Bag in a Box - Any good?

Andy44 said:

Hi Trueblue,

Hi Trueblue, is that 3~4 weeks after you pull the 1st pint?

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Binkei Huckaback said:

I've used both. Polypins with a beer engine and bag-in-a-box sat in the fridge.

Polypins are great and as I've mentioned before, there's an excellent thread about their use on another forum. However, I was never as satisfied with polypins as bottles.

I've only used bag-in-a-box once and have to say I was very impressed with the result, possibly because brew day had been a disaster and I didn't want to waste time cleaning bottles and by the time I got around to using it, I'd already decided to give kegs a go.

I think I'm right in saying that bag-in-a-box is less gas permeable than polypins, so there's less chance of oxygen creeping in if you need to condition for a long time. Should you want to dispense with a beer engine, you can buy an adapter to fit over the tap.

The only downside I can see is that they're single use, which is, in no particular order, bad for the environment and for your pocket, though I have heard of people using them a couple of times.

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Supernova said:

Hi Andy do you know what the adapter is called that you can use for the bag in box onto beer engine please.. Just bought both and only been putting tube into top of bag which doesn't work great

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Binkei Huckaback said:

I used polypins for a while, but was never 100% happy with the results (I suspect a conditiong issue as the few litres I bottled every batch was much better). A member of another fourm has an excellent polypin guide. I don't kniw if I'm allowed to post a link to it here, so PM me if you'd like the info.

Dads_ales guide is very informative and I'm sure there's another good one here too.

I have a 'disaster' beer in a bag-in-a-box which is refusing to carbonate and I'll post anything of interest.

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stroboscope said:

will put a simple DME brew into a 5L collapsible water container (PE plastic) with enough sugar to reach 2.5 vol, keep it away from any valuables, and see what happens. I'll report back – watch this space!

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Caramel Ox said:

I could be wrong but I don’t see how any flexible bag can maintain carbonation- only the first pint will have your target level, after that co2 will come out of solution into the space created in the bag.

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Dads_Ale said:

I have been experimenting with bag in a box for a while please read on:

Firstly these are designed for bright beer or low carb beverages such as wine or cider. In this respect they work fine. If you get one from your local brewery (shameless plug for Rebellion in Marlow here) then they usually have a shelf life of 7 days and 3 or 4 once started.

The problem in a homebrew environment is that they are not designed to take any pressure. So as they come are not much good for secondary fermentation (conditioning). the website does say it can be done by loosely fitting the tap and releasing pressure as it build up. I have a problem with this in that if you keep releasing pressure then your beer will be flat. Plus the inner bag is, apparently, gas permeable so any gas gets between the inner and outer bag and when you try and release pressure you get a fountain of beer..... bin there done that.

So I had bought 20 5 litre bags so was not going to give up. Next came reinforcing the box with cable ties. This allowed me to carry out secondary fermentation in the bag. It did end up like a football but no leaks.

This gave reasonable carbonation similar to that from real ale in a pub.

I have done this several times now and have managed to reuse the cardboard box several times. As for how long the beer last I have not managed to get it past a week without drinking it all.:drink:

Next project is to build a solid box and try again.

I will continue with these as they fit on the top shelf on my beer fridge that is too short for bottles.

Oh and you can connect to a beer engine.

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Moe said:

I think a water carrier would split, they’re not designed for pressure.

Wouldn’t you be better with a pressure barrel to reach that level of carbonation?
https://brew2bottle.co.uk/collections/home-brew-pressure-barrels

You would still need co2 to fill the headspace as you drink the beer though. But you could use the 16g co2 bulbs.

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stroboscope said:

This is a very interesting idea. Has anyone tried carbonating inside one of these using priming sugar, and then using one of the CO2 bulbs only for serving? Is that relatively straightforward?

I have one of these mini-kegs (https://www.darkfarm.co.uk/product/...ni-keg-with-fixed-tap-flow-control-co2-valve/), but find it quite difficult to operate. I often can't get any beer out of it at all, and can never be sure whether the bulb is empty or is there something else going on (the meter on the CO2 valve isn't much use). For that same reason I've long given up force-carbonating.

These pressure barrels look like the same principle, but simpler. I'm just looking for a straightforward way to serve beer, no need for bells and whistles! I'd need to find a 5 litre one, though – seems they all start at 10l, which won't fit in the fridge...

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