CO2 into Pressure barrels

[jaquiss2005]

Having bottled a few brews have purchased a pressure barrel with the small CO2 bulbs and holder. Question - when do I put in one of the bulbs and how will I know when to put another one in??

 

[pjbiker]

Simple answer, when the beer comes out slowly, it needs more gas adding.

 

[Kev888]

+1
Assuming there are no leaks you'll get part way through the barrel on the pressure from priming, in fact to begin with you may struggle to draw beer out gently enough, but after a while it'll try to suck air in to replace the beer coming out (or if its a top tap it'll stop dispensing altogether). You want to avoid oxygenating the beer so squirt in a CO2 bulb to give it some more pressure before it wants to suck in air, which as mentioned is when the beer starts coming out slowly - you'll get a feel for that with trial and error.

Cheers
kev

 

[orange]

Do you not need to inject some co2 at the start of barreling, to expel unwanted air. :wha:

 

[Kev888]

You could do, its supposed to reduce the beer oxidising as you barrel. I do this with my cornies - I run them off big pub gas cylinders so using a keg full of gas is no great issue, and being largely impervious I can keep the beer in them for quite some time so its worthwhile.

I'm unsure of the pros vs conns with a PB and bulbs though - it could be costly to purge the air of a PB with those little things and as the plastic is more gas permiable anyway the benefits may be lower, also i guess the priming fermentation could use oxygen too perhaps... I must admit that when using PBs i only purged the head-space after filling, but maybe there'd be benefit to purging the whole thing :hmm:

Cheers
kev

 

[aberreef]

Do you not need to inject some co2 at the start of barreling, to expel unwanted air. :wha:

I woulld have thought you'd be making a big bomb like that. CO2 will be produced by priming the beer which makes quite a considerable amount of pressure. If you pressurise before the second fermentation............ :shock:

I had one lot of beer burst the cap off the pressure barrel a few months back. Scared the bejesus out of me when it went :wha:

 

[Kev888]

I woulld have thought you'd be making a big bomb like that. CO2 will be produced by priming the beer which makes quite a considerable amount of pressure.

I think what he meant is to fill the keg with CO2 rather than air before racking into it - i.e. not under pressure, just by the CO2 being heavier than air it'll sit in there (instead of oxygen) until the incoming beer pushes it up and out the top.

Cheers
kev

 

[aberreef]

I think what he meant is to fill the keg with CO2 rather than air before racking into it - i.e. not under pressure, just by the CO2 being heavier than air it'll sit in there (instead of oxygen) until the incoming beer pushes it up and out the top.

That would make sense

 

[jaquiss2005]

Thanks for the advice all

Will be putting into the barrel in next couple of days

 

[Kev888]

That would make sense

It could have been taken either way, though I didn't realise at the time, so thanks for posting - its good to clarify anything that may be risky!

Cheers
kev