The Keezer Build

[BKBrews]

The paint has actually come out alright after the 2nd coat. I can pick out the imperfections, but I think overall someone looking at it from the outside won't notice too much. I will have a think about it and may do a 3rd coat when I've got it finished. Main priority now is getting it all functioning.

Today I bought the pine and built the collar. I went with 235x19 pine for the frame, cut back to 206mm (I am using 100mm tall tiles and will have a 3mm gap along bottom and 3mm grout line in middle - top will sit flush with collar). It was then covered in villa board ready for the tiles to be applied.

Plan is to fit the lid to the collar with the hinges (won't tile the back as I believe the tiles won't hold them properly) and then secure the collar to the top of the freezer. Once in place, I will do the tiling.

Anyway, enough of the talk, here's some pics. Super happy with the outcome!!

 

[BKBrews]

My goodies arrived this morning (Perlick 650SS tap, Keg King MKIII regulator, cheeky peak 4-way manifold, 4mm ID beer line, disconnects etc), so I'm hoping to get this tiled by the end of the week, ready to fit the tap over the weekend at some point. Aiming to be pouring a beer from it by the following weekend. Bought everything I need to do the tiling yesterday, so it's just a matter of securing the collar to the freezer, letting that settle, gapping it, then getting the tiles on.

 

[Meddo]

Hey BK, sounds like everything's coming together nicely

Did you end up going for barbs or push-in fittings? If barbs you might be better off grabbing some 5mm or 6mm ID hose as it's a fair bit easier to fit over the barbs from what I've heard (I used 5mm ID on the few barbs I have in my system and it worked OK). Given you've got a flow control tap the ID of the hose doesn't really matter with regards to hose length and flow restriction.

As an aside I have a three way plus pass-through secondary reg in mine. The three main outputs go into a 4-way and two 2-way manifolds for distribution to my six kegs - this combo basically lets me have any mix of up to 3 different pressures. The point of this ramble was that I swapped the barbs into the manifolds with push-in fittings as shown below. I've been suspecting a slow-leak since I've done that (I had one emptied gas bottle which I've since replaced) which I just confirmed. Turns out that even though I tightened up those push-in fittings before I installed the manifolds into the collar they'd somehow developed a leak around the threads. Seems like the thermal contraction must be slightly different between the manifolds and the fittings as they needed to be screwed in tighter again to seal against the leak. May be a bit of a trap for young players (like me) to check the fittings for tightness after they've cooled down to keezer-temps.

Good luck with the rest of your build :beer:

 

[Rocker1986]

You can also put silicone in the manifold threads to seal them properly. I had to do this with mine after finding a leak in one of them. It was just the standard barbed fitting.

 

[BKBrews]

Thanks for the info mate - yours looks great.

I've just gone with the barbs for the time being, with JG push-ins on the tap shanks only. I've heard it will be quite hard to get them on and by the look of it, it will be, but I will just be patient and see how we go. Going to sit down on the couch tonight with some boiling water on the table beside me and patiently give it a crack.

 

[BKBrews]

Just had a quick stab at it.... I see a very frustrating evening in front of me, possibly more than one!

 

[Rocker1986]

Why the JG push in fittings on the tap shanks? Do the shanks not have barbs on them for connecting the lines?

 

[BKBrews]

Why the JG push in fittings on the tap shanks? Do the shanks not have barbs on them for connecting the lines?

No they don't - I opted for the JG fittings instead. Bought from Cheeky Peak brewery as a complete set. Perlick 650SS tap, 100mm SS shank and JG push-in fitting for 8mm OD line.

 

[Meddo]

I went the same setup with the push-in fittings on the shanks, and everywhere else that I could. Makes life a hell of a lot easier being able to connect and disconnect lines without cutting.

You do need to be a bit careful with some of the KK inline fittings (tees, straight joiners, elbows etc), too much lateral pressure can cause a leak. I replaced nearly all the bends in my lines with elbows (the photo above was from before I did that) which tidied everything up and got rid of the pressure from those bends. The JG shank fittings seem to have a much deeper throat though and aren't really bothered by bends.

If it turns out you have too much trouble with the 4mm you'd be able to pick up a metre of 5mm or 6mm ID line for a dollar or two from most LHBSs I would think. Bugger-all of it required with the FC taps.

 

[tj2204]

No they don't - I opted for the JG fittings instead. Bought from Cheeky Peak brewery as a complete set. Perlick 650SS tap, 100mm SS shank and JG push-in fitting for 8mm OD line.

I've got the same setup for my taps, got covered in beer a few times before I got the JG fittings properly seated and sealed. Push them till they're all the way in, then push them in some more as they're probably not all the way in!

 

[Radshoes]

I have also gone jg for my taps. makes it much much easier to pull all apart and clean/discard and start again.

 

[BKBrews]

Hey BK, sounds like everything's coming together nicely

Did you end up going for barbs or push-in fittings? If barbs you might be better off grabbing some 5mm or 6mm ID hose as it's a fair bit easier to fit over the barbs from what I've heard (I used 5mm ID on the few barbs I have in my system and it worked OK). Given you've got a flow control tap the ID of the hose doesn't really matter with regards to hose length and flow restriction.

