Tony's Kegorator Mk 2

I got the tap of Ebay.

Ive never tried the beer but loved the look of the tap handle and love porter so i got it.

The kegs are comercial kegs..... still owned by the big breweries etc etc. If they are anywhere other than a licenced premise using them or at the brewery..... they are considered stolen property in the eyes of the law.

I figure i invested enough cash into the company that ownes them over the years, for them to extend me the curtesy of a lend of a few of them for ever :)

cheers
 
Im planning on just adding a cup of sea salt to the cold water for the font. I wont be freezing it, its just cooling for the lines all the way to the taps so all i need to do is stop the water going bad. Salt should do this.


What about just vodka/moonshine?? I was thinking about this and it has a few benefits, lower freeze temp, non-corrosive, and ethanol is petty good if it actually gets into the beer!
 
Beerswimmer said:
Im planning on just adding a cup of sea salt to the cold water for the font. I wont be freezing it, its just cooling for the lines all the way to the taps so all i need to do is stop the water going bad. Salt should do this.


What about just vodka/moonshine?? I was thinking about this and it has a few benefits, lower freeze temp, non-corrosive, and ethanol is petty good if it actually gets into the beer!
Click to expand...
what about star-san? might not be a bad option, though i don't know what temp it'd freeze at. not like you'd want freezing temps anyway. it'd keep the nasties away at any rate.
 
Tony ended up using a mixture of water and Methylated spirits, I think he got the mix to around 25% alcohol......

I'm sure he will be on soon to correct me if i'm wrong!!
 
Hey im back :)

Yeah used metho to stop it freezing but the smell in the freezer......... no wonder the folks out west who drink it lick boot pollish to seal there tongue and hide the taste. I used to live in a town where you could buy Metho cold from the fridge...... true story!

The rig works great........... I just need to get a bit more beer line...... it needs to be a bit longer than i cut it to slow the flow down enough for a perfect pour.

Will take a bit of tuning but i went through this with my fridge. Once its right its a pleasure to use.

At the moment i have a Brown Porter, a 7% Maibock and a 7% stout brewed with a Belgian Saisin yeast at 30 deg for 2 months! Its awsome! Dry, roasty, bitter, malty and a slight fruitiness and tasrtness to finnish it off. A very complex beer.

cheers
 
Nice looking setup, Tony- I've been assembling bits for one as well, though I'm considering building a wooden bar and slipping the chest freezer under it, like in a real bar. I'm using a Johnson Controls A419 for temperature control which is a damn sight easier to use than hacking the factory thermostat. And I've got a couple tap handles that'll blow your socks off... :onfire:
As to your brewing- I'm curious, what is your method for filtration? I've not gone past just using a couple layers of cheese cloth to get the large solids out so far but I've got a few batches that I'd like to experiment with filtration on. Could you school me some?
Also- are you force carbonating or are you sugaring in the keg? When I was young and impatient I'd just pop it with CO2 at 11PSI or so for 2-3 days and call her good until I tried sugaring in the keg- man, what a better taste! I've since learnt to be patient (and space my batches!) so they sugar in the keg for a couple months at least.

cheers,
Jas
 
Filtration: I use a 10 inch standard filter housing and have a 1 micron absolute filter cartridge. I drop the beer to drinking temp of 4 deg c, and put it in a clean keg. I then put 20kpa on the keg and pump it slowly up through the filter housing and into a second clean keg. Once its all gone through i close up the keg, put it in the kegorator and carb it.

Carbing: I force carb. No point using a second ferment to carb if you filter to have clear beer. It just makes more yeast. I put 250KPA on the beer out line so the gas triclkes up through the beer and carbs it up nicly. Takes 48 hrs.

I like this method as i can get to the beer within days of fermentation finnishing. Fresh beer is best! After a few weeks the hops fade and the beer just isnt as good as it is fresh.

cheers
 
Holy shit, down to 1 micron?!? That's better than most tap water I think- are you prefiltering before hitting the 1 micron filter? Seems to me that going straight at the 1 micron would clog it up in a hot hurry.
I've been mulling over building a double filter manifold using 2 Culligan pots. I was thinking about using a 20 micron first, then a 4 or 5 micron, but if you're using 1 micron guess I'll go there. Is it just a particulate filter, or is it charcoal as well? I'm assuming particulate alone.

If you don't mind, could you post pics of your filtration setup?
 
Tony - do you replace the filter after each use??
Would seem like a good (bad) spot to get nasties growing....

My brewery - manual operation, though I can recirc to hold mash temp and do steps if I am keen, but I only lose around a degree in an hour so normally don't bother.

Brew2.jpg



dreamboat
 
No its a special cartridge. Soak in warm napisan solution for an hour and its clean

Rinse in hot water and its good for next time.

Its starting to get a bit odd shaped now after 4 or 5 years use..... time to fork out another $70 :)
 
tony05 said:
No its a special cartridge. Soak in warm napisan solution for an hour and its clean

Rinse in hot water and its good for next time.

Its starting to get a bit odd shaped now after 4 or 5 years use..... time to fork out another $70 :)
Click to expand...

I would be interested in knowing exactly what filter you are using if you can find the specs....
 
Sic are you talking about the Kegerator Tony05 posted or the brew sculpture above dreamboat posted? Both would actually be considered still viable and I know from talking to him the Tony is still using his kegerator.
 
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