The second thing is to try to preserve the carbonation in the beer. When I'm planning to bottle a batch, I always take the carbonation level a little higher than normal because some will unavoidably be lost during bottling.
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^^^^ This. I always turn the pressure up a bit on my kegs the night before bottling for a competition to try to preserve the carbonation level and I bottle with a Beer Gun because to me it less of a PITA than a counter pressure filler. Yes, I get a bit more foaming but I can control that by bleeding some pressure off the keg during bottling. Yeah, it seems a bit counter productive, but it works for me and the carbonation level stays about right in the bottles
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That's interesting, because instructions for the Beer Gun and similar products all say to lower the PSI by half before bottling. "Set CO2
regulator to ½ of the normal dispensing pressure (approximately 6 psi) and open the pressure relief valve to reduce keg pressure to new setting." I think I'll start there because my maiden voyage will be with cider, not beer, and cider tastes good across most carbonation levels, in my experience. But I will keep sanitized bottles in the freezer compartment of my beer fridge and try it the other way, too.
I'm not quite understanding how you hold the beer bottle and the Beer Gun while you bleed pressure off the keg - I only have two arms. But maybe Kegland sells knock-off arms!