Davy_42's Keg Locker

What do a packing crate, a broken spa cover, leftover pink insulation and a Peltier Junction have in common?

Well, right now, they are all taking up space around the property, but they will in time become a keg cooler. Bekins trashed
one side of my spa's cover, the other is intact. So, the broken piece becomes the bottom of the locker and the "good" piece the top. I'll frame the locker with boards from the packing crate and put in 6" of insulatation for the sides. The Peltier Junction will provide cooling (maybe, have to run some tests). Some leftover panelling will finish things out. This will hold at least a dozen kegs for aging.

Sure, I could just buy a chest freezer and another Ranco, but what's the fun in that?

Broken half of the spa lid becomes the bottom of the locker. The yellow is construction foam (the only item I've purchased so far) I used to fill gaps and glue the pieces together.


About half way with Reflextic lining

booze shack...

The locker is (nearly) finished. I haven't decided between Peltier junction cooling or using an old water cooler and a submersible pump. The latter would give me more cooling capacity, so I would be able to lager. I am currently using two 2-liter bottles of ice, that I swap out every day.

Cover off showing kegs. The sliver tape around the edges will be covered with some edge molding, once I find the right stuff. At the lower end, you can see the top of the bottle rack.



Cover down. The edge flap is probably less useful on a cold chest than a spa, but I didn't see any reason to remove it.



Total out-of-pocket $10. Half for a can of foam insulation and half for a box of sheetrock screws. I suspect this would cost about $100 to build with purchased materials. Approximately R-25 all around, about triple that of a freezer.

Cool, you'll have to post how the peltier junction works - I've been wondering about using one of those.

I gave up on the Peltier, not enough capacity. So, I combined an old water cooler, a Ranco controller


A pond pump I had lying around



Some tubing and 13.5 feet of 1/4" copper tubing.



The water cooler runs normally, so the system always has a gallon or so of ice water available. The pump is plugged into the Ranco and provides about five gallons per minute. The copper tubing was wrapped around a vaccum cleaner wand, then removed. I'm planning on adding a section of PVC piping around the coil to improve air circulation.

As crude as this setup seems, it brought the locker down to 45F in less than an hour. Room temperature is about 75F. I'll let this run for a week with a min-max thermometer tracking locker and room temperature. Then I'll make the permanent installation, with cutouts for the plumbing and a drain for condensation.

So, with copper prices being what they are I'm up to $26 for the system. I'll probably move my soda water into the locker and put the tap on top of the water cooler. That will free the fourth tap in the kegger. Who knows, the locker might become the kegger.

Quite and ingenius and economical way to cool loads O cornies. It looks like you are circulating beer as coolent in that one hose.

Cheers,

Ed

Just part of an old cobra tap, as the section of tubing I had wasn't quite long enough. It will be replaced in the final installation