7 Tips for Creative Kegging
Just about the coolest technology available to every amateur brewer is the soda canister, better known as the Cornelius keg. The quality, versatility, availability, and cost of Corny keg equipment makes it perfect for homebrewing applications. Here are some tips for getting the most from your equipment – and from the kegging experience.
Keep Kegs Clean
Corny kegs are simple to clean because the interior is easily accessible. Commercial Sankey beer kegs, while having a higher capacity than Corny kegs, are far more difficult for the amateur brewer to charge, dispense, and clean. Corny parts are plentiful and readily available from hundreds of sources, even though they can be a bit pricey. In any case only a few key points need to be kept in mind for proper care.
Complete keg disassembly isn’t really required after every use if you’re dispensing beer that has been well separated from the yeast and your dispense keg is kept in constant use.
Take all the fittings completely off the keg and remove all seals for a thorough washing prior to storage. Using hot, soapy water and a toothbrush, make sure all the parts are free of any residue, especially on the poppet valves. Avoid using any abrasives on the stainless steel parts. Definitely do not use steel wool pads, which leave behind corrodible iron particles. Non-abrasive 3M Scotch pads or a sponge work best.
Occasionally, it’s also a good idea to clean out the inside of the gas and beverage tubes. This can be done by pushing a small cotton patch through the tubes using a wooden dowel or by pulling a patch through the tubes by tying a patch to a length of fishing line. Look through the tubes to ensure the inside surface appears uniformly smooth and shiny.
Avoid Mold that Likes Cold
If you use a refrigerator or freezer chest dedicated to keg storage, you’ve probably noticed the problem of mold. Any spilled or leaked beer left inside the refrigerator soon develops a growth of mold. An occasional cleaning with Lysol, Dow, or other foaming bathroom cleanser is easy on the plastic surfaces and also retards mold growth.
Ferment in Your Keg
Chances are you were brewing for quite some time before you invested in Corny keg equipment for homebrewed draft beer. If that’s the case, you may already have a number of fermenters, including glass carboys and plastic buckets. Still, Corny kegs are great for secondary fermentation vessels. They are compact, they stack well, and they don’t break.
Although some brewers use Corny kegs for primary fermentation, most brewers reserve them for use only for the cleaner, less volatile secondary stage. This keeps the kegs cleaner and eliminates any need to deal with blow-off problems. Situate the kegs almost horizontal, with the top of the keg held about six inches higher than the bottom and with the gas-in valve as high as possible. Connect a short length of tubing to a quick-disconnect gas fitting, and connect the fitting to the keg’s gas-in valve. Place the open end of the tubing into a container of water to act as an airlock.
If you really want to do your primary fermentation in soda canisters, you should allow plenty of blow-off capacity. Allowing a primary fermentation to vent through a poppet valve could lead to a plugged vent and extremely high fermenter pressures. Some brewers have modified the keg lid to accommodate this, which is a good idea.
You can get a spare lid to modify from your mail-order or local supplier. With the lid clamped to a bench to avoid disaster, drill a hole through the lid midway between the relief valve and the edge. You can use a variety of fittings from the home improvement store to provide a sealed vent suitable for a large-diameter blow-off hose. There are many options available in large stores. You’ll be able to devise a system that works best for you, one that can be capped off when you want to use the lid normally.
One note: You may want to avoid dry hopping. Hops tend to plug the poppet valves.
Use Your Keg’s Downtime
It’s often nice to be able to tap a glass of plain soda water for a real refreshing drink. After cleaning out a keg, fill it with three to four gallons of cold tap water (or even your favorite bottled water), then seal and pressurize to 35 psi and refrigerate. With a squeeze of lemon or lime, you’ve got a delightfully dry, sugar-free thirst quencher. Try extracts such as orange, raspberry, strawberry, and cherry, as well. Vodka sodas are an obvious option if you like that sort of thing.
Use Real Faucets
You can buy real beer faucets like those you see in bar-top mounts at your favorite establishments and install them at home on your keg refrigerator. If you don’t mind blasting a few holes through your refrigerator door (or side panel), this is a fairly easy thing to do and adds real charm to your draft dispense.
A one-half-inch drill bit can be used to get things started if you don’t have larger equipment. Then the hole can be neatly enlarged for the faucet stem using a small hand grinder, such as the Dremel hobby grinder.
For each faucet you’d like to install, you’ll need a faucet (of course) with mounting flange, a beer stem and nut, a barbed flange, nut, and washer. These parts are available at many homebrew supply shops.
If you buy locally, don’t leave the store without ensuring you have all the required seals (basically one for each end of the threaded stem that passes through the refrigerator wall).
On the inside of the refrigerator, the hose that will carry beer from your keg to the faucet can be terminated on one end with a swivel nut and threaded onto a quick-disconnect
fitting. The quick disconnect makes
it convenient to disconnect the keg completely from the dispense gear to prevent leaks.
Change Your O-Rings
Original equipment Corny kegs were intended to be kept at fairly high pressure compared to what is needed for beer. You may have noticed that at five to 10 psi (barely enough pressure to dispense), keg lids leak gas. Fatter, softer o-rings are available that provide a better seal and don’t depend on keg pressure to keep lids gas tight. Check out the selection at your local retailer or hardware store or available through mail order catalogs.
To stop leaks quickly, momentarily increase the pressure in the keg. Then decrease the pressure slowly.
Protect Your Seals
If your keg was used for soda syrup at one time, replace the seals before you use the keg to prevent the transfer of soda flavors to your brew. After you replace them, maintain them.
As quick-disconnect fittings are attached and removed from the keg poppet valve, the fittings slide over the oversized o-ring on the outside of the valve assembly. Without any lubrication, o-rings can get torn and wear out early. Since petroleum-based lubricants attack most rubber materials, non-petroleum lubricants are needed. One popular solution is Keg-Lube.
Available through most dealers who handle beverage equipment, Keg-Lube looks and feels like a lightweight grease but is safe for food contact surfaces and o-rings. A thin film of Keg-Lube applied to o-rings makes it much easier to attach and remove quick-disconnect fittings without harming seals.
