# How Much Dextrose When Kegging?



## BungalowBill (13/9/09)

Hi fellow Brewers,
I have been doing kits and kegging them , no probs and have been happy with everything, I have been just adding the kilo of Dextrose or whatever to the wort to ferment.
I have been reading a Morgans,pamphlet and they say to add and extra 200g of Dextrose to correct the alcohol percentage when kegging. I haven't been doing this so I suppose my batches haven't had the mind blowing bang, which is a good thing I suppose.
The question is , the kegs hold 19 litres and the rest I get about 3 pet bottles. Do I add more dextrose for the carbonation process in the bottle or just let it fly and be happy with what I have obtained so far.
BB


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## boybrewer (13/9/09)

BungalowBill said:


> Hi fellow Brewers,
> I have been doing kits and kegging them , no probs and have been happy with everything, I have been just adding the kilo of Dextrose or whatever to the wort to ferment.
> I have been reading a Morgans,pamphlet and they say to add and extra 200g of Dextrose to correct the alcohol percentage when kegging. I haven't been doing this so I suppose my batches haven't had the mind blowing bang, which is a good thing I suppose.
> The question is , the kegs hold 19 litres and the rest I get about 3 pet bottles. Do I add more dextrose for the carbonation process in the bottle or just let it fly and be happy with what I have obtained so far.
> BB



I don't keg cause I'm not rich enough to afford them,however I bulk prime and usually use around 128 to 142 gms in 23lt just depends on the temp and what the beer is.So I would just let it fly and see how you go .If you want to confirm this try the search icon or google top of the page on the right.

Cheers (BB)
Mike


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## buttersd70 (13/9/09)

BungalowBill said:


> Hi fellow Brewers,
> I have been doing kits and kegging them , no probs and have been happy with everything, I have been just adding the kilo of Dextrose or whatever to the wort to ferment.
> I have been reading a Morgans,pamphlet and they say to add and extra 200g of Dextrose to correct the alcohol percentage when kegging. I haven't been doing this so I suppose my batches haven't had the mind blowing bang, which is a good thing I suppose.
> The question is , the kegs hold 19 litres and the rest I get about 3 pet bottles. Do I add more dextrose for the carbonation process in the bottle or just let it fly and be happy with what I have obtained so far.
> BB



O....M....F....G. Is this what they really say???????? Jebus save me.....

OK. The amount of dex you want for a given beer can be worked out in the calculator in this article. LINK. There is a link in the article to a calculator, and the article is how to accurately use the calculator. For KEGS, you work it out, and then HALVE it. Kegs only take _half _as much dextrose to prime as bottles. And bear in mind, this is only if you want to naturally prime the kegs....if you want to carbonate them by using your co2 bottle, then no sugar of any kind is required in the keg at all. Not. One. Gram. So prime the bottles individually and run them off first as the easier option.


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## goomboogo (14/9/09)

Butters, I think he's talking about adding 200 grams of extra fermentables to the wort to slightly increase the alcohol content of the finished beer as the force carbonated keg won't have any extra fermentables added at packaging as in the case of bottle conditioned beers. I don't think the 200g of dextrose mentioned has anything to do with the amount required to naturally carbonate the keg.

This is the way I read it but I could be wrong.


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## buttersd70 (14/9/09)

aaaaahhhh. _IF _kegging, not _when _kegging. To allow for the additional alcohol that would have been produced had it been bottle conditioned...and this 200g would be added at the _start _of ferment, now at the time of going to keg....

I'm on the right page now, I read it that they were saying add 200g to the keg (which of course is ridiculous).

in that case, to the OP...you could increase the fermentables to account for the different abv between bottles and kegs....but honestly, I don't think most people would bother.


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## Bribie G (14/9/09)

I usually add about 90g of sugar to the keg, treating it like a giant bottle, just to get some carbonation going while it is waiting its turn to go into the kegerator. I do this to get cheap gas as opposed to paying BOC for the stuff, not to adjust the alcohol content. 200g sounds over the top.


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## BungalowBill (16/9/09)

BribieG said:


> I usually add about 90g of sugar to the keg, treating it like a giant bottle, just to get some carbonation going while it is waiting its turn to go into the kegerator. I do this to get cheap gas as opposed to paying BOC for the stuff, not to adjust the alcohol content. 200g sounds over the top.



Thanks guys for the input, It was just a querie as I had not come across it before and I don't think it mentions it on the cans. I had just added the kilo at the beginning of the brew and have only added 120g of dex to carb the keg whilst it was waiting for me to drink the keg in the fridge, now that I have upgraded to a kegerator I can fit 3 kegs in.  
I will put another 200g in my next brew and see what the out come will be.
The only question is waht about the 3 PET bottles, the sugars should be fermented out when priming sugar is added and capped is that right?
Cheers BB


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## The Big Burper (17/9/09)

BungalowBill said:


> Thanks guys for the input, It was just a querie as I had not come across it before and I don't think it mentions it on the cans. I had just added the kilo at the beginning of the brew and have only added 120g of dex to carb the keg whilst it was waiting for me to drink the keg in the fridge, now that I have upgraded to a kegerator I can fit 3 kegs in.
> I will put another 200g in my next brew and see what the out come will be.
> The only question is waht about the 3 PET bottles, the sugars should be fermented out when priming sugar is added and capped is that right?
> Cheers BB




BB,

The priming sugar for the bottles would be the same as if you were bottling the whole
batch.

cheers
BB


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## phoenixdigital (12/2/12)

Sorry to bring up and old thread but I thought I would give some advise to those adding dextrose to a keg. Something I just learned about the hard way.

When adding dextrose to a keg I recommend you dissolve into water first. I found out that adding the dextrose directly into the keg creates something like a grade 2 science experiment making fake volcanoes with bicarb and vinegar.

After much mopping and wiping down of equipment everything is back to normal.

I will do this outside next time as well.


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