kegging vs bottling

[rabbie]

I'm a bottler so far, but considering a couple of small cornelius kegs. Not sure I am a big enough drinker for it to be worthwhile though.
How long can beer sit in a cornelius keg once I start drinking?
I'm thinking about a couple of 9 litre kegs, and then bottling the rest of the batch (18 litres, half in a keg half in bottles).
The average week for me is anything from 1 to 3 litres beer, is the keg going to be off by the time I get to the end?
How much extra gear will I need to get started and how much CO2 would I be needing?
Also wondering how it'll work with storage, I keep my bottles in the basement and bring them up and into the fridge for an hour before drinking. No space/chance of permission for a keg in the flat, so I'll need to go down to the basement for a glass and drink it at cellar temp...?
Are you all using beer fridges in the garage? :wha:

 

[Moley]

I've only just started using Cornelius kegs (in addition to bottling), so I'm really not the best person to advise, but I understand that if you purge any oxygen from the keg when filling and then pressurise with CO2, the beer will still keep for many months, perhaps as much as a year.

I don't brew lager, I like my beers cool but not cold, carbonated but not fizzy, so for me cellar temperature of around 12°C is just about perfect.

 

[Halite]

The beer will keep for a long time in the keg and so you would easily finish it before it goes off. In terms of extra gear you will need the corny keg, a CO2 bottle, a regulator, quick disconnects, a beer tap and the beer and gas lines. The regulator is going to be the expensive part of all of that.

A 5lb CO2 tank will last you a very long time with a 9l corny, possibly 10-15 brews.

In terms of temperature I have my corny's in a keggerator, but I know quite a lot of guys who just have then in their garage of shed and it is fine.

 

[rabbie]

Thanks for the replies.
I am a bit dubious about having to go down to the basement every time I want a re-fill. I'm in a flat just now and always manage to bump into the neighbours when I'm collecting a bottle from the basement as it is, I've taken to bringing them up in brown paper bags :lol:
If you take a pint a night one night do you have to wash the beer line after? Sometimes it might be a week or so between samplings.

 

[Halite]

If you take a pint a night one night do you have to wash the beer line after? Sometimes it might be a week or so between samplings.

no it should be fine, if you have relatively short beer lines then at most the beer in the line is going to account for about 1/20th of your pint so I wouldn't worry about it.