Black 5ltr Mini Keg With Built In Tap

Excellent and very quick service!

5ltr Mini Keg

Hi. Saw these and bought 2 as they were cheap. Arrived quickly and I thought they looked good. Bought them as I brew 23-24l batches and thought after I fill my corny keg that I could use one of these for the remaining beer. Said they didn't need sanitised but I did it anyway just to be safe. Have both filled with a raspberry sour berliner weisse for during the euros.

Great keg - very convenient

TLDR: The product is good, and much better than bottling-up!

I'm just trying these mini kegs for the first time with a couple of 25 litre brews. I decided to try them because, hey, who wants to wash another bottle, right?! (Seriously, I got bottle washing burn out!)

I'm using the supplied bungs and the integrated tap. As I'm only on my first rack-up, I can't speak to reusability or longevity, but first impressions are that this looks very positive. The kegs are robust, more than they look in pics. The taps are printed "Fass Frisch", a company renowned for high quality products, and the taps live up to that.

The supplied handles clip on nicely, and are far better than my first-glance suspicions. The moment I cautiously lifted the first full keg by the handle my worries were gone.

As for usage, filling's a little awkward. I used a bottle buddy, and a torch to peer into the keg! A source online suggested putting the keg on scales and filling to a certain weight, which seems sensible to me, but I thought I'd make life difficult for myself first time around! (A fishing float would probably do the trick well.) I batch primed, intentionally under-priming (~2.5g granulated per litre for an IPA, much less than bottling), there are lots of warnings when reading up about over-priming 5L kegs, so I went with better to be under-carbed than under the floor boards! I'm not fussed about that this time, as I intend to get a Party Star tap for the next run.

With the pressure from priming sugar, the build up allows about 300mL of "under pressure" dispensing before the bung's valve needs to be opened, then the flow is fairly slow - curse Earth's weak gravity! The pressure will build up again over a half-day or so, but be aware that air's getting in every time, so not advisable to keep a started keg for "too long". A good excuse to drink the brew, and another good reason to get the Party Star tap: no air ingress. That setup would probably keep the brew good for over six months, maybe a year - but don't take my word for that, others would know much better. And anyway, who's keeping an open keg for a year?

The kegs also gave me a feeling of being a little bit more "pro", more set up, a slightly better homebrewer! I will defo be getting more.