hoping to have something done by the October long weekend!

 

 

 

Cheers

 

 

[Otto Von Blotto]

That's what I did pretty much. They may be sitting at 2.7 volumes inside the keg but by the time it makes it out of the tap into the glass it likely drops a bit. Certainly the beers never taste over carbed to my palate.

 

I would say at first to make the beer lines too long, because it's a lot easier to snip bits off to get the thing to pour right than it is to lengthen the lines if they're too short. A collar with taps is a good idea for keezers too I think.

 

No worries mate, it was helpful to me when I started to get the advice of others who on here who keg their beers. It's kind of morphed into a thread about what we've got on tap as well so it's usually easily found on the main page too which is good.

 

Good luck with it all though, I reckon you'll love it! I know I do, could never go back to bottling full time now.

 

 

[mickc1525229722]

Can anyone tell me if there is any advantage of ball lock over pin lock or vice versa?

IE: Dimensions of kegs' date='availability of fittings etc/

 

 

 

 

 

From my understanding is that one is a Coca Cola(pin lock) design and was only used by coke and the ball lock was a design and used by Pepsi but also manufactured by other companies.

 

So the ball lock are more common and so too are spares. That is my understanding

 

 

regards mick

[Waylon]

Its like buying a cordless drill once you buy a Makita your locked into Makita batteries...so you buy pin lock kegs your locked into it!

 

The main advantage of ball lock is!

 

Everyone I know has ball lock kegs, this meens you can take your kegs to a friends place/bar or a competition and enter your beer... You can also buy mini 9 litre ball lock kegs...

I love my mini keg

 

I never used pin lock so cant say anything bad about them apart from the fact there not as common!

 

 

[Gag Halfrunt]

Its like buying a cordless drill once you buy a Makita your locked into Makita batteries...so you buy pin lock kegs your locked into it!

 

The main advantage of ball lock is!

 

Everyone I know has ball lock kegs' date=' this meens you can take your kegs to a friends place/bar or a competition and enter your beer... You can also buy mini 9 litre ball lock kegs...

I love my mini keg

 

I never used pin lock so cant say anything bad about them apart from the fact there not as common!

 

[/quote']

 

Thanks guys, i now get it.

Like an iPhone or Android device, You can feel smugly superior with your iPhone but if you want to borrow a charger dont bother to ask about 70% of smart phone users.

[Otto Von Blotto]

Kegged my ESB yesterday, which is sitting next to the Bo Pils keg in the brewing area to condition or whatever while I empty the red ale and stout kegs currently on tap. It ended up being about 4.5% ABV. This brew was a re brew of a recipe I brewed a few months back which got infected in the cube and obviously never made it any further. A little taste test at kegging time was promising; it reminded me a little of Spitfire.

 

Galena pale ale is next up in the FV on Saturday, currently got the yeast starter crash chilling in the brew fridge. I suspect it will be kegged before the stout runs out which leaves me in the position of having all 3 of the next lot ready before this lot is emptied, a first!

[hopsgood]

Just wondering Kelsey,

 

What temperature do you mash/mashout for pale ales and ipas?

Is there much difference with other styles?

 

I have been producing very dry beers with a light body and i'm suspecting it may be too low of a mash. Would love to hear your thoughts.

 

Cheers

[BeakedRiot]

Just put on a batch of the "chubby cherub" Coopers recipe (apparently their version of Little Creature Pale Ale) - Not only my first brew in the full size coopers FV and first full extract brew but also my first brew which is not going to be bottled!

 

I decided to do something easy to drink (everyone, even the missus likes pale ale) just as a bit of a test run for the new setup. Brew-day went well although my pitching temps are still slightly high (pitched at 22C) but not enough to be a problem. I will have to refrigerate more water to add to the FV to get the temps a bit lower.

 

The Keezer is set-up with temp control and a fan now, and sitting in its final resting place. I am still waiting on a manifold to arrive in the mail from keg-king with a few other bits and pieces which should arrive this week. Once that gets here I can mount that somewhere (probably some sort of temporary glue or double sided tape for now as I don't want to drill into the side of the keezer - I will build a collar eventually) and I will have to secure the gas bottle somehow so it can't fall over inside the keezer. After that I should be pretty much done! It will just be a matter of attaching the beer/gas lines which I will do over the next few weeks while the brew is in the FV.

 

The plan is to perfect the beer line lengths and serving/carbonation pressure with this brew, so I can hopefully have another one ready for the October long weekend that I won't have to faff about with.

 

 

Cheers.

[Beerlust]

Good stuff Venerator!

 

Once you start pouring from the keg you'll wonder why you didn't do it earlier.

 

The Chubby Cherub recipe is a ripper too!

 

Good luck with it all.

 

Lusty.

[Otto Von Blotto]

Just wondering Kelsey' date='

 

What temperature do you mash/mashout for pale ales and ipas?

Is there much difference with other styles?

