Keg Filling

[Thirsty_Monk]

WOW what a discussion.

If I understand it well your beer is not carbonated at the transfer time.
You can use March magnetic pump used by homebrewers.

Place a coupler on the keg.
Relieve the CO2 pressure (open the gas in valve) and start filling. It takes about 5 mins to fill 1/2 BBL one keg.

It is doable but it is a pain to do it this way. You will end up buying a bright tank anyway.

[kbills]

I am curious why everyone is recommending a brite for this setup? If he is filling kegs to send to accounts, wouldn't he end up need to fill the keg from the bright as a next step?

I am about to upgrade to a similar size and was thinking I would gravity/co2 push from the fermenter to kegs, filling 6 kegs then force carbonate. One thing I am wondering is how to tell when the keg is full, yet leave a little head space for CO2. Probably going to have to use a large scale for that?

For those of you operating at this capacity, are you filtering? I was looking for some smaller filter systems to filter from the FV to the kegs. For serving in our place I am not worried about filtering, but since we may add some restaurant accounts, I think filtering would be best in that regard.

-Kevin

[v2comp]

I am curious why everyone is recommending a brite for this setup? If he is filling kegs to send to accounts, wouldn't he end up need to fill the keg from the bright as a next step?

I am about to upgrade to a similar size and was thinking I would gravity/co2 push from the fermenter to kegs, filling 6 kegs then force carbonate. One thing I am wondering is how to tell when the keg is full, yet leave a little head space for CO2. Probably going to have to use a large scale for that?

For those of you operating at this capacity, are you filtering? I was looking for some smaller filter systems to filter from the FV to the kegs. For serving in our place I am not worried about filtering, but since we may add some restaurant accounts, I think filtering would be best in that regard.

-Kevin

Kevin, you will really benefit from having a brite tank. being able to carbonate your beer to a repeatable and consistent level as well as filling your kegs completely full are the best and most relavent reasons for using one over keg carbonating.
keg carbing works obviously, and you can weigh each one during filling, its just one more thing you will have to do vs carbing up in a brite tank overnight and simply filling each keg completely the next day.

[Scott M]

10# of CO2 on top of the FV or BT helps move the beer into the half barrel kegs much quicker. I just kegged at a local brewery in Sacramento, the FV was a converted dairy tank. Every brewery operation is a little different, different equipment, fittings, pumps, hoses, brew system and you have to generally improvise in order to get the brew day done; you have the advantage of designing your set up.

I like moving finished beer with CO2 as it reduces the risk of introducing air into the keg. I support having a bright tank, it makes the job that much easier.

[TwoFisted]

There are a few breweries near me that ferment in 55 gallon plastic barrels with plastic liners for easier clean-up. I know one of them uses a carbonater pump from a soda dispenser. Like this one. pump You only need the pump not all the rest of it.
It's self priming and works great. You can also find them for around $150 if you look.

[panadero]

Hey all,
I have two of those carbonators, actually, and was thinking I might try carbing the beer in line while filling the kegs (same deal, three barrel fermentors, no brite yet). Anyone ever try this? I imagine it is like the inline carbonators from gwkent, or wherever.

On the other hand, we are not shipping out kegs at first, so I could just under fill them and carb in the walkin cooler overnight.

David

[callmetim]

We bottle and keg our beer and our brewhouse is just over 1.5bbls. We ferment in plastic then transfer to cornies. We carbonate in cornies then bottle directly out of those or fill to 1/6ths sankeys. It works but is a total pain in the ass. In the last year we have hand bottled over 25000 12 ounce bottles using a beergun and I don't know how many 1/6ths off the top of my head.

You can fill 1/6ths when beer is still by gravity or pump and then carb. or you can do it the way we do it and fill 1/6ths that are carbonated from a cornie using co2. Either way you will need to get a filling coupler. I got ours from Foxx. It costs like $100.

If you can afford a brite tank do it. Consistencey in carbing will be much easier. It is easier to clean 1 brite tank than 10 cornies.

If you're going to carb in 1/6ths you will need a coupler for each keg. If you're doing 3bbls that is 18 couplers, hose, fittings etc. That's gotta be around $1500 by the time you're done and you will ultimately be working toward getting the brite tank.

Everybody has their reasons for how they do things and you'll have to figure out what best suits what you do. We started out with as little capitol outlay as possible knowing it would mean much more work. Each year we reinvest our profits (ha) into improving the equipment. It has been a struggle and we work between the brewery and our real jobs 100+ hours a week. But we have no debt

I know this was about keg filling so sorry if I digressed.

[CaptainEBC]

We go straight from our 6BBL fermenter to the kegs. We carbonate using a Spundapparat set to about 15 PSI during the final end of fermentation, then crash the tank to 33 deg F. We then hook up a C02 tank at 10PSI.

During kegging, the C02 is still maintaining 10PSI on the fermenter and the kegs are all pressurized to 10PSI during our cleaning process.


We use one of these automatic shutoff fillers:

http://breweryparts.com/index.php/equipment-and-supplies/beer-kegs-amp-kegging-equipment/keg-coupler-amp-filling-head/manual-keg-filler.html

[Thirsty_Monk]

We use one of these automatic shutoff fillers:

http://breweryparts.com/index.php/eq...eg-filler.html

How is this filler working?
I was looking at it.
Is it Counter pressure filler?
Any foaming with it?
How long it takes you to fill one 1/2 BBL keg.

Thanks in advance.

[CaptainEBC]

Theres a little vent that allows air to escape while the beer fills the keg. As soon as the beer starts coming out of the vent hole, a small rubber ball floats up against a stop, which stops the air from escaping and hence the flow of beer into the keg.

It will fill a 1/6 bbl keg in about 2 minutes.

I just set it up and walk away to do other tasks and return when I hear the hissing air stop. The automatic shutoff is definitely worth the extra money.

[Thirsty_Monk]

CaptainEBC thank you for the feedback.

[callmetim]

What pressure are you pushing your beer with?

[CaptainEBC]

We keep 10psi on the tank while filling. If we had bigger tanks, we would porbably do something different to save C02.

The filler will work under gravity too, you just need to make sure the keg and tank are at the same pressure or else you get foaming or the keg will vent back into the tank and bubble.

[defenestrate]

We keep 10psi on the tank while filling. If we had bigger tanks, we would porbably do something different to save C02.

The filler will work under gravity too, you just need to make sure the keg and tank are at the same pressure or else you get foaming or the keg will vent back into the tank and bubble.

if you are filling under gravity, wouldn't the tank pressure be zero? so you would just have to make sure you didn't have your kegs pressurized while filling?

if the keg was pressurized, wouldn't the valve thats venting the keg be releasing the pressure?

trying to get a better understanding of this

thanks!!

[SRB]

How is this filler working?
I was looking at it.
Is it Counter pressure filler?
Any foaming with it?
How long it takes you to fill one 1/2 BBL keg.

Thanks in advance.

It takes us 10 minutes to fill 15.5
Stoked we finally got one. Ingenious design. For multi-task'ers this is a dream.
My only critique,
the GW keg coupler/tavern head is difficult to lock down. GW actually sent a new one out no questions asked, but the new one is no different in lock down performance. I switched it out with a micro-matic coupler and problem is gone.