I'm considering investing in a keg, fridge, etc. I live in a warm climate and currently do secondary fermentation in the bottles in the heat. I've read that people have chest freezers to store kegs. If I start using a keg does this need to go in the fridge straight away or can I leave it in the warm until I am ready to drink it?
Mostly I brew brew cans like coopers lager.
Leaving beer warm for extended periods, a couple of months, will cause it to stale quicker. But leaving it for a couple of weeks to carb and condition will be fine.
One thing to watch out for though is that the keg should be chilled before pouring a pint, or the dispensing pressure will be too high, and you'll get a glass of foam, unless you use a very long beer line to balance the pressure.
Given that your kegging process is sound, you can expect similar results from kegging as you are getting from bottling (and aging at high temperatures). When you keg, you would need to purge all oxygen from the headspace, of course. As already mentioned, the warmer the storage temperature, the more rapidly the signs of age will become. Depending on the style, those signs are not always bad, but generally so. You indicate that you will be doing secondary fermentation in the keg. During that process, you are asking the yeast to "clean-up" and there may be some off flavors from the yeast at temperatures higher than their optimal temperatures.
