Gas near misses

[Beerbuddha]

I have only just started kegging and was surprised how easy the C02 can affect you when purging the kegs of air in a confined space. You get dizzy fairly fast and this stuff can kill you. I have experiance with C02 in my work but its easy to drop all your training as soon as you walk past the gate at home.

So who else has a near miss story involving C02  ?
Also has anyone got themselves any sort of C02 detection meter for there brew shed ?

The mix of alcohol drinking and C02 that leaks in a brew shed = No fun.

[brenmurph]

Put in a vented floor

[Beerbuddha]

why i aughta  :

[Ciderhead]

Co2 is heavier than air so should have not had that effect, light headedness, blurred vision and unstable on your feet, your pissed!
I had a flush of it looking into a  tipped corny once, not nice, just breathe the oxy welding gas these days

[Beerbuddha]

But if one was on his knees and the co2 vents from safety valve..... it kinda blasts in ones face..but my main taught was if you had a snooze in brewshed and there was a leak from a keg you had hooked up to c02 bottle it could cause you issues during the night. Touch wood it never happens to anyone so hence the question about others experiance 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

You raise a valid point, BB there's enough CO2 in a cylinder to overcome you in an enclosed area,
Best to do your kegging with the door open or with a vent low down in the wall/ door. I had often considered the same risks around opening a fridge/fermentation chamber with an active fermentation taking place, in this case you won't be at risk of being killed but it could be enough to make you fall, Especially if you stick your head in quickly, before the gas has had a chance to dissipate. This would be particularly relevant to converted chest freezers. A blow off tube outside the freezer would sort out this risk.
Regarding detection the old way was a lighted candle at floor level, but this probably is a higher fire risk than the co2 risk.
Makes you think about all the American homebuyers kegging in their basements, there must be some near misses out there!

[Beerbuddha]

Exactly there has to be some poor sods who ended hitting the floor in a basement for sure.

The main thing is as you say " I have taught about it myself ".  The more we discuss it the people are made aware of the risks associated with it especially new people starting the brewing. God I sound like one of those boring safely officers lol

[mcgrath]

Was on a building site once where a guy thought it would be funny to spray a fire extinguisher into a room some of us where in.  Horrible feeling like your nose and mouth is all fizzy. By the time I left the room and found air I was about to collapse. I have the CO2 keg setup and also fermentation fridge and have thought about the risk myself. But I have never noticed anything really from syphoning into a corny full of CO2 or fermentor that even comes close. I don't think CO2 would go unnoticed unless you were asleep. For me I can feel it strongly in my nose and mouth and don't worry about it so much now. I think if there was a leak and I walked into a room I would know and get out.

[Ciderhead]

forgot I was transporting about six tanks in a car last year, dont ask, and one of the valves was damaged, as mcgrath says the symptoms were the giveaway, suppose lesson here is avoid confined unventilated areas with your Co2

[imark]

Avoid unventilated space. Sound advice. My wife lives by those rules when I've been on my oatmeal stout. Stood her well.

[mcgrath]

You're lucky. I had to give up stout!

[Ciderhead]

[LordEoin]

A few weeks ago I was trying to figure out how much sugar it would take to fill the headspace of a secondary with co2 and purge to oxygen. I read somewhere that a fairly standard brew will give off about 300liters of volume of co2. I'll try to find the page of maths...

edit -Here it is : http://lifefermented.wordpress.com/2014/01/22/how-much-co2-is-produced-from-brewing/