Cornelius - Coopers Ginger Beer and Canadian Blonde Lager

[bmouthboyo]

Hello everyone,

New lad here, brewed a few kits at uni with some mates in bottles but been over 4 years now so about time I got back into it . I hope one day to go AG but for now Kits suit me fine as I have a few Cornelius kegs and have limited space.

I will be brewing a Coopers Ginger Beer (Alcoholic version ) and a Coopers Canadian Blonde Larger.

I am not actually starting the brew today but I thought I might as well document this right from the start. So here is my equipment:

Fermentors
I have 2 fermentors that I plan to use. One is a standard fermenting bucket with a tap that I am going to add a grommet and air lock to, the other is a keg that I plan to use as a secondary FV before putting the brew into one of my Cornelius kegs.

I know the plastic keg is not ideal for secondary as I cannot see into it and is designed more for dispensing, however I found it at home and hopefully it saves me a few quid not having to buy a carboy or another fermenting bucket. I am hoping to use 1/2 inch tubing on the FV taps instead of syphoning from one vessel to another.

Cornelius Kegs
As I mentioned before I have 2 kegs that I would like to use to carbonate the brews. I will be replacing all the O-Rings and sanitising etc. before using them.

This is my main Cornelius keg that has a tap fitted.

Co2 set-up
This is the Co2 canister I was luckily enough to pick up for £15 from Salisbury a few years back.

And my cheap Chinese made regulator

For the time being I have to keep this cheap. I would have liked a glass carboy for the secondary FV but cannot stretch that far at the moment.

Can anyone offer any advice so far? Is it worth using my plastic keg for secondary FV? Does anyone else do things differently when using a Cornelius keg?

Sorry for the long post. More to come when I start the real brew day :thumb:

 

[Aleman]

When you force carbonate do not gas it up to silly psi, shake the **** out of it, then reduce it to 6 psi and expect to serve anything but froth. Force carbonate at the pressure you are going to serve at . . . just shake it a few times over a week with the gas on and you will be fine, otherwise all that will happen (even with a nice flow control tap) is you will get a glass of froth and no fizz in your beer

 

[bmouthboyo]

When you force carbonate do not gas it up to silly psi, shake the **** out of it, then reduce it to 6 psi and expect to serve anything but froth. Force carbonate at the pressure you are going to serve at . . . just shake it a few times over a week with the gas on and you will be fine, otherwise all that will happen (even with a nice flow control tap) is you will get a glass of froth and no fizz in your beer

Thank you, I am in no rush to carbonate it as the extra time in the Cornelius will allow it time to mature. Assuming all my fixings are air tight hehe

On a side note, the OUT connection has had the pipe cut so need to replace now. Does anyone know what these fixings are called so I can buy a little kit to re do it. I know I can use jubilee clips but I come across these a lot so may as well get one.

Thanks

 

[Duncs]

I will be brewing a Coopers Ginger Beer (Alcoholic version ) and a Coopers Canadian Blonde Larger.

How much larger is it going to be?

 

[bmouthboyo]

I will be brewing a Coopers Ginger Beer (Alcoholic version ) and a Coopers Canadian Blonde Larger.

How much larger is it going to be?

Well I am told this Canadian blonde is full bodied Cant wait to meet her lol

 

[Duncs]

I will be brewing a Coopers Ginger Beer (Alcoholic version ) and a Coopers Canadian Blonde Larger.

How much larger is it going to be?

Well I am told this Canadian blonde is full bodied Cant wait to meet her lol

I think I may have met her once :whistle:

 

[bmouthboyo]

OK so today I got my goodies from brewuk.co.uk. Excellent customer service and I received the items next day. Although I did spend over £60 and got there free delivery.

So after thoroughly cleaning my cornies and primary FV as shown in this great guide http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=6536 I was ready to go.

Conveniently the Ginger Beer Kit only makes 19 Litres so it should all fit nicely into my Cornelius keg, although I was planning on reducing the water if it was a full 5 gallon kit and making a stronger brew

So I bought some water to near boil on the hob in a cleaned casarole pot, added the extract and brewers sugar and in it went to the FV, topped with cold water to bring to 19 Litres.

Pitched the yeast

And on with the air lock. Incidentally have I put the right amount of liquid in it?

I took a OG reading and it came out as 1020. But I have always found taking these readings tricky. The kit says 6 days now then checking if it's reached FG. Once it has it's into the Cornie.

On a side note when I stripped my 3 Cornie kegs down each had different posts, tubes etc. One even had this as a gas in tube:

Most of the poppets seemed set into the posts and would not come out, also the posts had varying diameters and one even was some weird star shape:

Made removing them a pain, and also the gasket set I bought for each may not fit them all as the dip tubes seem different diameters.