One great way to take homebrewing to a higher level is to keg your beer.  By eliminating the bottling process, you can substantially reduce the amount of time required to bring a batch of beer into drinking condition.  Not only is the bottle washing, filling and capping eliminated, but with forced carbonation, the wait for bottle conditioning is eliminated as well.  Another advantage is the control it affords the homebrewer over his final product.  Not only do over- or under-carbonated products become a thing of the past, but even a decision to dry hop can be made after tasting the finished product.  If you elect to use a keg as a fermenter as well, siphoning may be replaced by pressure tranfer.  Addition of a filter in the transfer line can yield crystal clear beer every time.  And, of course, for those occasions (such as competitions) when bottled beer is most convenient, beer can always be dispensed from the keg into a bottle and capped for shipping.

Still with all of these known advantages, it would be more than a decade after seeing firsthand a home kegging setup that I would commit to one myself.  Two obstacles kept me from moving to a home kegging system: refrigeration capacity and fear of the unknown.  In this article, I hope to take the edge off that fear for fellow club members.  Refrigeration options will be discussed in a future article.

First, the Jan/Feb 1999 issue of Zymurgy contains a very helpful article.  It depicts a cornelius keg on on the cover with the teaser, "Kegging Basics--Save this issue!"  That’s good advice for the future home kegger.  In the feature article, "Kicking the Bottle Habit," Amahl Turczyn describes in exacting detail everything you’ll need to know to purchase new equipment for a cornelius kegging system, as well as details for reconditioning old corny kegs.  I followed it to the letter with complete success on some used kegs I’d had for a long time, but was afraid to open and clean.  One reason I didn’t start sooner was that I was concerned that my lack of knowledge might yield poor results.  Turczyn’s article adequately addressed my concerns, particularly his technique for cleaning out the small diameter pickup tube.

One area he doesn’t talk about is the outside of the kegs.  A bottle of Goo-Gone, available at any harware store, will help remove most of the adhesive on the outside of the kegs resulting from the dozens of product labels stuck to the outside in its former life.  After that, wet sanding with progressively finer grades of wet/dry sandpaper, from 320 through 600 grit imparts a satisfying finish to the stainless steel.

Of the two homebrew equipment retailers in Tidewater, Wine and Cake Hobbies dropped their line of kegging equipment, and The Brewmeister is the best local source.  Kim Harwig carries a full line of ball-lock accessories, and can order pin-lock fittings on request.  Turczyn discusses pin-lock vs. ball-lock fittings, and prudently advises the brewer to stick with one style or the other.  He doesn’t mention that one style is convertible to the other, but the associated cost of the individual parts exceeds the cost of a good reconditioned keg.

For my CO2 bottles, I compared costs from four advertisers in Brewing Techniques and Zymurgy.  Their prices for an empty five-pound aluminum cylinder were:

Heart’s (Orlando, FL) $79.95
Canada Homebrew (Abilene, TX) $85.50
Brewer’s Resource (Camarillo, CA) $94.90
Beer & Wine Hobby, (Woburn, MA) $106.45

Locally, I called BOC Gases in Chesapeake (near Bainbridge and Military Hwy), who sells cylinders for $64.00, steel or aluminum, and I stopped my search there.  They refill for $7.00.  The steel cylinders are heavier and dirtier than the sleek aluminum ones, but they have some advantages.  With an aluminum cylinder, you’ll have to wait while a technician services your tank, but steel tanks are swapped out with stock on the shelf.  Also, if you are swapping out cylinders, the vendor takes care of the periodic safety checks on the tanks he issues.  One thing to note about compressed CO2: it doesn’t slosh around like other liquid gases such as propane.  Since the internal tank pressure remains at around 800 psi until the tank is nearly empty, the only accurate way to determine gas quantity is by weight.

Once you’ve kegged your beer and are ready to condition it, you will want to know how much pressure to apply.  Gas absorption into liquid is a function of the liquid’s temperature, and a great chart for this info can be found in book #4 of the Classis Beer Style series: Vienna, Marzen and Octoberfests (pg. 67).  Coincidentally, that is our club’s beer style of the month for September, so read up!  Finally, when you are ready to serve your beer, crank the pressure regulator down to about 7 psi, disconnect the gas fitting from the keg, push on the poppet valve to vent excess pressure, reconnect the gas line, and enjoy!  If you are interested in knowing more, ask around at the next club meeting.
 

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