Fitting/Adaptor Problems with 4 tap Cobra Font

[shaunous]

Hey y'all, got myself a cheap chrome plated brass Cobra Font a long time ago, pic's below. I'm fuked as to how to mount fatlocks, more confusing is to how the beer line ends are meant to seal to a tap fatlock or even standard adaptor, I'm not sure if it's meant to be a BSP thread in the font or what. I'll do my own research if needed and maybe have to modify but thought I'd check with the AHB's brain trust to see if anyone else has already been through the shit fight.

Cheers,
Shaun.

 

[Wortgames]

I'm on mobile and I'm having trouble seeing the detail in your pics. Can't figure out what the things are in the sockets.

Can you tell whether the lines would have been plumbed 'to' the font sockets, or 'through' them into the adaptors?

 

[shaunous]

There stainless lines going through to the top, if you look at the top 2 photo's you'll see what they look like at the ends. Funny little fitting that's just floating inside the thread. With a seal on it. I could probably physically push a line and a fitting through, but there've been jammed in there pretty good on assembly, but they do move around a fair bit inside the thread, they cannot go all the way back though so there must be a fitting of some sort that does up against the seal, but what and where that is I don't know.

Fatlocks are 3/4 and this is just under that, wether it's metric I don't know, if not it'd be 5/8 or 11/16 imperial, or 18mm metric.

Did I just confuse the shit outa you

 

[Wortgames]

Kinda...

I've done a few fonts over the years but they've all been Andale or similar. This looks like something else.

My guess is the weird floating fittings form part of a valve, so when the taps are removed for cleaning the flow is cut off. If you're missing the other half of the valves your choices would be to try and find replacements, or to remove what's left and do something else.

The part (dangling?) at the bottom of the bottom pic looks a lot like a standard Andale snaplock adaptor, maybe it's the same thread? These usually have line glands in the rear (for direct plumbing 'through' the font) which is the way I'd probably go if the threads match.

I'm sure someone here will be able to do a better job of identifying what you've got.

Do you already have taps? This might help dictate the best way to proceed.

 

[shaunous]

Yeh that's a lancer fatlock, I threw that in there for a photo.

Nothing else come with it, the fatlock thread is bigger like I said than the font thread.

I will have to investigate more.

 

[Wortgames]

I don't know whether Fatlock and Snaplock have the same thread.

I do know that on a 'Parisienne' font I rebuilt with Snaplocks just recently, I was curious to see whether my Alumasc taps would screw directly into the font. They didn't, at least not initially. I was convinced the threads were different, but after a bit of messing around trying different combinations I realised they were actually the same thread, just a bit stiff at first.

I guess my point is that it is worth double-checking the fit, and also that if Aussie fittings, UK taps and a Belgian font are all using the same thread, and yours is definitely different, that might point to yours being American.

I'd be really keen to try an Andale Snaplock adaptor and see if the thread at least matches. If so, you could just remove all the current stuff and get a set of gland-entry Snaplocks and you'd be set.

If you can't find one locally to try, I can probably dig up a spare that you could use just to check the fit.

 

[shaunous]

So, done some investigating, it's a deff a 5/8 thread. Now I had 2 options, the snaploks on the keg couplers are 5/8, but they have a female thread and I would need to use a 5/8 male to male nipple, but after visiting my local tooheys rep yesterday and him making a call to who knows what, his found a snaplock for me that has a 5/8 thread and has got 4 coming in the next stock order. im still not 100% satisified they'll work as they seal differently where'as this looks as if its mean to seal on that o'ring face you can see in the pic's. But im pretty sure it'll work.

Will update when they arrive for the others who may have or get these fonts, they are made in Germany I found on the net, but made for the yanks, and at a 10th of the price of a similar font in Aus, there worth the effort to adapt to our systems.

Shaun.

 

[shaunous]

Here is the results of my Font to Snaplock situation.



This is a 5/8 Snaplock, from Andale/Lancer (Most fonts use the 3/4 Snaplocks)


This you can see i machined out the inner thread as from standard they will not fit over the fonts steel beer line


Here is a pic of the beer line poked out from the font to show where the snaplock will sit and seal


Here is a pic of the snaplock sitting over the beer line with the seal between them both



Here it is sitting home on the seal where it will stay (Kinda annoying it sits out that far, but a beer tap label/holder should hid it)


Hopefully this helps some of you as these fonts are getting around and this was my fix to keep the snaplocks Australian and Standard.

 

[Weizguy]

Thanks, that helps a lot. Also looks like I may be able to get a 5/8" to 3/4" adaptor to fit my existing snaplocks to my cobra fonts