Kegging

[Jaoqua]

<Questions at the bottom>

Well, I've kegged my first brew, and it hasn't gone well. If that beer's not infected now it must have miraculous powers of self-healing.

I sanitized and rinsed all my stuff. I even boiled the tubes because I wasn't certain that the sanitizer solution had got into them well enough.

But there were problems:
* By the time I'd carried the fv downstairs to the kitchen the head had broken up badly and a few bits were sinking into the beer.
* As I syphoned, most of the rest of the head stuck to the sides of the fv and the beer was rapidly exposed.
* Syphoning went ok until I got towards the bottom of the tube end that was in the fv. Anticipating that it would suck up air I unhooked the tube from the edge of the fv to place it lower in the beer, but being a soft tube there was soon a pinch and the syphoning stopped. As I tried to undo the pinch the end of the tube came out of the beer, and 'sluuuurp' - it was all over.

I tried to restart it a couple of times, but I had the same problem: as the tube went over the top of the fv (and also where it was connected to the hard plastic 'u'-pipe into the beer) there was a pinch.

In the end I decided to give it up. I've missed out on about two inches of beer at the bottom of the fv and there's about four inches of air in the keg. But I thought that if I carried on trying I was bound to get all sorts into the beer (if I haven't already).

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<Questions>
As ever, I'm after advice. Can anyone tell me what kit and process they use for kegging to avoid this kind of debacle? I think I'll buy a longer harder tube, ideally with one of those little taps in it.

Also, just today I thought I detected a slight sourness to the sg sample. I have been using a turkey baster to take samples, and I'm wondering whether I've infected the beer. Is there a better way? I have no tap on my fv.

[Jaoqua]

I didn't use S04, I used the packet that came with the kit. At one point in the fermentation there was a good two inches of head. After a few days that had gone down to about half an inch, and by the end it was quite thin and intermittently brown cake-like and bubbly. I could see that although it was brown at the top there was a thin line of white bubbles at the bottom.

I may have been a little hasty with my kegging. Since I have no tap on my fermenter I have been opening the top up and taking two slurps with a turkey baster. This has made me uneasy, though I've been as careful as possible. In any case, sg was 1013 yesterday and 1013 today, so I kegged.

Should beer be headless by the end of fermentation? And if so, why doesn't it sour quickly? I thought the head protected it.

Anyway, DaaB, what do you use when kegging? A tapped fv or a cane?

[stevezx7r]

Hi Jaoqua, your probably fine re any infection. The best bet is to get a tap fitted asap to your fv and use a length of hose to run the beer from it to your keg next time. As for taking gravity measurements, what I do is I fill my sample jar up with the same wort + yeast that's in the fv and leave it in the same place as the fv, then, you can watch as the gravity drops day by day without needing to disturb/risk infecting your beer

Regarding the yeast head. That is just an indication of using a top fermenting yeast, if you were making a "proper" lager the yeast head would be at the bottom. The c02 given off by the yeast as it makes your beer sits on top of your beer which forms your blanket. It's not the end of the world if it's disturbed a bit during transfer so long as you have enough viable yeast/sugar in suspension to eat any 02 which may get in.

The likelyhood is as it seems to be your 1st batch I would expect it would be drunk before it has time to go off anyway

[Jaoqua]

Ok lads, I'll add a tapped fv to my shopping list. It will be handy to have a second vessel there for water prep and sanitization anyway.

Steve, do you have a clear glass pot next to your fv then? Presumably you fill it as soon as the mixture is ready to start fermenting. If you have the hydrometer in it permanently isn't it hard to read because of the yeast head?

[stevezx7r]

Ok lads, I'll add a tapped fv to my shopping list. It will be handy to have a second vessel there for water prep and sanitization anyway.

Steve, do you have a clear glass pot next to your fv then? Presumably you fill it as soon as the mixture is ready to start fermenting. If you have the hydrometer in it permanently isn't it hard to read because of the yeast head?

Yeah, I have a standard plasitc and a glass "trial jar". One is used to keep an eye on the gravity the other when "testing"

I have my fermenter and trial jar in the room with me. Once the yeast head goes (it still leaves a scummy ring where it's been) I know it's done. I throw the old beer out of the trial jar and refil to get an accurate reading - I could just take a reading after 10 days but I like to see whats going on

I can still read it (unless I use us05 yeast, but that's a different story entirely) even though the top of the jar gets a bit mucky.