Brewery Sizes

It means they can brew 2.5 barrels (i.e. 720 pints) in one batch.

Then you've not heard of Dogfish Head in Lewes, Delaware, Uncle Sugar? When they started out, they brewed 12 US gallons at a time. That's about

10.3 real gallons, or just over a quarter of a barrel (or, alternatively, about a firkin and spillage).

A very nice micro here started out with a 30 litre setup made with converted Budweiser kegs. His beer was obviously good enough for him to afford to import a more professional setup.

:-)

Pictures of now and then here:

Wayne

Thanks for that.

No another question. When a tap is inserted into a cask, it pushes what looks like a wooden bung into the cask. How are these retrieved back at the brewery?

Dave

The keystone, which is the plastic or wooden bung that seals the hole in the end of the cask, has a weak central section and a stronger ring. With plastic keystones, bashing the tap through typically tears the central section on one side, pushing it out of the way. With wooden keystones, the central section floats to the top of the beer inside the cask.

When the cask is returned to the brewery the shive (big bung on the side of the cask) and the remains of the keystone are removed, the ullage is drained out (along with broken bits of keystone, etc.), and the cask is cleaned.

A fresh keystone and shive are used each time the cask is re-used. It is also sometimes necessary to replace the keystone or shive when the cask is full: for example, if a cask has to be re-fined, a fresh shive will be fitted once the finings have been added.

Steve Early