Finished my kegerator this weekend!

[Thirsty Mallard]

Finally got around to building the collar for my chest freezer and installing some taps! I forgot my camera for the first part of the process, so the build is not documented... but it's not rocket science.

Chest Freezer, with top removed


The collar (with putty to touch up)


Bottom view of the collar


Painted and pretty!


Collar installed and top replaced


Rear view (he he he...)


Taps hooked up


All done! I installed 2 taps, and 2 plugs in the open holes. I made the holes for future taps.


Taps close up

[coultond]

How do you have your system balanced with liquid tubing so short?

At what pressure do you dispense the kegs?

I'd love to be able to get away with tubing that short.

EDIT: Looks great by the way.

[Thirsty Mallard]

I have no idea what you mean by balanced.

It is possible that I should have longer tubing and I was an idiot... I just did it like that to not clutter the inside. I took a pint from each and it was normal. Am I missing something?

[DannyW]

Depends on what you mean by "normal."

At normal amounts of fizziness (2.something volumes of CO2) and normal serving temps (38-48F) you would get a firehose of foamy beer coming from lines that short.

If your normal is very lightly carbonated, then I can see how those lines would work fine. If you vent the kegs before every time you pour then I can see that it might work (but be a pain in the ass as well as wasting much of your aroma). Your serving pressure must be down in the low single digits, though.

At what pressure and temp do you store the beer, and same for when you serve. What is your serving procedure? If you've come up with some magic for successfully using lines that short, there are LOTS of people here that would like to know the secret.

[Speyedr]

Sweet collar dude. I thought you stole my CF for a second there. Balancing your system is pretty simple but you do have to read about it or be told. Kudos for taking this head-on. Here's a primer on draft setup.

All of this is from Dave Miller's Homebrewing Guide book...

When you "push" the beer at a certain pressure, you need to counter that force so that the beer doesn't come out of the tap as foam (Gas breakout). That's why when you tap a keg at a kegger with a pump, the first couple of glasses are all foam.

So, for example, you have your regulator set at 10PSI. You need to counter that pressure before the beer leaves the tap. You do this through hose restriction and gravity. 3/16" beer hose has a restriction of 3PSI per foot, and gravity provides about .5PSI per foot of height. So, since your taps are at the top of the keg and we're starting in the middle of the keg as an average point to start, you will get .5PSI from the height (1 foot). You still need another 9.5PSI restriction from the hose, or a little more than 3ft of hose.

Most people use about 4ft of hose on average. You can also use connectors to make different lengths to handle highly carbonated beer. Alternatively, you can carb your beer where you want it (say 15PSI for a Wit), lower the pressure for dispensing, and then jack it back up when you're done.

If you haven't already, you should download a good carbonation chart off the web and keep it handy. It'll tell you what PSI to add at what temp to get the level of CO2 you're looking for.

Good luck!

Rob

[coultond]

Here's a link to a whole lot of math for "balancing" a system.

http://hbd.org/clubs/franklin/public_ht ... lance.html

In my system, I try to keep my beer at about 2.5 Volumes of CO2 at a temp of 42*. The dispensing pressure for my tank is set to about 13psi. I need between 5 and 7 feet of 3/16" tubing to "balance" the system.

I didn't mean to derail a thread about your sweet new collar and freezer conversion. If your system works for you, RDWHAHB!!

[Thirsty Mallard]

Thanks for all the advice... actually now that I think about it, the first pint was a little foamy. I thought it was because I had just recharged the keg. I will replace the beer lines tomorrow!

In the meantime.. it still pours beer!

[Thirsty Mallard]

Thanks for looking out! I had no idea you had to have excessive tubing to counter the keg pressure. It makes sense, I just never thought of it... then again this is my first kegerator.

According to the fancy equation in that link you sent me I should be using at least 3.518 ft. of beer line. So I bought enough tubing for both kegs and then some and will replace the lines tonight.

Thanks again!