Lion introduces "Tap King" - party keg / growlers

[TJP]

Just wondering if anynone on here has had any more successes or falures they could share. I went away from home brewing many years ago due to not liking bottling and not drinking enough to warrant a full keg setup but this looks like it could be the solution.
I assume people are naturally cabonating beer in them, would forced carbonating be possible like with the tap-a-draught or would the tap king not work with the higher pressure to forced carbonate.

 

[Crispydude]

Hey Guys

Did anyone have success with the 8g bulbs? i have some 8g ones lying around so i would like to use these up prior to getting some 12g


Cheers

 

[Sydneybrewer]

good work all. a little birdie told me I have one of these coming for fathers day. had 2 years away from homebrewing now. but looking in to this has wet my apetite to get back into homebrewing. was doing 10l allgrain batches before i quit due to the pita of bottling and the expense of getting in to kegging. but this looks like a happy medium. my first thoughts when i found out about this was could it be used for hb, and you guys have started the ground work, cheers.

 

[barls]

Hi All,

I'm new around here but following this one with great interest. This looks like it should do the trick I think to undo these screws?

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Antislip-Plastic-Handle-Triangle-Screwdriver-Repair-Tool-2mm-x-80mm-/161026124589?pt=UK_Hand_Tools_Equipment&hash=item257de7ab2d

anyone confirm that this is the right size.
just checked all my bits and found im missing that one.

 

[Captain Morgan]

anyone confirm that this is the right size.
just checked all my bits and found im missing that one.

Mine is still on its way (hopefully!) but I will report straight back here regarding the fit once it arrives.

 

[mwd]

Saw the Lionel Ritchie advert for the first time on TV Channel One during the Formula One GP. Seen the kits in Dans.

 

[pressure_tested]

I have to say despite Squire being the only decent beer and using the term decent lightly, I am loving having this amount of beer on tap in my fridge. Tonight with dinner I just poured myself about 200mls because I have futsal on later. Can't wait to work out how to have my much better beer in there!

 

[browndog]

Just wondering if anynone on here has had any more successes or falures they could share. I went away from home brewing many years ago due to not liking bottling and not drinking enough to warrant a full keg setup but this looks like it could be the solution.
I assume people are naturally cabonating beer in them, would forced carbonating be possible like with the tap-a-draught or would the tap king not work with the higher pressure to forced carbonate.

TJP, they are not for force carbonating, they are designed for dispensing. They are only good for filling with already carbonated beer.

 

[Hwkdog]

anyone confirm that this is the right size.
just checked all my bits and found im missing that one.

I'm just using a 2.0mm flat screwdriver fits fine, doesn't strip at all,

So how many carb drops should I use for the 3.2l keg? 4 or 5? Don't want to put to much ,

I just cleaned put and sanitized keg , no leaks so far

 

[Adr_0]

Hey guys,

So I got my TapKing today, with 2 x bottles of Qld's finest. It seems like mrTbeer has done some awesome research and figured out how to hook up a minireg so that we can put in our homebrew, use 16g cylinders (threaded) and set our own volumes of CO2 (presumably).

I wanted to find out two things:
- the vol of CO2 that the beers come with; and
- the pressure of the regulator

So, sure you've all seen the front tap thingy down:

this tap thingy has a bit of tube in it, and when the TK bottle is engaged, a press on the TK tap lever thingy (not pull) pours out the beer. This tap elbow/nozzle I have removed to test, and connected some 3mm tube from Bunnings (pic below) to the tube from my regulator; see below:

Note that I cut the ball lock off this tube. This tube is 5/6mm PVC but I don't know much about it.

Pushing the nozzle down into the bottle allows the inside beer to flow, compresses the air in the tube and the regulator reads the pressure, which is...

...dammit, my regulator is shot. Can't remember the last time it was used, and I didn't test beforehand. Bugger.

But, the good news is this combination of tubing seals pretty well, even with only about 1" pushed into the tap nozzle and about 30-40mm pushed into the reg tube. The beer came down about 30-40cm, but there was plenty of air between the beer and the reg so no dramas about damage. So, you should be able to use the keg-side gauge of a regulator to find the pressure in these bottles. The temp they are at will then give you the volumes of CO2... cool.

