Ask The Brewmasters

I'm having an issue with kegs in the market being returned for being foamy. For awhile, it was only beer that was 4-5 months old but now we're getting returns from one month old beer. I don't have a lab to detect any micro contamination, but our beer always tastes great and uninfected in our taproom. We've also never had a foamy keg in our taproom, which is where about half of our production volume is sold through.

We sell our kegs through a distributor, which stores them cold until they're sold to an account.

The kegs I'm using are about 5 years old or less, from keg leases I inherited from the former brewery owners. They are all stainless steel and from reputable manufacturers.

I wash the kegs with a two head semi-auto keg washer that purges the kegs, rinses with 150 F water, caustic cycle, hot water rinse, PAA sainitizer, then charges to 11-12 psi of CO2. I've lengthened the times of most steps and a full cycle of cleaning 2 kegs is about 10 minutes. I don't use chemicals for more than 50 kegs, and check that after the last washing cycle, the caustic is still slippery and the PAA is still at an acceptable PPM. 

We've had issues with haze in our beers, which I believe is coming from proteins from hot side production. About a year ago, I started adding Brausol Special post-fermentation to clarify with good results. About 6 months ago, I started also adding it to my wort post-whirlpool.

Does anyone have any insight into what I'm doing wrong or should look into? Much appreciated.

I'm having an issue with kegs in the market being returned for being foamy. For awhile, it was only beer that was 4-5 months old but now we're getting returns from one month old beer. I don't have a lab to detect any micro contamination, but our beer always tastes great and uninfected in our taproom. We've also never had a foamy keg in our taproom, which is where about half of our production volume is sold through.

We sell our kegs through a distributor, which stores them cold until they're sold to an account.

The kegs I'm using are about 5 years old or less, from keg leases I inherited from the former brewery owners. They are all stainless steel and from reputable manufacturers.

I wash the kegs with a two head semi-auto keg washer that purges the kegs, rinses with 150 F water, caustic cycle, hot water rinse, PAA sainitizer, then charges to 11-12 psi of CO2. I've lengthened the times of most steps and a full cycle of cleaning 2 kegs is about 10 minutes. I don't use chemicals for more than 50 kegs, and check that after the last washing cycle, the caustic is still slippery and the PAA is still at an acceptable PPM. 

We've had issues with haze in our beers, which I believe is coming from proteins from hot side production. About a year ago, I started adding Brausol Special post-fermentation to clarify with good results. About 6 months ago, I started also adding it to my wort post-whirlpool.

Does anyone have any insight into what I'm doing wrong or should look into? Much appreciated.

What is the volume of CO2 in the returned keg?

What was the finished gravity of the original beer when packaged? What is the specific gravity of the returned beer?

I'm having an issue with kegs in the market being returned for being foamy. For awhile, it was only beer that was 4-5 months old but now we're getting returns from one month old beer. I don't have a lab to detect any micro contamination, but our beer always tastes great and uninfected in our taproom. We've also never had a foamy keg in our taproom, which is where about half of our production volume is sold through.

We sell our kegs through a distributor, which stores them cold until they're sold to an account.

The kegs I'm using are about 5 years old or less, from keg leases I inherited from the former brewery owners. They are all stainless steel and from reputable manufacturers.

I wash the kegs with a two head semi-auto keg washer that purges the kegs, rinses with 150 F water, caustic cycle, hot water rinse, PAA sainitizer, then charges to 11-12 psi of CO2. I've lengthened the times of most steps and a full cycle of cleaning 2 kegs is about 10 minutes. I don't use chemicals for more than 50 kegs, and check that after the last washing cycle, the caustic is still slippery and the PAA is still at an acceptable PPM. 

We've had issues with haze in our beers, which I believe is coming from proteins from hot side production. About a year ago, I started adding Brausol Special post-fermentation to clarify with good results. About 6 months ago, I started also adding it to my wort post-whirlpool.

Does anyone have any insight into what I'm doing wrong or should look into? Much appreciated.

