Co2 suppliers Liverpool?

peebee said:

The clue is in the name: Carb(… on Dioxide). The Nitrogen does nothing but push the beer mammoth distances unless you can get the Nitrogen to dissolve too like Guinness (requires very cold temperatures, very high pressures, perhaps a special tap, and … ?). So, as home brewers don't have "mammoth distances", use 100% CO2 and less pressure than a Pub would use with 60/40 (40% less pressure to be exact, so if a Pub is using 32PSI of 60/40, 14PSI of pure CO2 does the about same job at the same temperature - without getting tangled up explaining "absolute" and "gauge" pressures ).

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Ah, so to the home brewer the nitrogen is only ever any good to push the beer then?. And as I'm only going to do the occasional stout over the next year then any high nitrogen mix would be pointless then?, more so if I'm looking at gas to force carbonate as much as serving pressure. Of cause, could it not be thought a mix of say 60\40 would at least help prevent the chances of over carbonation which is a concern as I move to kegs & gas with some ipa's that might only want partial carbonation.

As far as I know, most people just get the pure CO2 then later get a second nitro mix gas bottle for stouts, if that's their thing. You can still serve stouts etc from a co2 bottle though if you want to serve both a lager and a stout at the same time from the same gas bottle you will need a second pump with second
regulator and maybe a stout tap, but it just won't have the nitro cascade like Guinness in a pub.

fury_tea said:

As far as I know, most people just get the pure CO2 then later get a second nitro mix gas bottle for stouts, if that's their thing. You can still serve stouts etc from a co2 bottle though if you want to serve both a lager and a stout at the same time from the same gas bottle you will need a second pump with second
regulator and maybe a stout tap, but it just won't have the nitro cascade like Guinness in a pub.

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Thanks, which begs the question, do any home brewers bother with single mixed gas bottles?. As if all we really want or need the gas for most of the time is carbonation and serving, well is there any benefit to getting anything other than pure co2?.

Dave 666 said:

Thanks, which begs the question, do any home brewers bother with single mixed gas bottles?. As if all we really want or need the gas for most of the time is carbonation and serving, well is there any benefit to getting anything other than pure co2?.

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Not quite sure what your question is. Some homebrewers do use the gas mix, along with a stout tap, to achieve the nitro effect you see in the pub when you get a pint of Guinness.
If you just plan on having IPA, pale ale, lager etc and the occasional stout I'd suggest getting the pure CO2 which is what most homebrewers use.

I might be wrong but as I understand it, at the homebrew level, the only reason to choose a co2+nitrogen mix is the above stated reason.
I've also heard that food grade and industrial co2 often come from the same filler tank and the difference is usually the pressure in the container and the size.

fury_tea said:

Not quite sure what your question is. Some homebrewers do use the gas mix, along with a stout tap, to achieve the nitro effect you see in the pub when you get a pint of Guinness.
If you just plan on having IPA, pale ale, lager etc and the occasional stout I'd suggest getting the pure CO2 which is what most homebrewers use.

I might be wrong but as I understand it, at the homebrew level, the only reason to choose a co2+nitrogen mix is the above stated reason.
I've also heard that food grade and industrial co2 often come from the same filler tank and the difference is usually the pressure in the container and the size.

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Nar, I often have a habit of over thinking things and thanks for the responses & insight. It's certainly helped convince me to scrap the mixed gas idea and stick with pure co2.

Though with regards to the difference between food grade & industrial grade, I thought it was down to higher impurities in the industrial grade not suited to food use?. Maybe the levels between the both are of little difference to make any real difference, I don't know?. Maybe the co2 does come from the same filler tank, but I guess I'll trust that if the supplier says it's good for food grade use them that's good for me.

Dave 666 said:

Nar, I often have a habit of over thinking things and thanks for the responses & insight. It's certainly helped convince me to scrap the mixed gas idea and stick with pure co2.

Though with regards to the difference between food grade & industrial grade, I thought it was down to higher impurities in the industrial grade not suited to food use?. Maybe the levels between the both are of little difference to make any real difference, I don't know?. Maybe the co2 does come from the same filler tank, but I guess I'll trust that if the supplier says it's good for food grade use them that's good for me.

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I think you might be right about that. Give them a ring to qualify whether it's safe before you buy. They are quite helpful if you go for progases and btw you can pay cash on delivery.