This is the tubing from Bunnings. They also have 5mm tube, which appears to be the same stuff used from the regulator back into the beer within the TK head unit thingy:

5mm tube as seen through the cutaway:

So the plan was to pull the bottom bit of this out, insert 5mm Bunnings tube, insert 3mm tube as joiner into 5mm reg tube, connect a TK bottle (half empty or so) and read the pressure that the reg is set to. But again, reg stuffed.

I'll order another and update in the next week or so hopefully. Bugger.


actually - just realised... - before you try this at home, you should probably use a t-piece for the cutaway pic above so that something is still connected to the beer side and it doesn't just piss out when you engage the TK.

 

[Adr_0]

actually, the nozzle has a tube inside that is very loosely fitted over the nipple of the white plastic nozzle thingy, and won't hold pressure. I gave it another go and it pushed itself off. fixable (ugly...) but will have to find another way for now to test the volumes of CO2 in the bottle prior to cracking the CO2 cylinder. bugger, will have to try plan B.

 

[mrTbeer]

Keen to see results of pressure tests for PET bottle and inbuilt reg. The mini reg doesn't back off when you turn pressure down, it also doesn't have any markings between 10psi and 20psi. That's the sweet spot but not sure of optimum pressure exactly. I've only had 1 TKeg of my homebrew decanted from bottles so CO2 volumes unknown, now on TKeg of Boags using my CO2 not theirs. A few glasses of foam so far but will get there in the end. Next test will be filling TKeg as a growler from Brewbake.

 

[OneEye]

so once i have the screws out how do i get the lid off the bottle? It doesn't seem to screw off or just pop off

 

[Hwkdog]

so once i have the screws out how do i get the lid off the bottle? It doesn't seem to screw off or just pop off

Once 3 screws r out just twist the lid like any normal bottle, it might be a ill tight as there will still,be a ill pressure in there .

 

[Mattwa]

Once 3 screws r out just twist the lid like any normal bottle, it might be a ill tight as there will still,be a ill pressure in there .

You don't need to remove any screws to remove the lid from the bottle, just use the tool that came with the dispenser to twist it off.

 

[Captain Morgan]

Sorry, can we just quickly summarise the "unmodded" situation? Are the 12g bottles from here http://www.ezychargers.com.au/index.php?cPath=51&osCsid=3gs4j5nr9pfvs9fupn4s6q8991currently working to dispense HB?

I want to mod mine to take 16g but I have a batch that desperatly needs bottling so I'm hoping to just go unmodded initially and want to make sure those ezy chargers work.

Thank you!

 

[bradsbrew]

Have not got around to grabbing the extra bits I need but have discovered another lid that fits perfectly. Next time I am at bigW I will be going through the water bottle lids. This one does not leak even with me squeezing the crappers out of it. Might put some juice in this one with some bakers yeast to see how it handles pressure. If all else fails at least I have a good size water bottle.

 

[Bentnose]

Sorry, can we just quickly summarise the "unmodded" situation? Are the 12g bottles from here http://www.ezychargers.com.au/index.php?cPath=51&osCsid=3gs4j5nr9pfvs9fupn4s6q8991currently working to dispense HB?

I want to mod mine to take 16g but I have a batch that desperatly needs bottling so I'm hoping to just go unmodded initially and want to make sure those ezy chargers work.

Thank you!

I thought driftdaddy was successful with the 12g units. I'm looking at ordering 10 from Ezycharger this week and will hopefully brew next weekend and will bottle 4 x TK's, so I won't know the results for a couple of months yet.

 

[TJP]

TJP, they are not for force carbonating, they are designed for dispensing. They are only good for filling with already carbonated beer.

Yes I realise they are only designed for dispensing but as the bottles are only designed for single use and we have already gone past that I am just wondering where the limits are, by the sound of it some people are already using them for natural carbonation and as the way people are setting them up appears to be with an external co2 source and a mini regulator I were just pondering the possibility of also being able to force carbonate, obviousley you would have to bypass the inbuilt regulator but apart from that and pressure issues I were wondering if there were anyother reasons why it couldnt be done.

 

[MastersBrewery]

Force carbing at serving pressure shouldn't be a problem other than waiting the week or so for it to be ready. You've already waited 2 weeks for your beer to ferment then another week or two of cold crashing, patience people!! It's the last hurdle