Font Mounted Counter Pressure Filler.

[raven19]

I can find one for you mate but that's it I'm afraid, I've send out 30 of these things !

Batz

Confirming your washer works an absolute treat mate. Thanks again!

 

[punkin]

Can you pull those snaplocks out with the beer still connected?



I've been wondering but ain't game to gamble.... <_<

 

[Batz]

Can you pull those snaplocks out with the beer still connected?

Of course that's what they are made for, change or remove a tap with keg still connected and under pressure. They have a shut off in them (the snaplocks)

http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=827

 

[MarkBastard]

Nice work batz, where'd you get that male fatlock fitting?

 

[Batz]

Nice work batz, where'd you get that male fatlock fitting?

Mark of Marks Home Brew found me one. I was looking for an old tap and had plans of cutting off the male fatlock and silver soldering a line fitting to it.
I'm sure someone here would have access to one.

 

[MarkBastard]

Cheers, I actually use lock-in's so probably even harder to find.

 

[Batz]

Cheers, I actually use lock-in's so probably even harder to find.

An old tap off ebay ?

 

[MarkBastard]

Yeah may be a good idea, if it's a tap with a nozzle I could probably just attach hose to the tap I'm guessing and then flick it on.

 

[Batz]

Yeah may be a good idea, if it's a tap with a nozzle I could probably just attach hose to the tap I'm guessing and then flick it on.

Cut the tap off, you just want the connection.

 

[beastien]

Will the washers work with twist tops?
Also has anyone attached one of these to a font, and then a tap on the front of the filler?
Looks like theres a plug that could be removed on the front for an attachment.

 

[Samuelsons_Jon]

Hi All,

Sorry to resurrect this thread from the dead. I've signed up on the forum here just for this thread!

I'm based in the UK (although I have family in Melbourne, so please be kind to a pom), and Oz is the only place that I've seen these so I'm thinking of importing one or five.

I bottle from 100L to 600L per month (cottage industry), and need to get my own equipment, but a proper CPF is AUD $15,000+, and I'd rather save my money for an automatic line if I ever need it! Not that I have 10% of that amount anyway!

Anyway, my question is this - does anyone have, or could they make, a video of this in action? I've not seen one at all, and after skimming through this thread I couldn't see one either. I'll be using glass screw-tops myself, but I have no idea if the collar is big enough.

Thanks all!

Jonathan

 

[Nick JD]

Thirsty made a video in another thread.

Can't find it. Anyone?

 

[Doogiechap]

Thirsty made a video in another thread.

Can't find it. Anyone?

The Videos in question are embedded in this post
Cheers
Doug

 

[Samuelsons_Jon]

Thanks Nick & Doug for the replies.

Doug, I may be having a senior moment, but that's a 'how to' for putting it together, no?

What I'm really looking for is a video showing optimal usage. I know that this will never be as fast a putting in a pro-grade line, but if I can put half-a-dozen together in a row then I might have something useful then I'd use it little and often rather than for 12 hours a month!

Anyone help here?

Ta!

 

[Camo1234]

Hey guys, can anyone tell me if these will fit to the fonts on the Kegerators with a 3 tap font? ie can I simply unscrew my perlick tap and screw this in?

Cheers, Camo

 

[raven19]

Doug, I may be having a senior moment, but that's a 'how to' for putting it together, no?

Those video's show hows its filled (not how to install it) - just click on the picture.

I would suspect you could only run 1 at a time per person though, as you really need to watch it during use.

If you wanted to line up 6 or so you would only be gassing up the 3rd bottle and the 1st one would be overfilling and need to be shut off (in my opinion).

Great unit, but not sure about use on a massive scale like you are hoping for.

Still for under $100 each you can't go wrong by getting a couple of them to try out (compared to $15k on a commercial unit)?

 

[Nick JD]

Filling a dozen glass 330ml bottles takes me about 15 minutes. Not really a commercially-viable filling rate.

 

[cdbrown]

Used mine after a couple of months of not being used and all the parts that were meant to move were stuck pretty good. Thankfully managed to get the relief open and also the pouring tap working so I could fill a bottle. What do you guys run through it once you've finished using it? Do you break it down to clean?

 

[Samuelsons_Jon]

Thanks for the assist guys. There's a link to a 'how to' video - somehow I missed that the images were clickable - der!

Regarding fill speed - I think Thirsty was maybe being a little over-cautious in my humble opinion. I've heard of double pre-evacuation units (one is a vacuum to suck the air, the second is to replace the vacuum with CO2), the double quite often being an option (i.e. a nice-to-have but maybe not necessary) so I think that three evacuations may be overkill? As for the filling speed - I use a double head semi-automatic CP filler at the moment, and the speed that Thirsty has is quite slow. I can bottle 6 a minute - that's 20 seconds from picking up the bottle to removing it from the filler at the end including manual pressure release.

Now, bear in mind that I don't bottle beer, and I don't have anywhere near as many fobbing issues as beer does. Also, there's a lot of Ascorbic acid in my products, so that's a natural anti-oxidant anyways.

This may sound dumb, and I have no experience here on these units, but here's my plan:
Find the right setting on the pressure release valve that allows a good fill rate with lack of fobbing then leave it there permanently. When I fill up with CO2 it will escape from the bottle and I'll have about 4 bar of CO2 pressure behind it so it should take about 1 second to evacuate a 330ml bottle! I don't mind that the CO2 escapes or that the bottle pressure doesn't match the keg pressure at the time of switching to 'fill' mode as I have to move it to that setting anyway. The bottles will be glass, so there's no way to test 'firmness', and as the CO2 is heavier than the air it will sit on the top of the product anyway at the headspace, and most of that CO2 will be displaced by product anyhow. Any potential fobbing will be put 'under pressure' straight away as the bottle starts to fill. Any bubbles that my product produces are quick 'light' unlike beer foam so they pop under pressure quite well.

This enables me to run a quicker operation per bottle, and I imagine I'll be running the pressure valve more open than Thirsty. The products will have been run through 5 lines (at least, possibly 10) of a 10 line remote beer chiller running an ice-bath config before it gets to the filler so it should be nice and cold an keep the CO2 dissolved as much as possible.

If I can run just four of these simultaneously, and lets say the worst case scenario is a full minute per bottle per filler (including pick up/set down etc) then I'll get 4 bottles per minute which is 240 bottles per hour. Lets be cautious and say 200 per hour. A pallet of 1880 bottles would take 9 1/2 hours to bottle if I did it all in one go.

For a few hundred $ it's got to be worth taking a punt on those numbers! If anyone sees flaws in my calcs then please slap me.

And before I go and make myself sound like a complete ass, I've not used this kit, Thirsty has, and as long as he's happy then he should continue with his method. I'm not trying to make it seem that I know better, I'm just trying to adapt his methods to make myself a few $, and save myself even more! Renting the filler I use at the moment is costing me $350 per pallet day (although that includes gas, mixing vessels etc).....

 

[Nick JD]

You need an adapter to fill glass bottles - and not many glass bottles fit.

Here's an fix for bottle variation, and unsuitable bottle collars.

http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...=59618&st=0