The Table-top Mini-Pub

[stux]

So, I built this a few years ago now, but I'm working on an upgrade for Australia day, so figured I'd start by posting the build pictures

Enjoy

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I decided to make a three font setup for my sister's engagement party. The idea was to try and get a bit of a pub feel in a smallish unit.

I built it on friday, was pouring on saturday!

120L later, it was a big success

A Blank Slate

Engagement Party tomorrow... need to design and build a 3 tap picnic setup...
Went to Bunnings, bought some wood, molding and brackets, and got to work

Deciding where to put the molding...

Was originally going to be a dual-tap setup, but decided I might as well add a third hole, and just get another shank!

Woodwork done...

Molding unscrews so the blackboard can be painted a few times at the same time as the varnishing

These brackets will do. Was thinking I might upgrade to a hinged setup eventually

taps, driptray and boards in place

SWMBO painted and varnished overnight. I mounted the hardware the next day.

The drip tray is off my kegerator. The mini-pub was sized to use the same drip tray from my main fridge. Don't need it at home when I'm out

Since then, I've taken the same approach with my 1 tap miracle barrel too.

Back of unit. The furthest edge was designed to be clamped onto a wide table. Wasn't sure how much downward force people would be applying. Since then I've taken the circular saw to the end of this and shortened the table top bit . Fits on normal width tables these days... ​

We thought it necessary to print up some instructions since a large majority of people using the taps will have no experience pouring beer with taps. Most people try to open taps slowly, and thus make a frothy mess.

In future I would recommend adding a 4th instruction:

4. Tell me when a Keg Blows!

Number 3... because it annoys me when people pour my beer like they've seen at the pub where someone who can't pour a beer overfills the beer until the oversized head they've created is poured down the side of the glass and into the drip tray

8.5 Kegs Go Up. Pretty much every keg of beer I had on hand... even the one with the bung poppet.
Then I just needed to find room for inconsequential stuff... like clothes... the children.. etc

The table-top mini-pub setup for 100 guests to use at a rather raucous engagement party

Each of 3 kegs is in a big bucket or bin with ice.
Found 2 bags of ice per bin was enough to keep the cold beer flowing all night.

Ran the CO2 at about 60kpa and had a very nice pour.

Gave the kegs a bit of a lift/wobble every now and again to check how they were going... and get the ice to reform around the keg walls again.

In later outings, I stand the 3 kegs in a techni-ice 100L esky, and fill that with ice.

Dead Soldiers.

120L of beer drunk...
A successful expedition

 

[stux]

A few more expeditions:

Supplied taps for my father's birthday party. He supplied the beer

(You can just see the lid of the 100L esky in the open position)



Trailer loaded with Smoker, Mini-pub, 100L esky and gas fridge/freezer for a camping expedition

 

[stux]

So, about a year ago now, I decided that I needed to improve the 100L esky + 3 keg situation so that it was more efficient with ice.

So, I bought some foam...


Cut the foam to fit inside the top of the 100L techni-ice esky, and then cut holes out for the kegs with a jig saw...





Its a very good fit







As it was virtually impossilble to remove the plugs, I also added a handle to one of them which then makes it easy.





Now, this works nicely. Basically means 2 bags of ice will keep all 3 kegs ice cold all night

Still need to give the kegs a jangle, or shake the esky a bit to collapse the ice as it melts away from the kegs.

As a bonus, it keeps the kegs locked down. Normally a keg in a bucket of ice+water will float as it gets emptied.

The ice was still present two days later.

 

[stux]

Which brings me to the upgrade I'm working on for our Australia day camping trip


Look what I picked up in the US a few months ago...



Its a 7 circuit cold plate. Stainless tubing in a rather massive hunk of aluminum.

I've looped 3 pairs of circuits to double their length and will leave the 7th circuit unutilized...

(squeezing the 5mm line over the barbs was hellish)

...

More later

 

[Ben1]

Wow! That thing is awesome. I need to teach myself to be more handy...

 

[CrookedFingers]

Thats awesome Stux.
Thats a great idea.

Nice work, neat job.

 

[stux]

Picked up the fittings I need for the cold plate, and some grommets.

6x 5/16" John Guest Straight-Equal Connectors $3.50 each (can recommend TruWater for all your JG needs)
6x Airlock Grommets



25mm Communications conduit is perfect for lining shank holes in fridges/eskies, bought a metre of it years ago from Bunnings and have been using it up an inch or two at a time ever since

I thought some insulation on the exposed parts wouldn't go astray



Drilled holes, lined with the comms conduit and siliconed in place, not the neatest silicon job, but it will do. Should prevents water/condensation entering the esky lining. Not 100% happy with the strength of the silicon may rip it out later and replace with a good bead of araldite.



The insulation will be compressed right against the wood when the esky is in place



esky is now in place



Two blocks of wood, strategically placed to allow the esky to be press-fit in place. Marvellous action as the esky clicks in, and this compresses the insulation perfectly. Will paint the blocks later. Also will plane the rough edge and touch it up.



You can see how good a seal the insulation forms when the esky is pushed against the faucet board, even though there is a large shank nut underneath the insulation.



3x 11mm holes for beer ingress



Applying an airlock grommet to the hole makes the perfect bulkhead fitting, its totally snug. Same technique works for keg fridges.