 

I have been producing very dry beers with a light body and i'm suspecting it may be too low of a mash. Would love to hear your thoughts.

 

Cheers[/quote']Hey mate, I usually mash at about 66/67 for pale ales; the one IPA I brewed would have been about the same I suspect. Dark beers are about the same as I find all the specialty malts help raise the FG enough for my tastes. The pale ales usually finish around 1.010 give or take a point or two but they never taste dry and light bodied, at least not to me. Mash out is at 78C for all styles although this won't affect the fermentability of the wort.

 

Pilsners I do a Hochkurz type schedule of 63C for 30-40 mins, 71C for 30 mins, then mash out as normal. Other lagers normally just a 90 minute mash at 64/65C.

[BeakedRiot]

+1 to what Otto has said about taking the keg king manifolds apart and applying thread sealant - I installed mine into the keezer today and found that at least one valve was leaking gas. This is annoying as it means I will have to wait until the weekend to go to bunnings for loctite. If I had my time over again I would have just pulled it apart and sealed it before putting it into my keezer to save the hassle. Seems like a quality control problem if all the manifolds they sell initially leak gas?

 

On a positive note my chubby cherub seems to be fermenting away quite nicely - can't wait to try this one.

 

I am also tempted to go and buy some beer to put into one of the kegs just so when my brew is ready I will already have serving pressure etc. worked out - Dans is currently selling 24x 500ml Heineken cans for $40 which might be a sign...

[Otto Von Blotto]

I dunno if mine is a KK manifold or not, but the process is still a good one to do just for some insurance.

 

I am also tempted to go and buy some beer to put into one of the kegs just so when my brew is ready I will already have serving pressure etc. worked out - Dans is currently selling 24x 500ml Heineken cans for $40 which might be a sign...

I did this with some Oettinger cans last year just to have another full keg, they were going for about that price. I got two cartons of them and filled a keg and re-gassed it. It worked quite well. I did notice when it emptied though that there was a small amount of yeast in the bottom of the keg - so they obviously don't get all of it out!

[josho1525228560]

Hey all the wife has found this and i suggested i ask if this will be ok as a starting point

 

Look at this on eBay http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/122085599792

[Otto Von Blotto]

I've got the Series 3 kegerator which has been working very well since being 'commissioned' about a year ago. The only difference was that I bought the fridge by itself and a different regulator from Craftbrewer and sourced the font and taps elsewhere as I had specific taps I wanted on it.

 

It just sits out on the back deck. The whole system works really well, I'm heaps happy with it. I'd buy another one in a heartbeat if this current one craps itself at some point.

 

I'd say as a starting point it's worth it - but you might as well make the most of it and put a three tap font on it.

[BeakedRiot]

I did this with some Oettinger cans last year just to have another full keg' date=' they were going for about that price. I got two cartons of them and filled a keg and re-gassed it. It worked quite well. I did notice when it emptied though that there was a small amount of yeast in the bottom of the keg - so they obviously don't get all of it out![/quote']

 

Enough to harvest? I wonder if this could be a viable way to harvest yeast from commercial beers?

[Otto Von Blotto]

There probably would have been yeah, although I didn't bother. I noticed the last glass or two get a little cloudy, then when it blew dry it looked like pond sludge in the glass.

 

You can harvest/grow yeast from a single cell if you have the means, really. How viable the yeast would have been in this case is the unknown though.

[Rob44]

There probably would have been yeah' date=' although I didn't bother. I noticed the last glass or two get a little cloudy, then when it blew dry it looked like pond sludge in the glass.

 

You can harvest/grow yeast from a single cell if you have the means, really. How viable the yeast would have been in this case is the unknown though. [/quote']

I bottled one of my cervezas into a dirty oetinger bottle just to see if I could catch some yeast flavour. Anything would be an improvement on what they are now as they will probably be going onto the lawn if and when I need the bottles, but ive only myself to blame.

Ive been very close to forking on a kegorator they come up often on Gumtree even here in bumf**k.

I just keep telling myself its the same goodness, just keep turning these bottles over!

[Otto Von Blotto]

There's nothing quite like being able to pour your own beer from a proper beer tap in your own home.

 

Bite the bullet, you know you want to

[Otto Von Blotto]

I kegged my Galena pale ale on my break today, so there are now 3 full kegs ready to go into the kegerator once this stout keg is emptied. The other two are a Czech pils and and ESB. The sample tasted promising, kind of banana in the aroma but the flavour was more citrus like. I noticed this banana influence in a Cascade pale ale a few months back too, but it dissipated quite quickly. The keg will sit around at room temp with the other two for a while though so maybe the yeast will do a bit more cleaning up in that time.

 

This batch I decided to not use Polyclar, just to see how much effect the isinglass has by itself. It certainly looked cloudier in the sample glass than ones treated with Polyclar. I left the glass on the kitchen bench to warm up and it was still pretty cloudy so I'm guessing it's mostly yeast haze there.

