Hi AR Dave,
I don't have any specific references at hand, but when I got into kegging a couple of years ago I found some good summary articles on some of the homebrew vendors websites. As well there are lots of good videos on youtube.
Basically all I do is as follows ……..
- crash cool the carboy for a few days just prior to kegging and add gelatin (unless I'm doing a porter). I don't think it is that important to crash cool, but I have the ability to do it, so I do! I believe it helps avoid chill haze - I always get perfectly clear beers.
- even though I dismantle and clean the kegs as soon as they are empty, I repeat the process before refilling them. I use a flap type brush on a drill to clean the inside of the keg as well as sponges.
Includes pulling the posts off, rinsing al the parts in star san and lubing all the seals with food grade lubricant (replacing any that look to be in need.)
I also bought a special long brush to make sure the inside of the dip tube is completely clean.
After I re-assemble the cleaned keg parts , I slosh a few cups of star san around inside the keg then drain it.
- next, I hook up the CO2 to the keg with the lid off and saran wrap over the lid opening and give it a few shots of CO2 (heavier than air) to fill the keg with CO2 - that way, if the incoming beer splashes around, there is no oxygen to be absorbed
- I now use a sanitized auto siphon to fill the keg.
- when the keg is filled, before putting on the lid, I use a "wine thief" to take a hydrometer sample to check my final gravity. Some folks say not to return the sample to the keg in case of contamination, but I always use a well cleaned and sanitized hydrometer well so I do return the sample to the keg. Never had a problem ………. yet!
- Now I put the lid on the keg and pressurize to about ten psi.
- I do a soap bubble test, mainly around the lid gasket, but also the safety valve and all my gas connections to ensure no leaks. I have lost a few bottle of gas through not being careful enough!)
- I pull the safety valve a few times to purge the headspace in the keg and ensure that there is only CO2 in there.
- now back in the fridge it goes with the gas connected for a week or so at about 39F to carbonate.
I think that is everything! Hope it helps. There is nothing to it once you have done it a couple of times!
Good luck ……………. Brian.
PS - one small tip I have learned! Whenever you hook a gas line up to a full keg of beer, it is not a bad idea to pull the safety valve first and drop the pressure in the keg.
Why? because if you don't and if it happens that your beer level in the keg is above the bottom of the short "gas in" tube in the keg, and if the pressure in your keg is greater than the pressure in your gas line, then when you snap the connector on, you will get beer forced into your gas line!
There will most likely be a check valve that will prevent the beer from backing up into your gas regulator and casing more serious problems, but even so, you don't want beer residue in your gas lines which could possibly cause problems with future batches.
This has happened to me a couple of times before I smartened up (no guarantee it won't happen again though!). Whenever it has happened, I have dismantled the gas lines and throughly cleaned and dried them.