New To Kegging And Have A Few Questions

[davemo]

I recently purchased a home brewing kegging set up that i am anxious to use. It consists of a refurb ball lock keg , a 5 pound co2 cylinder, a taprite regulator, a picnic tap , and all necessary tubing. I also bought a carbo cap for filling soda bottles etc. Ok i am planning on racking my beer into the keg and setting it in my second fridge to cool down (I understand the colder beer takes co2 more readily) then carb in the fridge for 24 hrs at about 30 pounds pressure. First question my beer is now still in the primary fermenter which is a bucket not carboy. Its 7 days in and starting to really slow down. I plan on racking to a carboy at 12 days ,then to the keg after say 2 additional days. Will i need to filter i realize this is a hard question to answer but is it a usual practice when kegging? Second question after the beer is kegged can i remove it from the fridge to room temp (i need the fridge space) then either fill a 2 liter bottle and carbo cap it or re cool it in the keg when i want some?Third question since i am using a picnic tap do i need to un hook it and sanitize it each time i use it, i assume the tubing to the tap has beer that remains in the line???? Just trying to cover my bases before i actually do the kegging, Recipe was simple by the way it was 4 pound pilsen dme,1 pound rice syrup solids and 1 oz of australian helga hops for 20 minutes for a ibu round 14 in 5.5 gallons finished beer

[BDawg]

First-
Congrats on going to kegs.

1) Skip going to a carboy. Let it sit the whole time in the primary. The old school "rack to a secondary" has been proven unnecessary except if you actually do a 2nd fermentation with something additional like fruit.

2) Yes, you can carbonate that way, but I'll leave it to somebody else who carbonates like that to answer. I do it the "set at serving pressure and temperature and wait for a week" method.

3) Remember that when the beer warms up, the number of PSI's that it takes to dissolve the same amount of gas goes up too. That means that like opening a warm soda, your beer will be quite foamy, and you'll probably have a hard time filling your bottle unless the beer is colder.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I'd rather warn you about problems you are likely to face instead of telling you everything is going to be peachy. You probably want to consider getting a small fridge/kegerator to serve from if you can swing it.

HTH-

[Ozwald]

Also, no need to filter (but you can if you want to). Typically leaving it in the primary long enough for it to finish up & carefully racking into the keg (no secondary, as BD mentioned) will leave all the keg-cloggers behind... provided you don't get too greedy when racking it over.

[Charlie]

What BDawg and Ozwald said.

I keg my ales at 14 days (unless something f'ed up), and it's important not to move the fermentor for a couple of days prior so everything is nicely settled.

If I want to fast carb (not fast-fast, just half-fast) I put it in the kegerator at 30 psi and wait 72 hours, then reduce it to serving pressure. There's the thing about laying the corny down with the gas post up to increase surface area and reduce depth, and it works, but it's also a real PITA (and who needs that?).

As long as your picnic tap is hooked up and serving I wouldn't worry about bugs. You can even switch it to another keg (as long as the first one was clean), but about every second keg I clean and sanitize my taps. And I don't ever leave one disconnected with beer in it. There's beer line cleaner (Micromatic?) and other commercial stuff, but at the moment I'm using 0.2M Trisodium Phosphate (TSP) which removes the gunk, followed by a water rinse, and storing the tap with it full of StarSan.

Kegging is a whole nother phase of brewing, and integrating it into your protocol is a process, not an event. But you'll get used to it fast, and you're gonna love it for the labor savings.

[Brewshki]

Also, no need to filter (but you can if you want to). Typically leaving it in the primary long enough for it to finish up & carefully racking into the keg (no secondary, as BD mentioned) will leave all the keg-cloggers behind... provided you don't get too greedy when racking it over.

I just spent way too much time watching your avatar thing. What in the world is it? hahaha

[Ozwald]

Also, no need to filter (but you can if you want to). Typically leaving it in the primary long enough for it to finish up & carefully racking into the keg (no secondary, as BD mentioned) will leave all the keg-cloggers behind... provided you don't get too greedy when racking it over.

I just spent way too much time watching your avatar thing. What in the world is it? hahaha

One of us. One of us.

Welcome to the club. Anyone who's spent enough time around here has done the same. Yes, there really is an end to it. It starts at the *RING*.

I almost changed it once. But I got threatened. So I can't.

[brewinhard]

Also, no need to filter (but you can if you want to). Typically leaving it in the primary long enough for it to finish up & carefully racking into the keg (no secondary, as BD mentioned) will leave all the keg-cloggers behind... provided you don't get too greedy when racking it over.

I just spent way too much time watching your avatar thing. What in the world is it? hahaha

One of us. One of us.

Welcome to the club. Anyone who's spent enough time around here has done the same. Yes, there really is an end to it. It starts at the *RING*.

I almost changed it once. But I got threatened. So I can't.

Is that Bjork?

[Ozwald]

Is that Bjork?

If you watch it all the way through, it's pretty self-explanatory. Sort of.