What is the volume of CO2 in the returned keg?

What was the finished gravity of the original beer when packaged? What is the specific gravity of the returned beer?

I'm having an issue with kegs in the market being returned for being foamy. For awhile, it was only beer that was 4-5 months old but now we're getting returns from one month old beer. I don't have a lab to detect any micro contamination, but our beer always tastes great and uninfected in our taproom. We've also never had a foamy keg in our taproom, which is where about half of our production volume is sold through.

We sell our kegs through a distributor, which stores them cold until they're sold to an account.

The kegs I'm using are about 5 years old or less, from keg leases I inherited from the former brewery owners. They are all stainless steel and from reputable manufacturers.

I wash the kegs with a two head semi-auto keg washer that purges the kegs, rinses with 150 F water, caustic cycle, hot water rinse, PAA sainitizer, then charges to 11-12 psi of CO2. I've lengthened the times of most steps and a full cycle of cleaning 2 kegs is about 10 minutes. I don't use chemicals for more than 50 kegs, and check that after the last washing cycle, the caustic is still slippery and the PAA is still at an acceptable PPM. 

We've had issues with haze in our beers, which I believe is coming from proteins from hot side production. About a year ago, I started adding Brausol Special post-fermentation to clarify with good results. About 6 months ago, I started also adding it to my wort post-whirlpool.

Does anyone have any insight into what I'm doing wrong or should look into? Much appreciated.

I'm having an issue with kegs in the market being returned for being foamy. For awhile, it was only beer that was 4-5 months old but now we're getting returns from one month old beer. I don't have a lab to detect any micro contamination, but our beer always tastes great and uninfected in our taproom. We've also never had a foamy keg in our taproom, which is where about half of our production volume is sold through.

We sell our kegs through a distributor, which stores them cold until they're sold to an account.

The kegs I'm using are about 5 years old or less, from keg leases I inherited from the former brewery owners. They are all stainless steel and from reputable manufacturers.

I wash the kegs with a two head semi-auto keg washer that purges the kegs, rinses with 150 F water, caustic cycle, hot water rinse, PAA sainitizer, then charges to 11-12 psi of CO2. I've lengthened the times of most steps and a full cycle of cleaning 2 kegs is about 10 minutes. I don't use chemicals for more than 50 kegs, and check that after the last washing cycle, the caustic is still slippery and the PAA is still at an acceptable PPM. 

We've had issues with haze in our beers, which I believe is coming from proteins from hot side production. About a year ago, I started adding Brausol Special post-fermentation to clarify with good results. About 6 months ago, I started also adding it to my wort post-whirlpool.

Does anyone have any insight into what I'm doing wrong or should look into? Much appreciated.

I'm having an issue with kegs in the market being returned for being foamy. For awhile, it was only beer that was 4-5 months old but now we're getting returns from one month old beer. I don't have a lab to detect any micro contamination, but our beer always tastes great and uninfected in our taproom. We've also never had a foamy keg in our taproom, which is where about half of our production volume is sold through.

We sell our kegs through a distributor, which stores them cold until they're sold to an account.

The kegs I'm using are about 5 years old or less, from keg leases I inherited from the former brewery owners. They are all stainless steel and from reputable manufacturers.

I wash the kegs with a two head semi-auto keg washer that purges the kegs, rinses with 150 F water, caustic cycle, hot water rinse, PAA sainitizer, then charges to 11-12 psi of CO2. I've lengthened the times of most steps and a full cycle of cleaning 2 kegs is about 10 minutes. I don't use chemicals for more than 50 kegs, and check that after the last washing cycle, the caustic is still slippery and the PAA is still at an acceptable PPM. 

We've had issues with haze in our beers, which I believe is coming from proteins from hot side production. About a year ago, I started adding Brausol Special post-fermentation to clarify with good results. About 6 months ago, I started also adding it to my wort post-whirlpool.

Does anyone have any insight into what I'm doing wrong or should look into? Much appreciated.