Dave 666 said:

Thanks, which begs the question, do any home brewers bother with single mixed gas bottles? …

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Yes they do.

Dave 666 said:

… As if all we really want or need the gas for most of the time is carbonation and serving, well is there any benefit to getting anything other than pure co2?

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No there isn't.

And to really stir things up and have people ask "why is HE giving advise on kegging?". At the same time I'm going to argue with something @fury_tea wrote (sorry!). I'm going to lose a lot of forum cred writing this!

Nitrogen as a propellant is a tool for pushing beer about large properties without causing the beer to over carbonate (from too much CO2 pressure). Obviously it is going to be a very rare home-brewer to need this. Nitrogen as an enhancer of head was a development by Guinness way back in the 1950s. Guinness stout at that time was sold through handpump. They had even developed the "high cask, low cask" system to exaggerate the creamy head that it had become famous for. But the problem was they had little control over the care needed to serve it successfully. They had tried "keg" with CO2, but drinkers didn't like what this did to the beer (high levels of CO2 creates a lot of acidic carbonic acid).

So they kept the CO2 down by using nitrogen, but also figured that if they cooled the beer and used very high pressures they could get nitrogen to dissolve in the beer and it would come out of solution slowly and in very fine bubbles. It even created the swirling "cascade" effect from the bubbles like the best hand pumped stuff.

But then came the really clever bit: The stout wasn't as good as the best hand-pumped Guinness (cue lots of folk choking on their "nitro keg" beer), it was freezing cold for a start, so you get a gang of very clever marketing folk to (successfully it seems) make this new product appear better than the old stuff and tie the new techniques into being responsible for the improvements (they weren't improvements, they were techniques to emulate the old stuff, but for people getting badly kept Guinness they were improvements).

Soon the "nitro keg" replaced the CO2 keg that was still being put out to the rest of the world (early "nitro keg" was only available in Ireland) and the hand pumped stuff disappeared.


There, that's damned any reputation I had around here? Perhaps I've done my bit for "fake news" as I've written it off the top of my head. And why is it odd I should give advice on kegging? Because I'm a lifelong "Real Ale" drinker! But I figured recently (40 years too late) that kegging was the only way I could emulate "Real Ale" (see my "treatise" https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BwzEv5tRM-5EQUhZbDNPdmV1bWc). I had to throw off a lifetime of believing you couldn't use CO2 in "Real Ale" home brewing and also learnt very subtle techniques to make it work - it is this subtle knowledge that I can use to give sound advice on "kegging" in general. That treatise even includes a bit on mixed gas, to get very low concentrations of CO2 in beer (something you can't do with a "breather" and CO2).

<EDIT: Corrected for my continued inability to correctly use "advice" and "advise". Flippin' English language!>

I like a lot of your post. And I get some of that as having worked at beer festivals and used the hand pumps for stout (which first got me into drinking stouts) I always thought that it pulled right it comes over as better than what stout I've since tried in a pub at unnecessarily much lower temps. Maybe in time I'll experiment working with stout & co2, but for now a lot to learn with what I'm just starting with working with co2.

@peebee you're not really disagreeing with me. I don't use nitro, but I do know people use it for the above reasons. Whether you think it pours a better or worse pint is pretty subjective I'd say. I think your forum cred is safe for now.

Thanks @fury_tea. It was my line …

peebee said:

It even created the swirling "cascade" effect from the bubbles like the best hand pumped stuff.

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… that contradicted something you said that had me worry you might take offence. Not at all it seems, nor did I generate the anticipated roasting for the rest of what I wrote. I forget, people are far "nicer" on this site, it's the "other" forum site I frequent that would have me tied to a stake for writing stuff like that. I reckon it's fear of @Chippy_Tea who probably disapproves of burning "heretics" on this forum .

peebee said:

Thanks @fury_tea. It was my line …

… that contradicted something you said that had me worry you might take offence. Not at all it seems, nor did I generate the anticipated roasting for the rest of what I wrote. I forget, people are far "nicer" on this site, it's the "other" forum site I frequent that would have me tied to a stake for writing stuff like that. I reckon it's fear of @Chippy_Tea who probably disapproves of burning "heretics" on this forum .

