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So, I've seen people mention Corny kegs as a fermenter. I've been a little confused about this for a while. The reason is my batches of beer are 23L and my corny kegs are 19L. What type of magic is used to fit 23L in 19L? I see people looking for "23L corny kegs" do such animals exist or are they like unicorns and dragons? Are they just confused that a 5Gal (US) is 23L when it's really 19L?

I figured the only way I was going to be able to ferment in a "keg" is to use a Sanke keg or throw away 4 litres of wort (never going to happen).

I don't use cornies for fermenters. They have a few issues for me.

Have you seen that on this forum? Supposedly American brewers brew smaller batches (according to Wyeast) which are probably 5 US Gal by the time they hit the secondary. I usually have 6Gal of beer by the time I get to the secondary. I think (but I'm no expert) that the 23L cornies are like unicorns and dragons.

I think people who use corneys as fermenters are brewing up a 17-19L batch, with the understanding that it's not all about the volume, but more about the closed system that is appealing. Easy to do in any brewing software.
For people starting from Festbrew kits, you could: boil it down to that volume, use a corney for most and a 4L growler for the rest, or ditch the extra (or use that as starter wort for yeast, etc).

I have split 20l to 2 cornies and used a racking tube to transfer to one corny.

I don't want to cut the dip tube to transfer with gas.

Sandy

Just as a side note, the guy from ontario beer kegs said in another post that they are getting 23L cornies in.

GAM wrote:I have split 20l to 2 cornies and used a racking tube to transfer to one corny.

I don't want to cut the dip tube to transfer with gas.

Sandy

I was thinking about splitting but I figured the extra work of dealing with two separate kegs would outweigh any benefit. Plus I was worried about the extra space left in the keg above the beer. Normally there'd be a small amount of space to purge, but splitting means that each keg has 6+ litres of empty space.

Oh I was thinking about two 3gal kegs, but that seems like a very expensive option.

Can't you use a pipe bender to bend the dip tube? But that might just be a overly complicated.

I always have to bottle 10 before I keg. If I don't it won't fit in the corny Also I end up with a large emergency supply of bottles that have nicely aged . It's my beer equivalent of leaving a twenty in an old coat to find later.

GAM wrote:I have split 20l to 2 cornies and used a racking tube to transfer to one corny.

I don't want to cut the dip tube to transfer with gas.

Sandy

This. My personal favourite is 10gal batch into 3 kegs, then filter down to 2 kegs full of goodness

protectivedad wrote: I was thinking about splitting but I figured the extra work of dealing with two separate kegs would outweigh any benefit. Plus I was worried about the extra space left in the keg above the beer.

It's CO2, don't worry about it. I've been known to ferment wine or beer in a half-full primary.

LiverDance wrote:Just as a side note, the guy from ontario beer kegs said in another post that they are getting 23L cornies in.

Hey LiverDance, did you ever figure out that pressure lock thing for a 10gal keg?

My issue with fermenting in the keg is that you need to vent the CO2. It's probably not hard to overcome, it has just been a bad experience that jades me (3am stout soaked ceiling).

You could always use a spending valve to deal with the pressure issue: http://www.ontariobeerkegs.com/Spunding ... unding.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;