Purchased A Kegerator

[Ross]

I thought a flooded font might cool all the important bits down more efficiently, including the taps...

Not in kegerator type set up unfortunatley, as the small volume of recirculating water will warm up rapidly. - The air blower you have is the best option.

Cheers Ross

 

[OzBeer_MD]

I'm pretty sure I have 1.1m of 5mm line on the taps, serving pressure of about 90 kPa (although I do sometimes use the flow restrictors to slow it down a tad), fridge temp of 4 degrees. Seems to pour nicely after the first 1/2 - 3/4 pint.

Flow Restrictors? are they on the taps? I heard that they can be a cause of problems in cheaper taps and be a source of neucleation points if they are inserted in the beer line.

1/2 - 3/4 of a Pint is a lot of foam!

BTW, I do actually have a computer fan blowing air into the font. I use reticulation poly-pipe to get the air up about 3/4 of the way up the font. It works, I guess, but it's reeeeally slow. I leave it on all the time because it takes so long to cool everything down - and it doesn't really cool the actual tap down much at all - I still get heaps of foam on the first pour. This is a pain because a lot of the time I just have a single beer after work.

Is there a circuit or flow of air? ie is there a way for the air to get out like in a flodded font setup?

Cheers,

 

[whitegoose]

Flow Restrictors? are they on the taps? I heard that they can be a cause of problems in cheaper taps and be a source of neucleation points if they are inserted in the beer line.

1/2 - 3/4 of a Pint is a lot of foam!



Is there a circuit or flow of air? ie is there a way for the air to get out like in a flodded font setup?

Cheers,

Yeah the flow restrictors are on the taps - and the taps are cheap, but they don't seem to cause any problems. Quite useful in fact.

Regarding the foam - I may have exaggerated - I'd say if I pour myself a schooner (about 420ml?) then the first glass, once full, will be about 50% head (mind you due to the shape of the glass this means it's probably abouy 75% head. After that the taps are the same temp as the beer and thus pouring "nicely". Is this normal for these sorts of kegerators? How much head do you get on your first pour?

Regarding the air blower - the hole in the top of my fridge might be about 7cm wide, my polypipe taking the cold air up into the font might be 2cm wide, so the air can recirculate by moving back down through the gap, outside the polypipe. Make sense?

 

[OzBeer_MD]

I reckon get just over a quarter of a schooner of head on the first pour (a third if I don't do a two stage pour).

Here's a thought. What if you move the top end of the 20mm air pipe all the way to the top of the font and reverse the fan? Will that draw cold air up to the top and chill the warm air that the pipe takes in? is your fan sitting on the bottom of the fridge?

I have some white foam lining the inside of the font tower plus some black foam (like the padding you see on the handle bar of a BMX bike) around the two beer lines. Like I said I have added plumbing insulation to my ceramic font that is used outside and might do the same to this kegerator font. Can you have too much insulation???

 

[whitegoose]

Here's a thought. What if you move the top end of the 20mm air pipe all the way to the top of the font and reverse the fan? Will that draw cold air up to the top and chill the warm air that the pipe takes in? is your fan sitting on the bottom of the fridge?

That's an awesome idea!! The fan is currently sitting on the "hump" inside the fridge (is that called the compressor hump?). I reckon I should be able to reverse the fan no problems - thanks mate!

 

[Munut]

Whitegoose,

I'm surprise your blowers not more effective.

How many taps do you have?

You could try what I have just done, I upgraded to a 2 tap font which was also taller than my old one and even after extending my polypipe wasn't getting good air cirulation and could see the CO2 coming out of the first part of the pour. So I scraped my old jiffy box and installed 2 fans into a lunch box and plumbed that up with the poly and that has done the trick. I leave this on all the time as you mention it would be slow to try and cool those line at the start of each session. Be sure to run that poly all the way up the font as well because the cold air falls back down to the fridge.

Hopefully that helps.

 

[francismcphail]

Questions is how much line do I need to get the thing balanced?

I've seen on craftbrewer.com.au compensator / restrictor that would work similar to the Celi taps flow switch.

5. The line included. Is that a joke? There's 1 meter of 5/16 keg line. By my calculations, I'd need 16-18m of the stuff to balance a kegerator.

And on that last note, what did you guys do? I have some 5mm line which I wanted to use, but it just won't stretch to go over the end of the barbed fitting for the tap. I can easily get it on the disconnect, but have no way of connecting it to the tap. I was thinking of connecting a few cm of the 5/16 and then using some sort of reduction fitting (if it exists) but can't seem to find one...

 

[OzBeer_MD]

Questions is how much line do I need to get the thing balanced?

The up hill run to the tap from the bottom of your kegs means that you will likely need less than 2 metres of 5mm ID line. (I have 2.5 atm and it's too long for pale ales at 10PSI)

There is an excel spreadsheet on the forum somewhere that will help you.

