Another reason for building something so silly: I have mentioned that the 2 and 3 liter bottles have the same cap shape and size(38mm). It's also true that the 6 liter PET bottles made for Tap-A-Draft use a 38mm cap. So once I have a working model, I could purchase three of these 6 liter bottles and have enough to hold 5 gallons of brew.
[EDIT]The free shipping only kicks in for orders of $59 or more, so you'd have to buy 8 to get it...shipping for one is about $6 for USPS. You can get three 6 Liter bottles for right at $30 with shipping. The price of the whole TAD system is $70 plus shipping, the price of what I'm building is about $15; $15 + $30 = $45, savings of about $35 when you count shipping costs.[/EDIT]
After a bit more tinkering and about an hour of walking around Lowes looking at compression valves and talking with plumbing experts, I have found that the only way to make any of the previously made plans work is with a welder to secure a washer to the nut attached to the bottom of the brass tee in order to make a secure fit. They would also require the use of copper tubing within the tee itself to attach the vinyl tubing to, as brass compression tees have no way of sealing to any sort of flexible tubing. I can see that now looking more closely at the plans I have posted the urls to.
Luckily I learned these little bits of knowledge before purchasing anyting other than my $2 pvc purchase. I will be returning to Lowes tomorrow to buy Aqua Marine Epoxy and trying for another cheap effective approach. This epoxy is used to seal plastic, metal, ceramics, fiberglass, and tile, works underwater, even dries and makes a water and airtight seal when applied underwater. Sounds like some kind of elven magic to me. 0.85 Fluid Oz is about $5, so I'm gonna buy some and bring it home. My plan is to drill two 1/4" holes in one of my PET bottle caps and run one 3/8" vinyl tubing line through for the feed line, another tubing through for my schrader valve. I'll probably wrap the lines in threading tape just for the hell of it. Once they are in place I will apply the expoxy carefully to the top and bottom of the cap, being sure not to get in the way of the seal on the underside. I'm debating whether or not to make the holes in the caps big enough for the epoxy to make a connection through the top and bottom, I think doing this would make the seal stronger, but possibly weaker physically...I do have lots of PET bottle caps laying around so I may experiment and try both ways. If this idea works, the total cost of my diy keg will be right at $10 counting the cost of the picnic tab, vinyl tubing, and epoxy. The nice thing about this concept(if it works) is that once the initial investment has been covered, additional caps can be built incredibly cheaply.
Here's a purdy little pic of what the finished product should look like:
I've looked everywhere for those metal stems and can't seem to find one locally. I tried lowe's, home de-pot, ace, even autozone.
As far as your question, aside from the 10 different reasons I've given in previous posts, I just thought of another one. My *ahem* brewing method is 1 week in primary and 1 week in the bottle. Scoff and curse all you want but it works and it's damned fine beer.
I would scoff and curse at no mans beer or method. Your method makes perfect sense now knowing its young and settling. For the all metal valve stems you might try a truck repair center, heavy equipment dealer or repair, probably even NAPA. The suggestion for these stems is just to make your project a little easier to copy for a fleet of bottles. For easy drilling of the cap, I sacrificed one bottle and cut the top 1/3 off. Then with a cap screwed onto the cut bottle I drilled from the inside. This kept the cap gasket pinched between the cap and bottle and made for a cleaner hole. Of course there was a block of wood under it when drilling.
__________________
Quote:
Originally Posted by the_bird
"I've got a fever... and the only prescription is, MORE CARBOYS!"
primary- Tangerine Dream, SWMBO slayer,
serving- amber ale hop experiment #6, Roggenbier, apfelwine
planning- Cru?
conditioning- 9/9/09 barleywine
Drink water?... Never, fish fornicate in it.--- W.C. Fields
Most problems can be solved with the proper application of force.
Good idea about cutting up a bottle for drilling the cap. I had read somewhere about doing that but thought it was just because they were afraid to hold the cap in their hand while drilling a hole in it. I hadn't even considered that it would keep me from damaging the gasket. Thus far the only place I have actually searched for the metal schrader valves has been online, but at every hardware/auto parts store in my city; I'm sure someplace carries it and just doesn't list it online. However, I'm hoping I will be able to make this work without needing to buy anything but the epoxy.
