king keg pressures

[paulg]

I currently use king kegs and have a problem with my beer being over carbonated
what amount of priming suger do people use I have been using 80 grams for 23 litres but think maybe this is too much.
I have no idea what pressure my kegs are at so am thinking of putting a widget world manifold on them with a 8 gram co2 converter as I am unable to get ww cylinders here
has anyone experience of the ww manifold and does the gauge give pressure in side of keg also is the relief valve adjustable for pressure as I would like to serve the beer with just enough pressure to keep condition in beer without being over fizzy
if anyone has a successful setup I would be interested to know

[Shrunken Reaper]

How over-carbed is it?

I usually use about that much and I haven't had any issues with OVERcarbination at all... but then I tend to 'check' my brews pretty consistently, so i might be fighting it that way

[paulg]

well both my last 2 brews have required no extra co2 to serve right up to and including the last pint in fact it was still very fizzy.I may be over reacting to having had a king keg split on me that may have been due to a stuck pressure release rubber as I would have expected excess gas to be vented before keg failure,that is why I am looking for ways of monitoring/lowering carbination levels

[Eric]

I may be over reacting to having had a king keg split on me that may have been due to a stuck pressure release rubber as I would have expected excess gas to be vented before keg failure

Not over but sensibly.
I too use about 80 gm and on odd occasions it will empty the keg as it did the last time it was used.
Might I suggest you continue what you are doing for the present and, after the first day, slide down the band to see it is free, confirm the vessel is gas tight and release some of the pressure. Then do the same after say one and two weeks which should reduce carbonation and vent some of the volatiles you don't want in the barrel.

[Wezzel]

I added car tyre valves to my KK lids so I can check the pressures. I add normally prime with 70g of dextrose and after about a week indoors I am usually up to 10 psi. I then put the keg in the garage where the lower temperatures slow the carbonation. I have noticed, however, that the KK pressure valves don't always work terribly well and i have seen my keg pressure reach 14 or 15psi.

Now i regularly check them and manually vent the pressure to 10psi. I must admit my beer is still probably over carbonated but I would rather that than have flat beer. I think I may go down to 60g or even 50g of priming sugar next time. Especially as the weather is getting warmer.

[MikeG]

I also use KKs (top tap) and I bought pressure gauges for them. I got them from Amazon for around £1.50 each. They have ¼ inch tapered BSP connectors which means that I could drill a hole (11.8mm is the tapping drill to use apparently; I used 10mm) in the KK's lid, and just used the connector to cut a thread in the lid which worked well as the connector is tapered. I then took it out again and wrapped a bit of PTFE tape around it to give it a good seal when I screwed it back in. Note. I drilled the hole as near to the edge as possible to keep it clear of the S30 CO2 adaptor.

I prime with 100g of ordinary sugar and the resulting pressure varies a lot from brew to brew.

I've found that you need around 100mB minimum to get a reasonable head which is what my currently drinking brew is standing at. My currently maturing brew is sitting at around 750mB and, so far, it's not leaked; fingers crossed. I'm a bit surprised that the release valve hasn't operated as it seems a lot of pressure. Imagine a 7.5 metre column of water over it!!

[MikeG]

Actually, I've been thinking; The amount of CO2 dissolved in the beer is dependant on the pressure as well as the temperature. So, you would expect the pressure to rise as the secondary fermentation proceeds then, when the pressure is high enough, some of the gas will just dissolve so the pressure will rise more slowly. Then, when you pour a pint, the top pressure will fall initially and then it will rise again as CO2 comes out of solution.

QED