As an aside I have a three way plus pass-through secondary reg in mine. The three main outputs go into a 4-way and two 2-way manifolds for distribution to my six kegs - this combo basically lets me have any mix of up to 3 different pressures. The point of this ramble was that I swapped the barbs into the manifolds with push-in fittings as shown below. I've been suspecting a slow-leak since I've done that (I had one emptied gas bottle which I've since replaced) which I just confirmed. Turns out that even though I tightened up those push-in fittings before I installed the manifolds into the collar they'd somehow developed a leak around the threads. Seems like the thermal contraction must be slightly different between the manifolds and the fittings as they needed to be screwed in tighter again to seal against the leak. May be a bit of a trap for young players (like me) to check the fittings for tightness after they've cooled down to keezer-temps.

Good luck with the rest of your build :beer:

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How did you wire up that computer fan by the way?

I removed a light from the inside of the lid of my freezer and planned on mounting a bracket with a fan to the screw holes left behind. As I will be using an Ink Bird 308S for the temp control, I wanted to wire the computer fan to a normal plug, which I will plug into the 'Heating' side of the Ink Bird. Theory is that the Ink Bird will run the freezer until it reaches 1 degree below the set temp and once it switches to the heating, the fan will come on and disperse the air. Once the temp rises to 1 degree above the set temp, it will switch back to cooling, the fan will turn off and the freezer will turn back on to bring it back down.

 

[earle]

I don't think that will work in practice. Temp controllers don't usually switch straight from cool to heat. Also, it may be better to run the fan while the freezer is on to disperse the "coolness" that it is producing.

 

[BKBrews]

I don't think that will work in practice. Temp controllers don't usually switch straight from cool to heat. Also, it may be better to run the fan while the freezer is on to disperse the "coolness" that it is producing.

I've been using a 308S and watched it run quite a few times - it seems to switch to heating as soon as it reaches the minimum set temp. You're probably right about the fan running while the freezer is cooling, but I think this will work as well.

 

[earle]

Fair enough, the 308S must work a bit different to STC's. You probably won't have a heat source in your keezer, but in a situation like a fermenting fridge where you have a heat source hooked up as well, it seems like you could end up with the fridge and heat source battling against each other and chewing through the electricity. Other temp controllers that I've used have a 0.5 degree buffer (but adjustable) either side of the set temp to prevent this from happening.

 

[Meddo]

BK, mine just runs off a DC power-pack with the wires punched through the collar. The fan is controlled by a momentary switch shown below - the fan runs full-time while the lid is closed and turns off when opened. Probably not an efficient use of power but I want to make sure that the cold air at the bottom of the freezer is being circulated to keep the shanks cool to reduce foam on first pour. I also don't want the fan to stay on with the lid open as that would just force cold air out of the freezer.

I have a whole packet of little momentary switches that are similar (but smaller) if you want one for the same approach?

 

[BKBrews]

BK, mine just runs off a DC power-pack with the wires punched through the collar. The fan is controlled by a momentary switch shown below - the fan runs full-time while the lid is closed and turns off when opened. Probably not an efficient use of power but I want to make sure that the cold air at the bottom of the freezer is being circulated to keep the shanks cool to reduce foam on first pour. I also don't want the fan to stay on with the lid open as that would just force cold air out of the freezer.

I have a whole packet of little momentary switches that are similar (but smaller) if you want one for the same approach?

11-10-2016 3-42-28 PM.jpg

Thanks mate. I think I'm just going to go down the DC power pack route, hooked up to the heating side of the Ink Bird and see how it goes. I can see why you would want it running full time while the lid is shut, but I think i'll try it just running periodically first and see if it's sufficient. I know it won't add much load overall, but my garage is becoming quite heavily loaded between the keezer, ferm fridge and grainfather setup!

 

[breakbeer]

Hi BKB,

Great idea to use the tiles in the collar (I might just do the same)

Have you ever drilled holes in ceramic tiles before? It's a fairly time consuming process & the correct drill bits can set you back nearly $100

Let me know if you have any questions

Cheers

BB

 

[BKBrews]

Hi BKB,

Great idea to use the tiles in the collar (I might just do the same)

Have you ever drilled holes in ceramic tiles before? It's a fairly time consuming process & the correct drill bits can set you back nearly $100

Let me know if you have any questions

Cheers

BB

Hey mate, thanks for that. It was the first thought I had when I decided to do it - love the look and I thought I could pull it off.

Never drilled holes in tiles before, so a little bit worried about that. I had a look at the diamond drill bits and noticed how expensive they were, so have asked around to see if anyone has some. I got my gear today and the shanks are a smaller diameter than I thought which is good - means my holes don't need to be as big.

I've read that you can cut holes/squares in the tiles using a grinder from the rear? Ever tried this? I'm very comfortable pre-drilling the holes prior to fitting the tiles, as I have planned the format so that I have 3 full tiles centred along the top row of the front of the collar - this will allow for 3 taps evenly spaced. Although I'm only starting with one tap, I'm going to cut all 3 holes now and seal the ones not being used at this point in time.

 

[BKBrews]

Put all of the disconnects on the 4mm ID line tonight and I can honestly say it was a piece of piss. One stretch with the needle nose pliers, into boiling water for less than 10 seconds and straight onto the barbs right to the hilt.

Only problem is the clamps that cheeky peak provided don't fit over the lines attached to the barb, so will need to sort that out. Probably don't even need them, but I'd like it all secure.

I used 2.5m lengths for the liquid post to shank section and 1m for the manifold to gas post section. Will accurately measure the regulator to manifold section once I've put it in the fridge.