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Nitro/co2 keg pressure?

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  • Nitro/co2 keg pressure?

    Hi gang,

    I was wondering what some of you who might have/had a nitro beer have done to keep consistent pressure while kegging. Currently we are kegging from a brite/conditioning keg, and trying to keep top pressure (80/20 nitro/co2 mix) the same through kegging, but still have some oddball kegs that end up too low. Suggestions?

    Also, can someone point me to some kind of co2/pressure gague that can be attached to a keg and can give an accurate reading of disolved co2?

    Thanks!
    www.devilcraft.jp
    www.japanbeertimes.com

  • #2
    Howdy,
    I've had great success with carbonating my nitro beer to around 1.5-2 volumes of CO2, kegging out, then nitrogenating the kegs in the cold room with a nitrogen tank set at about 40psi for 2-3 days.
    As far as checking CO2 volumes in kegs, I've modified a Sanke coupler with a "pancake" fitting on the beer-out portion. Then I can connect my Perlick faucet to the pancake and my Zahm-Nagel to the Perlick. Life is good!
    Luck to ya'!

    Prost!
    Dave
    Glacier Brewing Company
    406-883-2595
    info@glacierbrewing.com

    "who said what now?"

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    • #3
      Going nitro in kegs

      On a similar note. Our brewpub dispensed Stout is with 100%CO2 (the old fashioned way). Some customers have requested nitrogen and we're ready to do an experiment with a kegerator. We have a gas blender and will have a supply of 25%CO2/75%N2 coupled to the kegerator (with stout faucet as well). Does anyone have any recommendations on doing this? I'm thinking on waiting a few days after hook up for the system to equilibrate itself.

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      • #4
        Nitro beer

        The one thing I have learned when kegging Nitro beers is that you have to fill them slowly. I always start the filling without relieving any pressure on the keg and leave it for 30-60 seconds for the pressure to equalize. Then I open the relief valve on the fill head and fill the kegs slower than other beers.
        Nitrogen does not want to stay in solution as much as CO2 and I get great results babying it.
        We use a 75%CO2/25%N blend to carbonate the beer through the stone but push it out with straight CO2 while kegging.
        Hope this helps!

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        • #5
          experiment

          The stout I'm kegging is 100%CO2. The N2/CO2 blend and corresponding high pressure will be introduced during dispense. I'm hoping that it will equilibrate itself since the gas blend is 75%N2 with 0% in solution. I will hope for a steep concentration curve. Will post results here.

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          • #6
            Sulphur

            What was the results you had with this method?

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            • #7
              nitro

              My results are as follows.

              Our setup = Stout in our dispense tanks is with 100% CO2 - naturally carbonated. I fill kegs for our customers from here. Our tanks are rated at 2 Bar, so I could introduce Nitrogen to the dispense tanks and serve at the bar. However, then all of our keg customers would need blenders. We therefore have decided to stay the traditional 100%CO2 route.

              One customer had a blender (Mcdantim I believe). So I did the experiment and hooked up a regular keg and introduced the 25/75 blend to it (post kegging). This was almost 1 year ago but if I recall correctly, we waited a few days with the kegerator hooked up before starting to serve. I don't recall if we immediately had creamy stout or if we had it after a few days of serving, but creamy stout we did have :-) It was beautiful. Were it not for our keg accounts, I would make the switch here in the brewpub in a flash. It was better than Nitro Guinness! Keep in mind our Stout is at 6%ABV. Another pointer was that it took a lot longer to pour due to the foam. But apparently in Ireland that is the norm and if you try to rush a stout at the bar, the regulars will frown at you. The longer pour times could be an issue for us on a busy weekend at the bar, but I think we/you could tweak things to optimize the final stout. This is not the final chapter for me...

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              • #8
                Porter makes a good point that nitrokeg filling speeds are important; where I used to work we had a huge problem when it was decided to speed up the line (to improve line efficiency).

                The kegs were purged with 100% N2 (to control O2 pick-up) and the faster filling caused this to be entrained in the beer as microbubbles.

                When analysed immediately after fill, the kegs were in-spec for N2; however after 48 hours - once the N2 microbubbles had dissolved - the levels were at least doubled and keg pressures were crazy!

                Needless to say this lead to big dispense problems

                Once the line was slowed-up, the problem went away...

                On another point, dispense gas will affect the N2 level over time. Remember that N2 and CO2 'don't see' each other where pressure is concerned; you can put as much pressure using 100% CO2 as your system can handle, but N2 will still be lost into the keg freeboard and vice-versa.

                Ideally - but not necessarily practically - a dispense N2/CO2 mix should echo the mix in the beer. Somewhere around I had a little software program that worked this out - now where did I put it?

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