San Antonio has no NAPA(National Auto Parts Association)? I like the metal stems because they "bolt on" instead of needing epoxy or glue. The plus side is when the cap wears out or strips the valve stem can be "bolted on" the next one. Safety is a concern while drilling something in your hand, I have two thumbnails on the left thumb from a drilling mishap, but as you deduced the cut bottle is more for the secure holding of the gasket. If you want the metal stems and can't source them, shoot me a PM. I'm planning on getting some more for the barleywine trade occuring soon.
__________________
Quote:
Originally Posted by the_bird
"I've got a fever... and the only prescription is, MORE CARBOYS!"
primary- Tangerine Dream, SWMBO slayer,
serving- amber ale hop experiment #6, Roggenbier, apfelwine
planning- Cru?
conditioning- 9/9/09 barleywine
Drink water?... Never, fish fornicate in it.--- W.C. Fields
Most problems can be solved with the proper application of force.
I purchased what looked like the strongest epoxy available at lowes. I carefully applied it to both sides of the cap after securing the two lines in place; it dried nice and solid on both ends. After waiting twice the recommended time just to be sure it was dry, I did a test run. While the seal is air and water tight, it is not able to hold any amount of pressure over about 5psi. This obviously is useless for my application.
So the general problem I have had in designing this thing is that I don't want to have to use any kind of brass tee as 1)the brass is not made to make any kind of seal with anything other than brass or copper tubing and 2)I don't like the idea of the fittings for the co2 valve and feed line costing more then the co2 pump, feed line/tap, and keg all put together. All the tutorials I have found and posted here so far have been able to jerry-rig it into a working state, but all required some specialized tools and soldering, neither of which I have. The easiest and most effective way I can think of to make this work is to do what I have been trying to do, which is have two seperate holes in the cap, one for the air valve, and one for the feed line. This is very difficult to do with a standard 38mm cap as you only actually have about 25mm or so to work with before you start affecting the gasket. You could possibly do it if you could find some 1/8 or 1/16 compression couplings, but I have not been able to and am not sure they even make them that small. If they do, and someone can find them and make that idea work, please post your results here.
Since I am unable to make the compression pieces small enough to fit into a cap so small, I am now looking at just making the cap bigger. I actually thought about doing that somehow in the past; anything I could've done probably would not have been a very strong seal. Then I was wandering around my local HEB yesterday, and I stumbled upon a 5 gallon water bottle with handle, on sale for $5. I grabbed one, should've grabbed all five of them...then after getting home I find this thread: http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f35/homemade-keg-5326/ After a quick chat with denny, I have deduced that the 5 gallon water bottle will hold the pressure, so long as it is properly regulated. He suggested a pressure relief valve, which I found for about $10. I then found a PSI regulator with built in gauge for $10. I've already ordered a CO2 bike pump, so am now waiting for both of these to arrive. Once they do, it's back to lowes to get the compression fittings to attach to the water bottle lid(one for the feed line, one for the regulator/co2 pump assembly). Clearly this is no longer a bike pump keg, and it's not even an original idea anymore, but damn it I've come this far, I might as well finish what I started.
I've just added up the prices for everything I still have to purchase, and everything I've purchased already. I went a bit over my budget. Here's a list of what I've already got:
5gal bottle: $5
Tap & Feed line: $8
CO2 Pump: $10
PSI Regulator: $10
Total: $33
Here's the list of what I need to buy from Lowes to make everything fit together:
Spent $33 already, need another $15.05, for a grand total of 48.05.
There is a bright side to this. When I want to buy more kegs, they will only cost $5 each for five gallons, as the whole assembly is built into the cap which is interchangeable. One down side is I won't have any mini-kegs, which I originally wanted so I could at least keep them in the fridge. I have seen these same water bottles range in size from 1 gallon up to 7 gallons so I'll definitely have to go take a closer look at them and see if they use the same caps(crossing fingers). If this is the case then I will be able to have an assortment of keg sizes for $5 or less each, and only need to one tap system.
Another down side is that the water bottle could still explode once I get everything together and test it. I plan on setting the regulator to 12-15 psi, and leaving it there. As long as I am able to prime correctly before kegging, I shouldn't have to worry about an explosion. From the very beginning I had been worrying about over-pressurization; mainly because I know that none of my friends know anything about homebrewing or kegging and would either "forget" to add pressure to the keg, or they would over-pressurize it or something stupid like that. It is a relief knowing that the regulator will take care of all that for me.
![[Not a] Bike Pump Keg [Evolution]](http://cdn.homebrewtalk.com/iconimages/f51/not-bike-pump-keg-evolution_ltr.gif)
Linear Mode