 

On Wednesday I'll be pitching the yeast into my XXXX Bitter rip off muck around brew to keep the kegs being filled while these next three gradually empty.

[Rob44]

You just reminded me, the isinglass is still sitting in my fridge, I forgot to use it.

What yeast is going into your XXXX? I don't drink fourex but I wouldn't mind trying 7 or 8 of yours. Sounds alright, you use cluster right, how do you like it?

[Otto Von Blotto]

You just reminded me' date=' the isinglass is still sitting in my fridge, I forgot to use it.

What yeast is going into your XXXX? I don't drink fourex but I wouldn't mind trying 7 or 8 of yours[img']biggrin[/img]. Sounds alright, you use cluster right, how do you like it?

I don't normally drink it either but I thought I'd have a crack for shits and giggles. I did use Cluster, yes. I've never used it or brewed this recipe before so I'll have to wait until it's ready to really know. I'm using Wy2001 Urquell lager yeast as it's the only lager yeast I have on hand at the moment. Gotta go harvest the jar of it in a sec actually, then crash the starter in my keg fridge for pitching on Wednesday.

 

I have enough Cluster left over for another crack at it so I will do it again but this time I'll get the proper malt (couldn't get it this time around) and also use Wy2042 Danish Lager yeast in it which is often recommended for megaswill clones.

 

 

[BeakedRiot]

First batch ever went into the keg yesterday afternoon!

 

Went pretty smoothly but I think it will take me a few goes at it to really get it nailed down. I transferred from the FV to the keg by attaching some beer line to the bottling wand which I inserted in the tap and had a QD on the other end which I attached to the beer out post on the keg (Gravity fed) - This worked really well and didn't look like I was at risk of oxygenation. I left the lid off so I could see where I was filling to- I have heard some people do this with the lid on so it is a "closed" system and just attach a gas QD to the keg to release the pressure but I have no idea how people know where in the keg they have filled to (other than by weight which seems like more hassle than it's worth).

 

There was an extra couple of litres of clean beer which I put in one of the SS ultimate growlers. I will probably carbonate this with a C02 bulb and the growler drafto kit - I had intended to bottle a couple but ran out of motivation late in the day.

 

I left the keg hooked up at 35PSI for 24 hours and turned it back to 12PSI after burping it this afternoon - I will hook up a pluto gun and give it a taste during the week to see what the carbonation is like. I currently have the keg sitting at 2C.

 

 

I am flat out with work at the moment but hoping I can get in a session sometime soon!

[Otto Von Blotto]

If the beer is kegged cold you can get an idea where it's filled to by the condensation that appears on the outside of the keg as it fills. I don't have the lid on mine either, I just run a silicone hose from the FV tap into the bottom of the keg and drain it slowly to avoid splashing it. In some ways I prefer this because if the keg is left to sit for a while before being tapped (like most of mine are these days), the liquid out post doesn't get stuck with dried up beer in it or whatever.

 

I normally take the excess beer out of the FV prior to kegging - this clears the tap and surrounds of pretty well all the gunky crap so it stays out of the keg. Where this excess goes depends on the size of the batch; 21L batches I just pour 3 schooners or so to clear the tap, and 25L batches the excess goes into my bottling bucket and is bulk primed and bottled.

 

When dropping the pressure on the regulator, apparently it's best to drop the pressure to about 1 bar below the intended setting and then bring it back up again, in our case that's basically dropping it to zero and bringing it back up to whatever serving pressure setting is being used. That's what the instructions in my regulator said to do anyway.

 

Sometime this week I'm gonna take the stout keg out regardless of whether it's empty or not, along with a lemon lime and bitters keg I have in there, and give the inside of the kegerator a good clean out, as well as fixing up the beer lines and the water lines for the font flooding tube. After that's all done I'm putting the next three batches in to carb up and sit cold for a couple of weeks so they can clear up a bit before I have some mates around for my birthday.

 

Cheers

 

Kelsey

[BeakedRiot]

Do you often store kegs out of the fridge for long periods?

 

I haven't read up much about storing kegs like this - How long can they last? I am guessing a fair while if you burp all the oxygen out of them?

[Otto Von Blotto]

I wouldn't say long periods, no. I have a pilsner that was kegged on the 31/7 which is going into the fridge on Friday, so that's only about 6 weeks sitting at room temp. Where I store them is cooler than most other places in the house too. In any event, it's not much different to storing bottles in the cupboard or whatever for months on end. I do purge the oxygen as much as possible though, and I leave them sit on gas for an hour or two straight after kegging just to get a bit in there, but I don't fully carb them until they go into the kegerator.

 

I wish I had a spare fridge to store them in though. A little while ago the secondary fridge under the house died, and the olds replaced it and the freezer next to it with new ones. I was gonna steal the freezer to keep kegs in, but it died 3 days later . One day!