Root Beer is Pure Foam?... Ideas?

[EFaden]

Hey all,

I have a keg of Sprecher's Root Beer and am having an issue with it. I made up the batch about three weeks ago and it was going great. I force carbed at about 35 PSI. It was coming out perfectly. My fridge froze over and now all I get out of the keg is pure foam. Anyone have any ideas how to fix it?

 

[bdupree]

make sure the post from the keg isn't stuck or any ice still in the line

 

[EFaden]

Thats a good idea... I'll take it apart tomorrow.

 

[thughes]

Had a similar issue with my keezer a few weeks ago resulting in 3 kegs (and a few cases of bottles) freezing solid. After I got a handle on the temp, all my beer was pouring as nothing but foam. I suspect that the temp drop allowed additional CO2 to be absorbed by the beer as it cooled and finally froze, resulting in super-over-carbonated beer once it warmed back up again.

Working on this assumption, I shut down the gas to the kegs and then purged excess CO2 over the course of several days until the beer was completely flat. Turned the gas back on, waited a few days for it to carb back up to the proper level, and was rewarded with beer that once again poured properly and had the correct amount of carbonation.

 

[EFaden]

Pretty much what I am doing... I didn't think about the Temperature vs CO2 problem. That really explains why I have way too much gas in there. Are you in Rochester, NY?

 

[thughes]

Pretty much what I am doing... I didn't think about the Temperature vs CO2 problem. That really explains why I have way too much gas in there. Are you in Rochester, NY?

Yes I am, I didn't look at your location before now. I'm in Charlotte, near the cemeteries.

Strange coincidence that we're both in Rochester, I had the same "freeze" problem recently, and the only reason I stopped in here instead of the beer side of the forums is that I just bottled up my first batch of root beer tonight and needed to do a bit of research (extract).

Cheers!