Racking from Primary to Kegs via Co2

If you tie up the hop bag using just enough line to have the hops submerged, you could remove the hops from the beer by transferring a few pints to your stomach

 

Give this a read @FATC1TY
http://www.bear-flavored.com/2014/09/how-i-dry-hop-my-ipas-with-no-oxygen.html?m=1

 

Yep, I do it all the time. My normal primary is a bucket, so I'm using an auto-siphon to the liquid-out post. When using a carboy I use the racking cane through the orange cap to the liquid-out with CO2 giving it a push.

Not overkill at all. I do exactly this when a spare keg is available . . . the hops stay behind until all the beer has transferred. A quarter-turn on the PRV (receiving keg) and you're good to go. CO2 is your friend.

 

I always do closed transfers for my hoppy beers and often do them for my non-hoppy beers as well.

 

So you have to take the lid off your bucket to start your siphon? I use buckets as well and am interested how you rack to keg in a closed manner with a bucket?

 

From the bucket-to-keg the beer is exposed to air. But I attach a swivel nut to end of siphon tubing and connect to the liquid-out post. This eliminates splashing and the exterior of the tubing never touches the beer. Carboy-to-keg and keg-to-keg are closed.

As koopa mentioned, this isn't restricted to hoppy beers. I have two 3 gallon'ers on my keezer hump that are regularly filled by a closed loop from the larger cornies.

For @FATC1TY: My empties are always stored with sanitized water which is purged before a transfer. Usually some starsan foam is left behind. When transferring in through the liquid post it is common to see the foam "percolate" out through the PRV . . . I consider this normal and it probably even helps sanitize.

 

I do it that way for some beers, not all beers.

 

What sort of swivel nut?

thx

 

Yeah, what sort of swivel nut?

 

I just recently started doing all my kegs this way. I used to CO2 force rack to the bottom of a purged keg by removing the lid and dropping the tubing in, but this last time I did it through the liquid out on all 3 kegs of IPA. I also jumpered them to a new keg after carbing them and allowing them to clear, now I don't have to worry about yeast and hop debris getting swirled into solution when I move the keg. Some of the best drinking IPAs I have made to date.

WARNING: If you do this, do not purge the keg and leave it closed! My first time doing this I had the keg purged at 40 psi and didn't have the PRV opened. When I hooked up the QD to the post it shot 40psi into my closed system under my carboy cap and made the whole Better Bottle boom and jump. Had the carboy cap not popped off it would have exploded the vessel.

 

What the brewer meant to say was "swivel nut with barb":
My siphon tubing is 1/4" so I use a 5/16" barb. I have flare fitting on my liquid post that this attaches to. If your post has a barb fitting just slip the tube over it . . . may need a hose clamp or cable tie, but you're dealing with really low pressures so this isn't super critical.

tsk, tsk

 

recently bought one of the speidel 60L fermenters with a spigot on the bottom. Put a liquid out disconnect on the end of the hose and rack into a purged keg that way (purge the hose as well). I still get oxygen entering the fermenter, so looking for ways to close that end off, but for now it's open...maybe get another spigot up top. Way better than auto-siphon out of a bucket though...

 

So if you are using the orange carboy cap to push co2 in and beer out do you just buy a racking cane to stick in the top? Do you have to buy a fitting to hook up the CO2? And is a sterile filter for the CO2 really necessary?

 

I personally have a SS racking cane in mine. I also bought a flare tip to barb fitting that allows me to attach the swivel nut at the end of my CO2 line to the carboy cap. Like this.

 

Thanks for that link man!

 

That's exactly what I have changed. I recently added the liquid post and jumpers. Need to add them into the blog post and update that.

 

Hmm, trying to figure out how I can utilize this with buckets...