From Keg To Bottle?

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thanme

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Hi guys,

So I've had a kegerator setup for going on 6 months now, and I absolutely love it. My big dilemma at the moment is, how do I take quantities the beer with me? I can't host all the parties :p
I guess my thought/hope is that I can get myself a bottle capper, some bottles, sanitise the bottles and somehow bottle up some beer and go. I know it's not going to be as simple as it sounds, so I was hoping someone could shed some light on this for me.

Thanks :D
 
Use a Counter Pressure Bottle Filler to fill your bottles from the keg.
Here's how I made mine

Or you can buy one from Craftbrewer
 
Craft brewer has an attachment which you can attach to your CO2 Cylinder and carbonate up with.
 
Get yourself (or build) a counter pressure bottle filler (have a look, heaps of info on the site), and alss have a listen to the brewing network sunday session dated ~ 14th June. They spent a bit of time talking about transfering from keg to bottle, and various methods. (as an added bonus, angry Jamil makes a showing, funny as)
 
sanatise the bottles, chill them. Turn gas off, vent the pressure in the head space so it pours in a slow dribble. Fill, cap, repressurise keg. Simple. For going out with, this is all you need to do; if you want the beer stored for any length of time (more than a couple of days), counter pressure filler is the way to go.
 
Going to BABBs meeting tonight and you can bet that half the sample beers there will be keg beers drawn off into bottles. You wouldn't know the difference. Heck I even bottle down from (well-chilled) 2L goonie bottles into smaller bottles and they last for weeks.
 
Cool! Doesn't seem that hard at all.
I reckon I'll build one over buying one though, given the cost. I get told I spend too much money on "beer" lately :p

Thanks guys!
 
Craft brewer has an attachment which you can attach to your CO2 Cylinder and carbonate up with.

Will these...

cap.jpg


...carbonate from flat, or are they just for holding the already carbonated pressure from dropping?

What I'm really asking is, could this method be used for instant carbonation from beer bottled flat? Apply CO2, and then poured into a glass?
 
sanatise the bottles, chill them. Turn gas off, vent the pressure in the head space so it pours in a slow dribble. Fill, cap, repressurise keg. Simple. For going out with, this is all you need to do; if you want the beer stored for any length of time (more than a couple of days), counter pressure filler is the way to go.

This is also my method. Works fine for consumption up to several weeks after filling if you CAP ON FOAM. Foam is CO2 bubbles, so if the cap displaces foam, you should only have CO2 in the headspace. Works really easily with a pluto gun.
 
Will these...

cap.jpg


...carbonate from flat, or are they just for holding the already carbonated pressure from dropping?

What I'm really asking is, could this method be used for instant carbonation from beer bottled flat? Apply CO2, and then poured into a glass?

yes... you can use this to carb up flat beer - essentially force carbing a small volume of beer in a PET bottle.
 
yes they will carbonate from flat....but it's not instant. You need to shake the crap out of it to saturate the beer....and the result of that is that you need to let it sit and settle so that you can open it without gushing everywhere. I've used them fairly successfully for a fairly low carb, with about a 15-20minute settle before opening.
 
sanatise the bottles, chill them. Turn gas off, vent the pressure in the head space so it pours in a slow dribble. Fill, cap, repressurise keg. Simple. For going out with, this is all you need to do; if you want the beer stored for any length of time (more than a couple of days), counter pressure filler is the way to go.
this is what i did last night for my caseswap contribution. capped it with the foam in the bottles and even gave it a bit of a 'push back' from the celli taps to get a bit more gas into the bottle.

it worked a treat. cool, clean bottles is the keg and not having the beer rushing out at a great speed.
 
heres a recent description i gave to warren when bottling for the xmas case swap like CM2 about how i attempt to reduce O2 in the bottles.

For bottling i simply degas the keg headspace, attach gas and turn reg on until i hear it just starting to leak into the keg. Then its a simple 45degree fill from a picnic tap.

Cheers! :icon_cheers:


Pretty simple actually. Taking the notion that CO2 is heavier than oxygen, I disconnect my gas post (damn i love JG quick release fittings). Stick the gas tube from the regulator deep into the bottle, crank the reg to around 100kpa and turn the bottle on. You will actually hear the air being pushed out from a sharp whistle to a deep drone as it becomes CO2 against CO2. Then i simply leave the bottles next to me in the coopers box etc whilst i begin my bottling. i do everything in a draft-free area so majority fo the co2 should stay in the bottles without any issues.

Now i know this isnt as good as CPBF and im not considering it as a replacment. But the difference between O2 in the headspace with my method is it really that much of an issue? Im sure there would be a crapload more from beer that is bottle conditioned direct from the fermenter compared to mine.

My main concern is the beer coming in contact with O2 while she fills. IMO, once you pop the lid on, any O2 in the headspace will be pushed up against the bottle top as some CO2 comes out of solution from the beer.

All of my processes post fermentation get this CO2 hit. Empty transfer keg gets purged when kegging from the fermenter. Bottles when bottling from the keg/fermenter, same deal. Keg to Keg transfer, Recieving keg gets the same.

Cheers!
 
Haha. I forgot all about this post!!
Ok, so does capping on foam mean fill it until there's foam at the top? I mean basically coming out of the bottle?
I think I'm grasping the concept :p that would mean all the O2 has effectively been pushed out of the bottle?
Will it be ok to fill the bottles from a tap?? When you say 45 degrees, does the the tap need to be turned or just hold the bottle at 45 degrees?

So many questions, but I'm getting there ;)
Thanks all!
 

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