Overcarbed sugar primed 5lt mini keg

[brianman]

Hi guys, been searching everywhere, sooo many answers, my head is spinning. Been two weeks since primed my little shiny ones (2) with table sugar, used the caps not spear head. Put in the fridge yesterday, took out and put the spear on today, but forgot tube. But before putting on without tube foaming started, left to chill to 5c in ferment fridge for a few hours, as soon as i removed head foaming again, like a frigging geyser, fitted tube and replaced head, and obviously cleaned up what seems like an awful lot of spilt beer.
Question time, where do i start? i used less than 1/2 my bottle prime rate, so will cut back even further. What to do about the overcarbed kegs, have seen posts about up turning, changing over in and outs, etc. Must add here that i don't keg or haven't up till now so my knowledge of kegs and or keg problems is veerrry limited. Do i need to add CO2 to pressurise the keg a little? ahh, i'll wait for any advice that is forthcoming.
PS Bought the mini kegs through Mark at ATHB, did my own BB with his stock, thanks Mark a pleasure to do business with.

 

[Grott]

Could it be that fermentation hadn't finished? What was fg reading?

 

[brianman]

Could it be that fermentation hadn't finished? What was fg reading?

Checked twice, finished at 1.012, i have had a bit of carbonating problems since i started to rack and CC, so to make sure fermentation is complete, i whirlpool the fermenter a couple of times when topping up to batch size, just to stir up the yeastys. No funky smells or anything so infection is not a problem.

 

[LAGERFRENZY]

Did you release the pressure via the pressure release valve a few times before taking the lid off the keg? Doesn't sound like it.

 

[brianman]

Did you release the pressure via the pressure release valve a few times before taking the lid off the keg? Doesn't sound like it.

To tell the truth, didn't think i'd need to, as i didn't know it was overcarbed, thought it would be like opening a bottle, they don't have PRV.
Just released a little pressure a couple of times through the PRV, the hissing decreased then started to foam.

 

[brianman]

Bit the bullet and poured till pressure dropped, got 1litre of head and about 250ml of beer in a container, after about 5 mins about 375ml of beer. Not the way i wanted to get my first home brew draught beer. Hoping now with more headspace i can slowly bleed off pressure. I'll put the other one in the fridge and do the same tomorrow.

 

[EalingDrop]

I also naturally carb in the mini kegs (4L & 5L). Never had one NOT foam up in the first few pours. I've kegged about 10 batches of various styles in them.

Purging with PRV until there is no hiss will help, but leave it for few minutes the pressure will build up again and you're back with the same issues. After a few foamy pints and you should be ok. Clean the silicon tube well before use I find help reduce the geyser effect. Something about rough surfaces kicking off the fizz.

Last night forgot to bring the mini regulator, but attached the tap anyway. Same problem - foamy couple of pints then ok after that. The inherint pressure was enough to dispense half a keg (5 minutes between pours). Always towards the end it becomes a bit flat. Not sure if forced carbonated beer behave the same way.

 

[brianman]

I also naturally carb in the mini kegs (4L & 5L). Never had one NOT foam up in the first few pours. I've kegged about 10 batches of various styles in them.

Purging with PRV until there is no hiss will help, but leave it for few minutes the pressure will build up again and you're back with the same issues. After a few foamy pints and you should be ok. Clean the silicon tube well before use I find help reduce the geyser effect. Something about rough surfaces kicking off the fizz.

Last night forgot to bring the mini regulator, but attached the tap anyway. Same problem - foamy couple of pints then ok after that. The inherint pressure was enough to dispense half a keg (5 minutes between pours). Always towards the end it becomes a bit flat. Not sure if forced carbonated beer behave the same way.

Cheers mate, nice tip about the tubing, how much priming solution do you use? i think i'll go to about 8.5-8.75gms as against the 11.5gms in these first ones, mine are all 5lt, i think i would rather undercarb than overcarb, at least i can then use CO2 to get desired level.

 

[EalingDrop]

It's about 2.5 Co2 vol or approx 6.25g/L.
(@20c).

It's not ideal as you'd want to carb according to style. Hopefully other insights would crop up and help resolve it better (longer pick up tube, rest the kegs for a few hours after transportation?). I'm still trying to work it out myself TBH.

 

[brianman]

It's about 2.5 Co2 vol or approx 6.25g/L.
(@20c).

It's not ideal as you'd want to carb according to style. Hopefully other insights would crop up and help resolve it better (longer pick up tube, rest the kegs for a few hours after transportation?). I'm still trying to work it out myself TBH.

That is so weird, like i said earlier, have had a few slight overcarbed batches, that's one of the reasons i got the mini kegs, so i guess i should force carb, anyway, weird because i started my brewing using a 1/2 teaspoon per stubby, approx. 2gms, hardly ever had any problems. Things were getting worse since racking and CC'ing every beer, i machined a few mm's off the top of the 1/2 teaspoon so now it holds approx. 1.7gms, that's for each stubby, so way less than your carb level.

 

[EalingDrop]

I bulk prime. Half into kegs other half into growlers and bottles.

It might be that beer travelling up the tubing in the kegs that's causing foaming. Next time will pour straight from the 5L kegs and see if it's any different to bottles/growlers

 

[brianman]

I bulk prime. Half into kegs other half into growlers and bottles.

It might be that beer travelling up the tubing in the kegs that's causing foaming. Next time will pour straight from the 5L kegs and see if it's any different to bottles/growlers

Hi Ealing, from what i've read, and from my first two kegs, we should use less than 1/2 bottle carbonation, more like 60-70% less. Will be interesting to see what my third kegs carbonation is like next weekend, that will be 1 week, different batch same carbonation rate.

 

[EalingDrop]

Briby, let me know how you go with the third keg.

I've got a 4L Mini keg of Adnams Ghost ship clone (2.1 Co2/Vol). It's been in the keg for 4 months, should be interesting to see.

Look up 'bottle carbonation experiment'.
It's a CRUDE experiment, but interesting to see levels go up in the first week, then back down again in the second week.
http://homebrewmanual.com/bottle-carbonation-experiment/

All said, I'm definitely better at foam control than before, and overall these mini kegs are still very good for my needs (lots more brew time and people to share the beer with).