Chilling Beer Lines

[BDBrewing]

I'll be the first to admit that this was poor planning on my part. However I built the bar in my basement long before I got into homebrewing and never even considered having beer on tap.

But I got together with with my carpenter and my engineer with what I thought was a decent plan for mounting my kegerator under the bar and running lines less then 5 feet to the taps. Well turns out that is just not feasible.

At the moment the only possible option is to put the kegerator in the next room and run the beer lines 15 feet to the taps. I'm not happy about this idea but I can't go dismantling my entire bar either.

I plan on running two 3/16" beer lines from my kegerator to my taps. I already plan on wrapping the lines in foam isolation. But I could potentially have roughly 3oz of flat beer per pour if I'm not having a party and pulling constantly. Now I don't throw parties every week but I do like to have a homebrew quite often.

The kegerator I have is a small converted fridge and there is little room left for a beer line cooling system but I can try.

Any recommendations would be appreciated.

Thanks
~B.D.

[Henning1966]

Does this kegerator have a freezer? If it does you could allways do a something like this http://www.thebrewingnetwork.com/Beer-G ... st-Freezer. Run the cool line with the beer lines but instead of a radiator on the end run the warm glycol return back to the freezer in a line on the outside of the foam.

[BDBrewing]

No there is only a fridge section and the chiller is a plate along the back fall.

Thanks
~B.D.

[CRBrewHound]

The only thing I can think of that is not extremely elaborate or require a secondary source of cooling is to cut a hole in the side of the unit connect Larger (depending on # of tap lines, something like 4" to 6") PVC piping into it and seal around where the lines come out at the other end (might require a small fan as well in the fridge unit).

Basically my thought is extending the fridge chamber around beer lines closer to the tap. Does the way I am trying to explain make sense?

[BDBrewing]

Sure If I'm understanding this right you say instead of running the lines in just insulation run them thru well sealed PVC pipes (which could have insulation on the outside and have a fan blowing the cold air from the fridge thru the PVC. Sounds like a solid Idea.

Right?

~B.D.

[CRBrewHound]

Sure If I'm understanding this right you say instead of running the lines in just insulation run them thru well sealed PVC pipes (which could have insulation on the outside and have a fan blowing the cold air from the fridge thru the PVC. Sounds like a solid Idea.

Right?

~B.D.

Yep, that was what I was thinking, should work.

[keelanfish]

I've seen this done successfully. You really need to have two lines though so the fan can blow the cold air through a loop that returns to the fridge. Otherwise the, if the air can't move through the conduit, no cooling will happen. I think if you were to leave the serving end open so the air could exit, then it might work, but your fridge would probably run all the time. You may be able to run a two inch line inside a three or four in line and use that to complete the circuit.

[Kbar]

This is why you see expensive systems in breweries and bars that rtuyn Glycol loops throught the conduit that contain the beer lines. The issue always comes down to cooling capacity. In long beer line runs, you can not simply cool a reservoir of glycol and pump it up and back to cool the lines, as the glycol loop has to run cooler than the kegerator to work effectively.

See here for example;

http://www.chicompany.net/index.php?mai ... 46_252_254

Also, make sure to do your Pdrop calcs, as 15 feet of 3/16" beer line is 30 Psi of pressure drop.