Corny Keg Setup

[eblis]

After contacting Norm and being placed on his waiting list I have been trying found out how to set up the kegs and with there being so many variations I was wondering what is the best way.

From my understanding when you use a corny keg you force carbonate the beer instead of using suger and allowing natural carbonation to take place.

So first question would be do you need to have a constant supply of CO2 attached to keep the pressure in the keg to dispense the beer and if so what system do you use.

Any pictures of setups would be a great help :

 

[Mark1964]

you need c02 if you want to force carbonate but you dont need the gas on all the time

 

[eblis]

the how does the beer come out of the keg, i thought once some had left the keg then the pressure inside would drop, or I am missing something here?

 

[Runwell-Steve]

You need more pressure in the keg than outside in order to dispense the beer.

Personally I leave all my kegs that have beer for dispensing connected permanently to a CO2 bottle. For force carbing I use different lines at a higher pressure.

I usually dispense at about 10 psi, but I force carbonate between 20 and 40 psi depending on how lively I want it.

You will need a CO2 bottle, either a pub gas bottle or a converted Fire Extinguisher. A regulator, a single regulator is fine if you want all your kegs at one pressure, but if you want different pressures then a Gas Management board is more suitable. I have a Gas Management board so I can have all my dispensing kegs being connected at 10psi, while I have a couple of other lines at 20 and 40 psi for force carbing and flushing out kegs while cleaning them.

You will also obviously need some disconnects, beer line, gas line, and taps. Norms kegs come with disconnects and beer line and gas line so no need to worry there. You will want some taps, it's better to have the ones that connect to beer line, rather than the one that is attached to a disconnect, the length of beer line helps reduce foaming.

I'll take some pics of my setup in a bit for you to see.

EDIT: and here they are.

Gas supply,

This can be connected to a single regulator like this which you can get from Norm

But I have mine connected to a Gas Management board, which you can also get from Norm

The left hand gas out pipe is at approx 10psi and goes through the roof of my fridge to connect to my kegs, the other 2 lines coming out are what I use for force carbonating and flushing the kegs out when cleaning them.

Inside the fridge is a bit chaotic with the gas line split 4 ways to connect to all the kegs, and the 4 beer lines. I do only have 3 kegs on tap at present hence the gap front left.

Heres a close up of one of the kegs showing the Gas in, (Grey Disconnect), and beer out (black disconnect) all connected up.

The beer lines are all connected to the taps which are on the fridge door.

The taps are on the outside and where the beer obviuosly gets dispensed from

The next pic shows the 2 extra gas lines which I use for force carbing etc.. hanging over the taps.

Hope that helps

 

[BrewDan]

What a nice set up, is the gas management board worth getting? I have three cornies at the moment. Roughly how much do they cost?

 

[eblis]

Now that is what i call a set up, thank you for the pictures its been very helpful :thumb:

 

[Runwell-Steve]

I have only had the Gas Management board running for a couple of weeks now, before that I had all four kegs connected up at the same pressure from the single regulator and it worked fine.

The only reason I wanted to have more flexibility was for carbing up Weisse beer and Lager, which needs a higher pressure than is required for Ales, and I wanted to be able to do that without disconnecting all the other kegs first.

If you are always brewing the same style of beer it's probably not really necessary.

I also wanted a higher pressure line as a couple of my kegs need a high pressure blast to get them to seal properly.

I paid £60.00 for my Gas Management Board second hand, not sure how much they are meant to be.

 

[BrewDan]

Thats great cheers Steve, I think I will be looking into one of those, I am going to have different styles of drinks in each so it would be handy to have them all at a different psi, rather than as you said keep disconnecting and adjusting the dial.... not that its too much of a strain doing it, but it would be handy :thumb:

 

[BarnsleyBrewer]

Looks great that Steve. :thumb:

 

[Moley]

I am going to have different styles of drinks in each so it would be handy to have them all at a different psi, rather than as you said keep disconnecting and adjusting the dial.

You can't have them all at different pressures but all of the outlets have their own taps so you can give one keg a boost and then close its tap without affecting the others which had been turned off.

If I may borrow Steve's photo:

On the right hand side at 5 o'clock is the high pressure feed from the gas cylinder. The dial at 1 o'clock shows the cylinder pressure / contents. 7 and 11 o'clock are safety valves. The screw in the middle of the primary regulator controls the outlet pressure at 9 o'clock to the right hand tap and pressure gauge directly above it. Steve has that set around 40psi for force carbonating Weisse and lager, mine is the same for force fizzing wines.

That pressure is then further reduced by the right hand red knob at the top of the board, through the gauge below it and to the 2nd outlet tap from the right. Steve and I both have that at around 20psi for carbonating ales.

That pressure is then further reduced by the left hand red knob at the top of the board, through the left hand gauge, which then supplies the 4 left hand outlets and taps all at the same dispensing pressure, 10psi in Steve's case but around 5psi for me.

 

[BrewDan]

Thanks for clearning that up, so what I want to be looking for is something like a 4 guage regulator. I have seen them on kegworks, but, a bit expensive to have shipped here.

 

[eblis]

Why has the single regulator got to dials?

 

[Runwell-Steve]

If I may borrow Steve's photo:

You may. :)

 

[Moley]

Why has the single regulator got two dials?

Cylinder pressure and output pressure.

 

[Runwell-Steve]

Thanks for clearning that up, so what I want to be looking for is something like a 4 guage regulator. I have seen them on kegworks, but, a bit expensive to have shipped here.

I'm not really sure why you would need 4 different pressures.

Generally speaking you dispense everything at the same pressure, in my case thats 10psi, If you have a different set up with temperature and length of beer line that will differ to suit yourself.

The other pressures are purely there for force carbing as Moley says, 40 psi for the Weisse and Lager, and 20psi for Ales. These 2 aren't connected up all the time though so you can easily adjust the pressures of them ones.

I can't really see a reason for needing any more but you could easily add another second stage regulator to one of these boards by connecting it to the spare outlet at 9 o'clock coming out of the big red knob on the top left of the picture, if you needed it.