[BrodyR]

Think I removed the dip tube and poppet valve but left the guts of disconnect intact originally

You need the keg post poppet valve in place to press against the poppet valve in the disconnect, otherwise the valve in the disconnect will remain closed. 

You might need the dip tube in place in order for the keg post poppet valve to seat correctly, but I'm not positive about that - easy enough to test though.

Awesome, so really all you do is leave everything intact and hook a disconnect with a barb/tubing to the keg?

I would prefer that since it makes it easier to use C02 to transfer out of the fermenting keg or use the corny as as serving keg without breaking out the wrench to reassemble

[beersk]

What I do, when I ferment in a keg and harvest, is have my liquid tube bent a tad so it sits off the bottom of the keg a couple inches. This will leave behind a 1/4 to 1/2 gallon, which should be plenty for most beers to leave trub and yeast behind. After the closed transfer is complete, I'll swirl the keg and pour off the yeast into jars. Just sanitize the outside of the keg really well before pouring off into jars.
And Narcout already covered it. All you need is a gas disconnect with a piece of tubing going into a jar of sanitizer for blow off.

You don't want to ferment, say, 4.75 gallons of a Belgian blond in a keg though. It will clog the blow off and you'll have a serious mess on your hands. Ask me how I know this...

[erockrph]

What I do, when I ferment in a keg and harvest, is have my liquid tube bent a tad so it sits off the bottom of the keg a couple inches. This will leave behind a 1/4 to 1/2 gallon, which should be plenty for most beers to leave trub and yeast behind. After the closed transfer is complete, I'll swirl the keg and pour off the yeast into jars. Just sanitize the outside of the keg really well before pouring off into jars.
And Narcout already covered it. All you need is a gas disconnect with a piece of tubing going into a jar of sanitizer for blow off.

You don't want to ferment, say, 4.75 gallons of a Belgian blond in a keg though. It will clog the blow off and you'll have a serious mess on your hands. Ask me how I know this...

You also don't want to make the assumption that a lacto ferment isn't going to produce much CO2 pressure and skip the blowoff/spunding valve. And definitely don't just hook up a tap to the liquid out to take a pH sample in that case. Unless you want to take the sample from your floor/wall/ceiling/pants/etc.

[beersk]

What I do, when I ferment in a keg and harvest, is have my liquid tube bent a tad so it sits off the bottom of the keg a couple inches. This will leave behind a 1/4 to 1/2 gallon, which should be plenty for most beers to leave trub and yeast behind. After the closed transfer is complete, I'll swirl the keg and pour off the yeast into jars. Just sanitize the outside of the keg really well before pouring off into jars.
And Narcout already covered it. All you need is a gas disconnect with a piece of tubing going into a jar of sanitizer for blow off.

You don't want to ferment, say, 4.75 gallons of a Belgian blond in a keg though. It will clog the blow off and you'll have a serious mess on your hands. Ask me how I know this...

You also don't want to make the assumption that a lacto ferment isn't going to produce much CO2 pressure and skip the blowoff/spunding valve. And definitely don't just hook up a tap to the liquid out to take a pH sample in that case. Unless you want to take the sample from your floor/wall/ceiling/pants/etc.

Oh man, that's brutal.

The blow off clogged, so I'm thinking, "Okay, I need to remove the post and put a bigger blow off on there." Cool. Take the post off. About 2 seconds after I removed it the yeast just exploded out of the keg, 6 feet into the air for about 5 seconds. I couldn't believe it. I wish I'd gotten it on video. The beer turned out awesomely though, even if I only got 3.5 gallons out of the 4.75 gallon batch.

[homoeccentricus]

You guys are making me feel extremely insecure now.

[beersk]

You guys are making me feel extremely insecure now.

Just don't do what we did and you'll be fine