Storing Cornie kegs

[Rob Martin]

I have always stored my cornie kegs upright when they have beer in them. Are there any concerns about storing them on their sides either during conditioning or serving?

Thanks

[Matt]

Well for serving it's a question of where your dip-tube is. Obviously, upright is the only right way to serve. the headspace of pushing CO2 needs to be above the opening of the dip-tube to work properly, and you won't get all your beer out of the keg if the dip tube isn't in the lowest point of the keg. I suppose if you have a long and straight tube drawing from the side, you COULD serve on its side, but I'm hard-pressed to find a reason you'd want to.

For conditioning... well, again, there's a good reason to keep it upright. You want any sediment to fall to the bottom and settle where it can get blown out the dip-tube on the first pulls. If you condition on its side, the minute you disturb the keg, all that sediment is going to go right back into suspension, and then you've got murky beer again.

Matt

[DJ in KC]

I've served a couple almost on their side, cooler size/shape gave me no choice. Just watch how you hook everything up since the in tube will probably be submerged. Transferred off the yeast/trub to another keg for a clean traveling keg. Just position it so the diptube can pick up the most it can - you can finish the last pull or two upright since there's not junk left at the bottom. Worked OK for me until I bought some 3 gal kegs a couple years ago.