Keg Best Practices

• Freezing temperature is higher than regular beer ⟹ NA beer has some potential to freeze in the lines, though our trials have shown resistance to freezing at standard glycol temperatures of -2ºC. If you have any freezing issues or the beer isn’t behaving, get in touch via the contact details below, and we’ll have a team member come through as soon as possible. 
• No preserving effect from alcohol ⟹ NA beer is more susceptible to contamination by external yeast that could cause refermentation in the keg. We are confident that our recipe formulation has cracked the code for the contamination issue, but a little added good practice will make it bulletproof!

• Keep hygiene top of mind: Wash and/or disinfect hands with spray before handling and minimise contact with critical connection points.
• Keg Changing/Line Cleaning: These cool room actions create the situation most likely to introduce cross contamination. Alcohol or disinfectant spray is your friend! Liberally spray the couplers, keg tops, and connection valves every time you change a NA keg or swap a fitting for line cleaning, etc. NB: the washout line connection also needs to be sprayed with disinfectant.
• Dedicated NA Line: The line dedicated to NA beer should be chemically cleaned, using your standard chemicals, prior to tapping your first keg. Make sure you also clean the COUPLER to be used, either by bucket soaking with chemical or by including it in the cleaning cycle using a cup for recirculation.
• Identifying Tags for beer lines and couplers: Minimise the potential for cross contamination with regular beer products by clearly tagging your gear. These tags will be supplied by Heaps Normal to get you started.
• Serving Temperature: Realistically, a system running at -2º to -1ºC should not present problems to NA beer in the lines. If there are any freezing events in your venue, notify us and we will come out asap to assess and work with you to find the best solution for your venue. 
• Line Cleaning Frequency: We highly recommend a weekly line cleaning for NA products to stay on top of any build up of contaminants. We are closely monitoring this aspect, and will review the recommendation based on the feedback from our initial customers. 

• Storage Temperature: Store NA kegs between +4º to +8ºC. This usually isn’t a problem, as cool rooms are generally kept within that range already. If storing NA kegs at ambient temperatures, ensure kegs are placed in the cool room and fully cold before tapping. Like regular beers, pouring warm NA beer results in lots of foam and wastage.
• Line Cleaning: As above, a weekly line clean is highly recommended. Regular and consistent line cleaning will go a long way towards keeping your NA beer in tip top shape (just like those regular beers!). No different methods or chemicals are required. Just remember to use your disinfectant spray liberally.
• Keg and Line Pressure: No difference here! As long as the temperature is right, NA beer will act just like a regular beer on its way through the taps, so no need to change your gas pressures or run separate gas feeds. For example: if beer pumps are used, then head pressure for standard mixed gas (55% CO2) can stay at 1.0 - 1.2 bar. If using head pressure to serve the keg, then the standard of 1.5 - 1.7 bar can be set on the regulator. We do not recommend using pure CO2 as a serving gas.
• Standard best practices at the bar will benefit NA beers as well as regular beers: cleaning the taps daily or weekly; inspection of the rubber gaskets in the taps and font connections; don’t dunk the tap nozzle into the pint while pouring; use tap plugs overnight to avoid bar flies, etc.

Feel free to contact us at any time for any queries! Find contact information below.