 

[OzBeer_MD]

I have added a computer fan to the font on the kegerator. Seems like a good addition. The temp has dropped from 26 degrees in the font to 11 degrees. This is a 12V fan being fed about 7 volts by an old nokia charger. Runs silently

Pics.

http://twitpic.com/uqhxv

http://twitpic.com/uqi27

http://twitpic.com/uqi8j

 

[mxd]

I like your design, I was tring to think how could I get the air up, will have to do the same.

cheers
Matt

 

[RussTaylor]

I have added a computer fan to the font on the kegerator. Seems like a good addition. The temp has dropped from 26 degrees in the font to 11 degrees. This is a 12V fan being fed about 7 volts by an old nokia charger. Runs silently

Pics.

http://twitpic.com/uqhxv

http://twitpic.com/uqi27

http://twitpic.com/uqi8j

Nice work OzBeer. I used one of these http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?I...mp;form=KEYWORD from jaycar with some pvc tubing from Bunnings. I found my PC case fan didn't have enough pushing power and bugger all air was coming out of the end of the tube. I can get the tower down to about 8 degrees.

My problem now however is the fridge won't pull down. Without the blower, I can keep the fridge at about 3 to 4 degrees but with the blower on, the fridge struggles to get below 6. The LED on the front is just wrong, I don't know what it's measuring. It is pretty warm here in Adelaide at the moment so I assume it's pulling all the warmth from the font down into the fridge.

 

[OzBeer_MD]

Hi Russ,

Yeah i suppose it is all a trade off. Have you added any additional insulation to the inside of the tower? I have the tower lined with a white flexible foam and a styrofoam 'lid' (can be sen in the pics). I have also added a chunk of black tubing around the beer lines and 20mm electrical conduit from the new fan box).

How well does your beer pour?

cheers,

 

[RussTaylor]

No, I haven't added any insulation and have no idea what's in there. The lid of the tower is pretty tight and I can't budge it, perhaps I'll try again tonight. I'm going to have to insulate it or add more insulation by the sounds of it.

I hooked up my first keg on Saturday at 12PSI so it's only getting carbed enough now. I had a couple last night and it poured reasonably well but a bit too quick.

What's the flexible foam that you're using?

 

[OzBeer_MD]

No, I haven't added any insulation and have no idea what's in there. The lid of the tower is pretty tight and I can't budge it, perhaps I'll try again tonight. I'm going to have to insulate it or add more insulation by the sounds of it...... What's the flexible foam that you're using?

Not sure how to describe it, so I took a pic with my phone. Gave me an excuse to pour a beer too :icon_cheers:



You can see in the background I have also used some 'grippy' black foam mesh on the top of the kegerator to stop the glasses moving around and clinking against each other in the middle of the night when the compressor kicks in.

I hooked up my first keg on Saturday at 12PSI so it's only getting carbed enough now. I had a couple last night and it poured reasonably well but a bit too quick.

Yes I am still learning alot when it comes to storage/pouring pressures. I am currently trying to settle things down at about 90kpa and then work out what to do with lengths of line.

 

[RussTaylor]

Thanks for the photo, I can see exactly what you've done. I'll give it a go and see if I can keep the internal fridge temp down.

I just assumed it already had insulation in it...

 

[RussTaylor]

Managed to get the lid off the tower last night and happy to say that there was styrofoam in the lid and some sort of wetsuite foamy stuff as insulation inside the tower.

What I realised though is that the beer line is 8mm not 5mm like I thought. I received the tower already plumbed and 2 extra meter lengths of tubing which was 5mm. I assumed that the extra tubing and the tubing preplumbed in the tower was the same...I should know never to assume!! <_< so I have some work to do today to replumb the tower. The only problem is that there's a brass thing crimped over the beer line attatched to the tap. Looks like a bitch to remove. Sorry, no photo and a bit hard to describe, anyone got any ideas?

 

[goomboogo]

Russ, the brass clamp will have to be cut off. It's a less than ideal set-up considering many people like to change their lines every year or two. I've got one of these fonts with the crimped-on brass clamp and I re-plumbed with different beer line but I also bought new elbow pieces that were stainless steel. So, I didn't need to remove the clamp but I can't see any other way of getting it off.

 

[RussTaylor]

Russ, the brass clamp will have to be cut off. It's a less than ideal set-up considering many people like to change their lines every year or two. I've got one of these fonts with the crimped-on brass clamp and I re-plumbed with different beer line but I also bought new elbow pieces that were stainless steel. So, I didn't need to remove the clamp but I can't see any other way of getting it off.

Cheers, I thought that would the case. I've got a pair of tin snips, do you think they would do the job? Not sure what to use.

 

[OzBeer_MD]

I think oblique cutters are used to both tighten those things and cut them off. Replace them with stainless Steel cobra clamps that are reusable.

 

[whitegoose]

Russ, the brass clamp will have to be cut off. It's a less than ideal set-up considering many people like to change their lines every year or two.

Really? I'm happy just flushing my lines with hot water and then sanitiser after each keg.