Identifying Hardware, Part II

Earlier today, I created a post asking for helping identifying a keg part and @JuanMoore quickly provided an answer. However, turns out how I have more questions!

There are three kegs in question here; Keg A, B & C. Each keg accepts a D-type coupler.

First question is a larger-scale question: How does one carbonate a sanke keg? Also, are each of the kegs that follow considered sanke keg? When I search for "sanke kegs", Google returns the standard 15.5 gal, one valve kegs that BMC use primarily.

Keg A: Appears to have a 3x type D couplers connections plus a type A coupler. Why?


Keg B: Has what looks like 2x type D couplers, except each port is slightly different. My guess is one is gas in, that other is liquid out, which which is which? It has two of each ports, too. Why is that?


Keg C: Here's a cool little 5 gal keg. If the above is true for an in and out, this doesn't have that -- it just has two of the same type of ports. How do I use/carb this sucker?


Thank you very much for your help!

As mentioned in the other thread, those were designed for cleaning beer lines and shanks at bars. They were filled with cleaning solution, and then connected to the coupler so that the solution would be forced through the lines and shanks with gas pressure. They're not really considered sankey kegs even though they accept sankey couplers. I've seen them referred to as "cleaning cans" and "pub kegs".

The one with 4 different connection points is likely for 4 different keg coupler types, so that it could be connected to any beer line quickly and easily without having to swap the coupler. Looks to me like a type D, type A, type U and type S. It could be 3 type D's and a type A so that it could connect to several lines at once, but the more typical method is to daisy chain the lines so that it goes from the cleaning keg to the shank, and then a jumper between the shanks so that it then goes backwards through the next line, and another jumper to go from that coupler to the coupler of the next line, etc. It would make more sense to have a variety of types on each one than several of the same. Each sankey connection point accepts a coupler, and each coupler connects both the gas and liquid, so it's not one gas and one liquid side on the kegs with two types of connection points.

FWIW the type S is nearly identical to the type D except the valve is slightly deeper. A type D coupler will fit on a type S keg, but won't push the ball down far enough to function properly. A type S coupler will fit on a type D keg, but usually you won't be able to lock it in the engaged postion because the valve won't let it push down far enough.

Carbing in sankey kegs isn't really much different than in any other keg type. You connect the gas, set to your serving pressure, and wait. