Easy Keg?

[ScottM]

Hi Steve - I use these, both ones I've purchased from an online homebrew store, and ones from a brewery that I re-use. They are the same kegs, apart from the branding.

I don't see any gas cylinder though - so are we talking about the same thing? The kegs at the top of this thread are the ones with the red tap at the bottom, and wee valve in the top. Once you've opened the valve, the contents drain via gravity (once the initial pressure has subsided).

These kegs cost £5 to buy new online, so if you can get a full one for £15, the beer is only really costing you £1 a (metric) pint. If it's decent beer, that's not bad :)

I prime mine, and so far this has worked ok. I normally batch prime and then fill bottles and mini-kegs from the same bucket. One poster in some thread indicated that the kegs had a maximum priming rate much below what you would normally use for bottles, but I've not been able to find this info anywhere.

You asked for a piccy...

Note the red tap at the base. The other 5 litre kegs you see have no top, and use some little CO2 cyclinder and a tap that goes int the top valve. I've never used these.

The link at the top reckons 20g per 5L, which is 2g per metric pint. I'm guessing that most batch priming for bottles would be a bit more than this. The only thing I read from the above was that they didn't recommend anything REALLY fizzy like ginger beer. Anything up to a reasonably carbonated lager (4g per metric pint) would probably be fine :)

 

[MacKiwi]

Ah, so it does!

That's fine then - I normally add around 80g of priming sugar to 20 litres of beer, so 20g in a 5 litre mini-keg is bang on.

 

[johnnyh]

I put 1 tablespoon per keg, works fine for ales.

 

[steve6690]

Here is a picture of the kegs I have from my local brewery,

From the front it looks the same, it has the integrated tap.

If you look at the top the req twist cap injects the 1 time use co2,

I only have 2 kegs the first one I tried to use it as a storage unit,

Opened 5 500ml bottle of my brew and poured in all except the sediment at the bottom, and it didn't seem to work, I just got a little dribble would take almost as long to pour a pint as to brew a new batch.


We get them for £15 a keg by "mate rates" we bought about 30 kegs for Christmas for the lads at work, and my boss goes there every week for one,

 

[ScottM]

Opened 5 500ml bottle of my brew and poured in all except the sediment at the bottom, and it didn't seem to work, I just got a little dribble would take almost as long to pour a pint as to brew a new batch.

You need to re-prime the batch when adding it to the keg. 2.5L in a 5L keg is a LOT of headspace. You would be much better adding in the full 5L. Once done, sprinkle in 20g of sugar and leave it in the warm for a week or 2. After that bring it into the cold.

At this stage you will have a pressurised/primed keg ready to pour. The beer will come out nice and steady with a bit of gas leading to a nice head. When getting to the bottom of the keg the pour will slow considerably but by this point you should only have a pint or 2 left. At this stage, when you are ready to drink those pints, pop the valve on the top to allow air to come in and pour the pints as normal. With the valve open there won't be any vacuum created, the pour won't glug and will be fairly constant.

Rinse, repeat

 

[steve6690]

Sorry didn't mean to put 5 I did use 9.

Thanks for the help, unfortunately I have damaged one of my kegs trying to get the co2 injector out of it, as I was hoping to source a new co2 injector, and go down that route rather than priming with sugar.

Just means I've got an excuse to visit my brewery again :

 

[ScottM]

Even better, CO2 injector idea seems great :)

Is it 8g bulbs or 16g bulbs?

 

[steve6690]

I've not a clue, it looks like they are a once only type.

Because you pretty much have to destroy the one coming out, and I've not completely finished yet. They seem to have a sealant round the top.

Not saying you couldn't get it out with out damaging the actual keg, but trying to source the co'2 injector might be tricky

Shame really because they would be even better,

Here is a YouTube link from the manufactures huber


HUBER easyKEG IPS - so funktioniert's - HUBER Packaging


Not allowed to post a link but if you search the above it will bring up the right vid

 

[ScottM]

I had a look then popped over to their website...

http://www.huber-packaging.com/fileadmi ... S_2008.pdf

Looks like it's not meant to come out at all once used. Shame really as they could easily sell those with disposables to just about every homebrewer on the planet lol.

Having said that I bet they would be very easy to convert with an S30 pin valve for 8g bulbs.

 

[MacKiwi]

Hey cool, never seen one with a CO2 thingy built-in. Anyone know if/where you can buy these (empty I mean)?

edit : found these guys...

http://www.mytap.eu/English/English_Homebrewers.html

8 euros? Doesn't seem too bad. I'm assuming that after using the CO2 widget once, you can re-use the keg as if it was a regular non-C02 one...