Kegging

Buying, building and using brewing equipment and apparatus. Product reviews and questions.

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johnbarley
Light Lager
Light Lager
Posts: 19
Joined: Fri Jan 24, 2003 8:30 pm

Kegging

Post by johnbarley »

I'm going to get a couple of small kegs from a friend and was wondering how much tubing can I use from the keg to tap? My problem is I want to have the keg in a fridge in the basement and run a tube up thru my floor into my kitchen (15 feet approx). Is this practical? My concern of having the fridge upstairs is that I have a soon to be 3 yr old who is very curious! Don't want him wasting the beer by pulling the tap or even drinking it which would be bad (until he's 21 then we can enjoy together). Any suggestions?

Thanks
John Barley (Corn)
Turbo
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Feb 19, 2003 11:37 pm

Kegging

Post by Turbo »

One thing I think you will need to do is to run a larger insulated pipe to put your keg line in to keep it refrgerated. If you don't keep it cold it might cause foaming problems.

Another thing to look at is that the Beer that sits in the long keg line will probably go flat when not used for prolonged periods. You will need to bleed out the flat beer before pouring you friends a glass to get rid of the flat beer in the lines.

Give it a try and see how it goes. Good Luck, Dale
fitz
Strong Ale
Strong Ale
Posts: 442
Joined: Thu Dec 19, 2002 8:36 am

They sell insulation

Post by fitz »

They do sell insulation for beer lines for approximately the same thing.
Some bars that do a great deal of business have their kegs in a basement cooler and their taps are upstairs in the "bar area"
Many of times this is way more than 15 feet since the CO2 is lighter than the beer, I would think that you wouldn't have a flat beer problem, but it may still get warm even with the insulation. I would suggest, if you are having friends over for a drink, pour the first beer in a pitcher. Then you wouldn't get all of the warm, or if I'm wrong, flat beer in one glass. Make sure it is smal ID line, or you'll definitely have a foaming problem.
FINA
Posts: 6
Joined: Wed Dec 04, 2002 3:21 pm

glycol

Post by FINA »

My buddy Ed actually did something like this, and actually fashioned a jacket around the beer line with a glycol filled tube wrapped around the beer line. It may be a bit of overkill being that you will need a pump and something to cool the glycol (I think he may have actually ran the glycol line through the freezer of the fridge to cool it). This contraption worked great though. The faucet is on his back deck and it still pours frosty brew in the in the middle of the summer in GA. On a much cheaper and less time consuming note, if your wife will let you put the fridge upstairs you could just but a lock for the faucet they have them on morebeer.com for about $40. It's under the faucets, towers, and handles heading.
canman
Pale Ale
Pale Ale
Posts: 55
Joined: Sun Dec 29, 2002 9:40 pm

cold air blower

Post by canman »

run the line inside pvc pipe and use a blower fan to cool inside pvc with cold air from fridge. They actually sell a system just for this. Last place I saw the blower was on Ebay
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