Beer Forum

I am new to kegging and was wondering if I can store my kegged beer warm.
I can only chill one keg at the moment but have 7 kegs to fill.

Once the beer is kegged and the o2 bled off do I have to carbonate immediately or can I leave the carbonation stage to when the beer is in the fridge getting cold?

Thanks for the advice.

Brendan

if you dont have your beer fully carbonated and you just have a little pressure to keep the lid sealed, the beer will absorb that CO2 and then you wont have a seal anymore in anywhere from a few hours to a few days. Surley the lid will appear to be sealed but more often than not especially on used kegs that the seal is no long air tight. I wouldn't be comfortable storing beer especially warm without it being carbonated because of this reason.


Rob

Rob,

Thanks for the info. I hadn't thought of that.

If I was to carbonate the beer at 30psi at 24c 75F. Can I then store the beer warm?
That is as cold as I can get it here in summer without refridgeration.

The figures are from Brewing classis styles page 299.

Brendan

i think the golden rule is that for every 10 degress C increase in temp, chemical reactions / beer staling will increase 2 times. In essence If you want to store this beer at 24 C for more than a few months, your beer will go bad more than 4 times faster than at 0 C. Although i have never stored kegs warm so i have no actual experience on just how long they would last.

Also, if your sanitation is not perfect, at 24C thats primo temp for any sort of residual bacteria grow into potential off flavors.

I'm going to start off by saying that I'm just starting to get into kegging (actually waiting for my first couple of kegs to show up today), but I don't see why, if you carb it, you wouldn't be able to store them warm-ish. I keep all of my bottled beer in my basement and that is around 65*F. It stays just fine. Would I like to get it colder than that... sure, but I just don't have the resources at the moment.

If the keg is carbed, then I don't see why you couldn't keep it where ever. I think 75*F is a bit on the warm side, but it's not the end of the world. But that's just my thoughts on the matter.... I'm a noob at kegging, so there might be some different things to consider that I haven't yet.

I have kept bottled beer for 6 yrs and had no trouble with the sanitisation.
I just dont have any way of keeping more than 1 keg cold. Summer in Aust is a bit warm ( The min in Sydney is 70F for the next few days and that is with rain)and most houses don't have basements. It should be OK in winter.
I might have to brew and store in winter and drink it in summer.


Brendan

I've had success with naturally carbing in a keg, by using priming sugar. Works well in warm weather. I add CO2 upon kegging to blow out the O2 and initially pressurize, the residual fermentation takes care of the rest. Just make sure you've got a really good keg that seals, and use keg lube on the rings.

Sounds like you need a chest freezer setup to hold more kegs. Storing carbonated keg brew at a warmer temp will most likely make the CO2 come out of solution. I would come up with some way to chill them or you would be better off bottling for now.