You need to squeeze the grommet in, then



massage it into place



Tada



all three holes completed



Cold plate all plumbed with JG fittings. I found I wanted to group the In lines so used another piece of comms conduit. This prevented the lines obscuring the centre of the esky. In retrospect it would've been even better to have alligned the entry holes vertically rather than horizontally and then the runs could've been along the wall. Still, neat, nice and serviceable



All done on construction. I proceeded to flush/soak with PBW, rinse, starsan. Seems to be virtually no turbulence. Or leaks...

Then planed the raw edge, and handed it off to SWMBO to re-stain/varnish the new and exposed timber.

Next stop Australia Day where I'll give this a real work out

 

[stux]

One really nice thing about the new setup is that all the paraphernalia, drip tray, faucets, kegging tools/equipment, small gas bottle and reg, can be stored in the esky for transport. It forms a solid unit.

It is ideally a 2 person lift with that cold plate though!

So much nicer than the previous situation of carrying around a large L shaped object, and a milk crate of stuff, and a 100L esky.

 

[nic0]

Are you still going to pack some ice around the kegs or will the cold plate do the job? How well would it work with room temperature kegs?

 

[stux]

I'm not going to ice the kegs. They'll just be kept in the shade

I'm not 100% certain how well it will work, but I have a little miracle barrel 50' of SS coil in a 6L port barrel) which will chill a warm keg plenty well as long as you're not continuously drawing from it. The barrel has about 750ml of beer in its coil chilling at any time.

Cold plates are supposed to be better than coils, the limiting factor is how many beers do you want to pull in a row. If you are pouring continuously then the beer needs to get cooled as its moving, which means you need more contact area, but in a domestic situation there'd normally be a bit of a rest between pours which allows the next pour to be really cold

In a situation where you need more cooling power, you simply open the bung and keep the melt water drained to below the top of the cold plate. Melt water is 0C but ice is colder than that. By draining the water you get the ice in contact with the cold plate and that will chill the cold plate below zero.

Will measure how much beer is in the lines when i test this weekend, but I'm fairly certain it will work well

 

[stux]

So, after finishing the upgrade just in time for our Oz Day camping trip it was time to pack all the gear up



Kegging box, taps, driptray and all plumbing & fittings fit in the esky. The drip tray perfectly wedges the cold plate against the esky wall so that it doesn't move during transport. Even my starsan spraybottle fits in, although my 5L sprayer/pumper that I use for flushing the lines doesn't.




5 kegs + c02 bottle and the minipub packed up on trailer

Brewer's Assistant approves


As soon as we had the kitchen table up it was time for first pour...



Not a bad pour considering it was on a trailer not so long ago. Was ice cold though. At this stage we only had a few 1L blocks of ice sitting on the cold plate, but it still worked magnificently. Kegs weren't that hot yet, but it was a stinking hot day. The beer was soooo refreshing... that the rest of the site setup didn't get finished till the next day

Was running gas at 150kpa.

Unfortunately, we had forgotten the chalk so couldn't update the blackboard!




Check out the condensation


The next day we managed to get some chalk...



From now on the chalk will live with the kit


Anyway, I experimented with the kpa at between 150 and 200kpa. At 100kpa which is my home serving pressure beer went flat. At 150-200 kpa it served well, and it recarbed to the right level. Still not 100% certain what is the best pressure, it might depend on the temperature of the kegs.

One bag of ice lasted one day and a little bit of the next day under fairly heavy use in 30+ degree temps. The beer was ALWAYS ice cold, probably about 2C even when the kegs must've been 20C+, and sooooo refreshing, even the normally quite ... carefull... drinkers were digging into the ginger beer and cider!

Always had a great head. I swear this thing nearly works better than my normal kegerator!


The beer was so nice and cold that we promptly went through 2 kegs of great beer...




And the tragedy was that after 3 days we ran out of beer. Oh Noes. This meant a trip to BWS to get some Lashes and other beverages... and we had a great place to store the beer... while still cooling the ginger and cider lines

Only one bag of ice in the above pic.

 

[jonnir]

I like that your able to still use the esky for other beers with the cold plate? You may have mentioned it but where did you source the cold plate?

 

[stux]

I like that your able to still use the esky for other beers with the cold plate? You may have mentioned it but where did you source the cold plate?

It was this one:
http://www.chicompany.net/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=376_17_58&products_id=3237

I first looked into cold-plates a few years ago, but shipping it to Australia was going to be impossible, so when the opportunity arose, I organized for it to be UPSed to my hotel on a recent business trip, then I took it back in my luggage (dual bag allowance). Remember, its frickin heavy

Bet there were some funny faces at security screening.

Anyway, 165USD + 25US UPS ground shipping to my US hotel. Plus a few thousand dollars in incidental airfares and hotel bookings

(you can ship to hotels before you check in to the hotel...)

 

[stux]

Will measure how much beer is in the lines when i test this weekend, but I'm fairly certain it will work well

Checked the lines when I flushed with starsan the other day. 250ml of beer in the lines.

I flushed the beer out into a jug until I saw starsan come through.

This compares quite favourably with the 750ml in my previous coil based barrel.

 

[squirt in the turns]

Melt water is 0C but ice is colder than that.

Adding salt will lower the freezing point of water, allowing the water surrounding your plate to be below zero? Or not by a significant enough amount to make any difference?

 

[stux]

Adding salt will lower the freezing point of water, allowing the water surrounding your plate to be below zero? Or not by a significant enough amount to make any difference?

That occurred to me, my biggest concern was actually freezing the beer in the lines. Only needs about -1.5C to freeze.