Manufactured Kegerators

[graffix]

Hi everyone,

I am looking for some insight on a kegerator, from those that have some experience.

Basically I am wondering what the pros and cons of a setup like this would be:
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-KEG-FRIDGE-KEGE...=item1e5cb1f090


I have seen lots of your projects, and they look great, but I have no tools and no shop or place to hack away on things. I also need something that can fit easily in my apartment, and a big old fridge is hard to hide. Something like this would be easier to look at than whatever I would hack together.

Thanks for your advice.

 

[bullsneck]

I have very similar, but I paid about $150 less.

It has been good to me, just haven't brewed enough to keep it full!!

 

[graffix]

Thanks bullsneck,

How long have you had yours? Where did you buy it?

Cheers,

Dave

 

[zoigl]

Hi everyone,

I am looking for some insight on a kegerator, from those that have some experience.

Basically I am wondering what the pros and cons of a setup like this would be:
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/NEW-KEG-FRIDGE-KEGE...=item1e5cb1f090


I have seen lots of your projects, and they look great, but I have no tools and no shop or place to hack away on things. I also need something that can fit easily in my apartment, and a big old fridge is hard to hide. Something like this would be easier to look at than whatever I would hack together.

Thanks for your advice.

I am a beginner AG brewer and have only made a couple of brews,
I paid about the same price
I like it, but it is a bit of an ask to get it to hold 3 cornies, I think that it could be done though. 2 cornies is easy!
There is another style of kegerator with a bulging door, this might be easier to fit more cornies than this flat door model.
I love the temp control, the taps are OK, and I got a bigger CO2 gas cylinder from Beer Belly.
So in a nutshell, it is easy to use, and far better for a beginner than trying to adapt an existing fridge/freezer. I have another fridge to hold extra cornies while they get conditioned.
Cheers

 

[potof4x]

I was involved in the purchase of 3 indentical looking fridges from a different online seller 12 months ago. 2 of them were returned for a refund by the other guys but I kept mine. Had to purchase all the correct fittings because the ones supplied didn't fit much, but the ones in your ad looks like they will be right.

It fits 3 cornies just fine and I have seen a three tap font that is available which may suit you better. I have the two tap font which I had some flow issues with, which I wasn't able to resolve. These guys might have better customer service though.

I am using mine as a fermenting fridge at the moment and it works great for this. I can fit my large 60l fermentor in there.

Price was about the same, but always pays to shop around as I have seem them cheaper than what I paid.

 

[Bribie G]

The kegerator (which I have) holds 3 kegs no problems. However the fonts on the Ebay version are undoubtedly cheap Chinese crap and apparently pour heaps of foam, and don't seal too well. If you are serious about a long term investment then I'd go around the same price for just the base kegerator from a sponsor at the top of the page, or any other home brew supplier who can do a similar price, and then dig deep and get a quality font set. The bitterness of a shoddy item lasts far longer than the sweetness of the initail "bargain" price, and after a couple of years of usage the better fonts will pay for themselves over and over again.
Also you have someone reliable you can fall back on if the fridge itself causes problems.

 

[graffix]

Thanks for the tips everyone, good to hear from people who have actually used them, they are the ones that will know.

I just wanted make sure it wasn't a foolish route. I know it's probably not the "best" but hopefully it's a reasonable trade-off in price and labour required.

My last concern would be regarding the taps. If they do in fact turn out to be cheap plastic crap, can they be unscrewed and replaced? Or is that asking to end up wrecking the whole thing and replacing the whole font instead?

Thanks,

Dave

 

[bullsneck]

My taps do the job. They may be Celli rip offs, but they pour a decent beer. 95% of the time, they work every time.

In all seriousness, the 5% of pours which are poor (pun intended) are mostly due to warm taps - first beer of the night, etc.

 

[Batz]

I think these things are fantastic for those you can afford them and don't have time or perhaps the interest in making there own.
The one recommendation I would make is buy a quality unit like craftbrewer or one of our sponsors sell, I believe the cheap ones are just that "You get what you pay for"

Batz

 

[graffix]

Thanks Batz,

I will check out Craftbrewer when their site comes back online. I didn't know where else I could find fridges like this.

When you say "if you can afford them", it makes me think this is the expensive way to go, but when I look around, and try compare apples to apples by buying a new small fridge and then modifying it and buying the parts, I keep coming up close, sometimes more. Aside from getting a free fridge or something like that, it seems like these are about priced to the sum of the parts...

Would you agree?

 

[praxis178]

Thanks Batz,

I will check out Craftbrewer when their site comes back online. I didn't know where else I could find fridges like this.

When you say "if you can afford them", it makes me think this is the expensive way to go, but when I look around, and try compare apples to apples by buying a new small fridge and then modifying it and buying the parts, I keep coming up close, sometimes more. Aside from getting a free fridge or something like that, it seems like these are about priced to the sum of the parts...

Would you agree?

One thing they don't usually price in are the kegs (probably want a minimum of four), and often also the gas too. Those two items will add anywhere from $300 to $400+ to the set up, just one more thing to keep in mind.....

I currently have a BOC rented cylinder, but at $36 odd per quarter plus the gas ($32), it's not a cheap option unless you use a lot of gas. A 500g user owned one that is swapped/refilled by you LHBS is probably the way to go there.