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It could be me misunderstanding something here but I don't see how that contradicts what I said. I said the same thing, that some homebrewers use nitro to create that effect (which is what you see in most pubs serving Guinness from a keg) which far as I know is correct. I didn't allude to it being the historically accurate way, just that that is what it is being used for.

Dave 666 said:

I like a lot of your post. And I get some of that as having worked at beer festivals and used the hand pumps for stout (which first got me into drinking stouts) I always thought that it pulled right it comes over as better than what stout I've since tried in a pub at unnecessarily much lower temps. Maybe in time I'll experiment working with stout & co2, but for now a lot to learn with what I'm just starting with working with co2.

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If you do start experimenting, I should add that I did try to emulate the "high cask, low cask" system without success. But I've only tried it once. So my failure means nowt.

The "high cask" was a special small cask with exceptionally thick staves (2" if I remember rightly). Note the casks were all wooden then. The "high cask" was filled with fermented stout and a good measure of unfermented wort. It would ferment in the cask creating very high pressure (for a cask). The low cask was filled with fermented out stout (no priming). It was served by pumping a measure of "low cask" stout into a glass and topping it up from the "high cask".

It was used until quite recently (1970s, 1980s perhaps). I used to know someone who said he travelled on the boat from Cork with the fermenting Guinness. I now believe he was talking about these "high casks".

fury_tea said:

I use progases UK based in Bootle, think it's 60 deposit and 10 for a refill, they deliver for free to liverpool areas as well

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Yep, went with these in the end, though I was quoted £50 for the deposit & £10 for the gas with free delivery. Should have it tomorrow so made up with that, just in time for a long weekend of testing my first keg full of beer that's pretty much ready :) .

Dave 666 said:

Yep, went with these in the end, though I was quoted £50 for the deposit & £10 for the gas with free delivery. Should have it tomorrow so made up with that, just in time for a long weekend of testing my first keg full of beer that's pretty much ready :) .

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Actually yeah thinking about it, I'm sure that's what i paid too.

Delivery driver came in and had a look at my regulator (not a euphemism) and offered me some spare o rings (also not a euphemism) and a bit of advice on using the bottle. Pretty good service all round I found. I'm not endorsed to say this either!

Dave 666 said:

Ok, trying to source a co2 supplier before going down the small soda stream gas bottle route I did some searching and can see these threads come up all the time etc. But the only such thread for my area (Liverpool) is several years old and or the companies mentioned no longer appear to deal in co2.

The only local existing supplier I can currently find is Boc, and with there rental charges (which doesn't seem to be clear for co2) and delivery charges (even collect in person is £20 odd) is simply to cost prohibitive. So is there any Liverpool members on here that can point me in the right direction before I simply get a soda stream has bottle instead?, Thanks.

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I used CO2 services in Connah’s Quay, very handy for south wirral. £50 for full bottle, £20 to refill.

Church St, Connah's Quay, Deeside CH5 4AR

yikkerman said:

I use H Roberts - Regent St, Liverpool L3 7BN. 0151 236 7558
They will refill your bottle for £10

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Hi Yikkerman, do you still use them? Looking to get mine refilled, hoping I can get some from them! Do they do food grade CO2 or do you just get ordinary?

Have you tried Jimmy's beer and gas?
0151 647 9033. They're in Birkenhead. From Liverpool, out of the Birkenhead tunnel, head towards Chester, past Camel Laird then at the shell garage on the left turn right at the lights. Immediately pull in to the bed factory car park and the gas place is in there somewhere.

I've not used them myself yet but I've still got a few brews worth of gas left in my bottle but I will be giving them a call

Cheers Tom

soupdragon said:

Have you tried Jimmy's beer and gas?
0151 647 9033. They're in Birkenhead. From Liverpool, out of the Birkenhead tunnel, head towards Chester, past Camel Laird then at the shell garage on the left turn right at the lights. Immediately pull in to the bed factory car park and the gas place is in there somewhere.

I've not used them myself yet but I've still got a few brews worth of gas left in my bottle but I will be giving them a call

Cheers Tom

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Thanks Tom! I had previously come across their website but thought they were trade-only (just from what their website says). I might give them a call at some point to ask!

thethirdhand said:

Thanks Tom! I had previously come across their website but thought they were trade-only (just from what their website says). I might give them a call at some point to ask!

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Don't forget to report back

Cheers Tom