Bottling from Corny?

[Cobnut]

Having been bottling for the past few years (quickly learned to use Little Bottler, batch priming, draining tree, etc.), I am taking baby steps towards Corny kegs, but bottles remain very useful and attractive for sharing, portability, etc. So I've been trying to research best options for bottling force carbonated bright beer from a corny keg.

T'internet seems divided on best options, so how do the experts of JBK feel?

- Counter-pressure filler?

- Beer gun?

- Something else?

And where to source the kit?

I feel confident of a rush of opinions and hopeful of clearing my confusion

[orlando]

By far the best bottling device out there is the Pegas . If you search on here you will find a lot of threads concerning it. AliExpress will have some Chinese "homages" to it as well but the original is bomb proof.

[f00b4r]

If it's just the odd beer and not for long term storage then a carbonation cap (or a handful of them) can be very useful to fill PET bottles with bright beer (ex fizzy drink bottles too). I have a Pegas and it's great but for doing the odd beer the carbonation cap is my preferred choice (I don't have it permanently setup though).

[Cobnut]

If it's just the odd beer and not for long term storage then a carbonation cap (or a handful of them) can be very useful to fill PET bottles with bright beer (ex fizzy drink bottles too). I have a Pegas and it's great but for doing the odd beer the carbonation cap is my preferred choice (I don't have it permanently setup though).

Do you use that to transfer carbonated beer to bottles? Or do you simply carbonate a bottle of beer using the cap?

[f00b4r]

If it's just the odd beer and not for long term storage then a carbonation cap (or a handful of them) can be very useful to fill PET bottles with bright beer (ex fizzy drink bottles too). I have a Pegas and it's great but for doing the odd beer the carbonation cap is my preferred choice (I don't have it permanently setup though).

Do you use that to transfer carbonated beer to bottles? Or do you simply carbonate a bottle of beer using the cap?

Transfer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCrfp8h ... ture=share

[f00b4r]

You can do all sorts of cool things with carbonation caps from cleaning beer lines/taps, emptying/flushing beer engines between sessions to avoid stale beer, adding finings to kegs and with the Fermentasaurus 2 (due soon-ish) it looks like they are using these as their standard ports on the top and collection bottle (should allow you to rouse hops in a closed system and purge the collection bottles amongst other things). As long as you cover the bottle to avoid skunking you can take 1-2L bottles of beer to friends using fizzy water bottles.
Orlando is right about the Pegas, they are great to use but I only use mine when bottling a keg or a few from a number of different kegs. It even has an (expensive) add-on case that allows you to bottle in glass safely (even if the bottle explodes), although there are hacks to imitate this without the safety barrier (it probably depends on the type of beer and carbonation if the official method is worth it).

[Jambo]

I bought a beer gun and I don’t get on with it (anyone want to buy!?). In retrospect I don’t know why I bought it as the whole idea of kegging for me was to save time, moving beer out of a keg into a bottle is something I’m not prepared to spend time on, but each to their own.

What I do which I do find works well is continue brewing 23L ish batches, Corny 19 L and bottle the other 4. The 4 L tends to cover the portable beers I need, without needing to handle the beer another time.

[Chrissyr63]

Agree with f00b4r - have started bottling to 1lt fizzy water bottles using a couple of the caps and works well.

[Cobnut]

Thanks all for the comments.

I've taken a double-plunge and ordered an eBay special counter-pressure filler and a couple of carbonation caps, but to be honest if the first taste of the 10.5L corny of my Sam Smith's oatmeal stout clone is representative of the whole keg, I'll be through it before the deliveries arrive! SWMBO enjoyed it too.

[wasteddegrees]

Beer gun works great. Can't recommend enough. Keep kegs cool to reduce fobbing