I didn't invent the concept, I just built the device.
I needed a way to keep 2 kegs worth of beer cold for 10 days for a camping trip last summer. The solution? Cool it as you pour.
I recently pulled it out of storage, as it's the last day of our classes on friday, and I am having a BBQ. The concept is simple. Take a cooler, fill it with ice and water, and run some metal tubing inside of it full of beer.
There's 50ft of copper tubing inside the cooler, and it does a GREAT job at keeping beer cold as it pours out. When we brought it camping, we had the kegs sitting in the shade, and had cool beer for 10 days. We had cold beer for a day or 2, then the ice melted, and we had cool beer. It worked so amazingly great.
I recently took it all appart, cleaned it all, and rebuilt it. Before it was pretty half-assed with lots of home depot brass fittings, and large sections of vinyl tubing connecting things together as I didn't know the proper thread sizes for teh tap and keg coupler. I now have all of the proper fittings, and a proper shank for the tap.
The keg couplers (I have a second one), the CO2 regulator, and tap were purchased on ebay. Spare parts, and the shank from an online beer equipment site (I could have got the tap and couplers there too). The CO2 bottle I bought from a local welding supply, but I also could have rented it. The cost of a refil is about $25cad, and that's enough gas for about 5 kegs worth of beer.
It's still a little foamy, but that's a pressure issue I'm trying to fine tune. I used to run the keg at about 7-10psi, but I bumped it up recently to about 22psi, and that has gotten rid of most of the foam when pouring.
It's Big Rock Traditional if anyone's wondering. It's brewed locally, and the local liquor store usually carries about 20 kegs of it on site, so it's easy to get on short notice.
I needed a way to keep 2 kegs worth of beer cold for 10 days for a camping trip last summer. The solution? Cool it as you pour.
I recently pulled it out of storage, as it's the last day of our classes on friday, and I am having a BBQ. The concept is simple. Take a cooler, fill it with ice and water, and run some metal tubing inside of it full of beer.
There's 50ft of copper tubing inside the cooler, and it does a GREAT job at keeping beer cold as it pours out. When we brought it camping, we had the kegs sitting in the shade, and had cool beer for 10 days. We had cold beer for a day or 2, then the ice melted, and we had cool beer. It worked so amazingly great.
I recently took it all appart, cleaned it all, and rebuilt it. Before it was pretty half-assed with lots of home depot brass fittings, and large sections of vinyl tubing connecting things together as I didn't know the proper thread sizes for teh tap and keg coupler. I now have all of the proper fittings, and a proper shank for the tap.
The keg couplers (I have a second one), the CO2 regulator, and tap were purchased on ebay. Spare parts, and the shank from an online beer equipment site (I could have got the tap and couplers there too). The CO2 bottle I bought from a local welding supply, but I also could have rented it. The cost of a refil is about $25cad, and that's enough gas for about 5 kegs worth of beer.
It's still a little foamy, but that's a pressure issue I'm trying to fine tune. I used to run the keg at about 7-10psi, but I bumped it up recently to about 22psi, and that has gotten rid of most of the foam when pouring.
It's Big Rock Traditional if anyone's wondering. It's brewed locally, and the local liquor store usually carries about 20 kegs of it on site, so it's easy to get on short notice.
