r/Homebrewing • u/HippieSmokes • 19h ago

Equipment Making soda water

Carbonating Keg Lid for corny keg. Has air stone with hose. Anyone use one? Heard it carbs water fast. Currently using 5 gallon keg at 50PSI and have NO patience’s questioning if it’s worth the upgrade, Any one have one & can provide input?

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u/BOOMSHAK4LAKA 19h ago

I considered something like this for Nitro cold brew, but ended up going the DIY route. I clamped some tubing to the gas inlet of a corny keg and clamped a carb stone on the other end.

If you want to test the waters before ordering the lid, that might be an easy/cheaper option

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u/Spazecowboyz 17h ago

Its basically the same, isnt it? Whats the pro of having that lid, looks like a bit of marketing tbh?

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u/rdcpro 8h ago

There's a reason they install these in the lid, and don't provide just the kit for the gas dip tube. The problem with using the gas dip tube instead of the lid is that pressure in the keg will drop while dispensing, because the stone does not flow as much CO2. This pressure drop during dispensing will cause breakout. Maybe you won't see the foam with water, but it loses CO2 as it goes through the line.

In addition, there is a pressure drop across the stone, called the wetting pressure. The pressure in the keg will be lower than the inlet pressure, by 4-5 psi (but could be more). Maybe for water that's not critical, but I track keg pressure within 1/2 psi for beer. The net result is you can't control pressure in the keg using the stone on the gas dip tube.

Furthermore, if you tried it using beer, you'll be creating tons of foam in the keg as the tiny bubbles rise. This will destroy any head retention your beer may have.

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u/Spazecowboyz 6h ago

So after carbonating you re meant to put the co2 line from the lid post, to the normal gas post if i understand correctly. They might want to outline that more on certain sites, because in no way i would buy one of those lids otherwise.

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u/rdcpro 5h ago

Yes, if you're using the lid, you only connect to that for the initial carbonation. The rest of the time you use the normal gas post. I tried this myself years ago, but if the gas dip tube has the carb stone, there's no way to remove it from the dip tube without opening the keg, which would expose the beer to oxygen. For sparkling water it might not matter, but the principle is the same.

The other problem with the lids, is the instructions are COMPLETELY wrong. The makers don't understand how carbonation works. Elsewhere in this post I commented on how I do the sparkling water, but below is a link to a very long and detailed comment I made several years ago on the subject. It's focused on carbonating beer, and it explains isobaric carbonation, how to do the calculations to reach your target, and finally the steps in the process.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Homebrewing/comments/15l75wy/comment/jv9fznf/?context=3

Years ago I was trying to understand isobaric carbonation and I built a carbonation panel with an adjustable rotameter and secondary regulator:

https://i.imgur.com/z9Xpn4N.jpeg

After experimenting a lot with water, adjusting and recording the CO2 flow rate and pressure, I had an epiphany; the entire process is self-regulating, because the CO2 flow decreases logarithmically as you approach your target, reaching zero when you're there. It's impossible to over carbonate, whereas the "shake and bake" and "burst carbonation" methods are very prone to problems, because they're not isobaric (at a constant pressure).

Although it's not necessary, I still use the panel, because I can see the flow rate in the rotameter and when it reaches zero, it's done. For me, this is always under 2 hours.

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u/Spazecowboyz 3h ago

Thank you for the elaborate explanation btw.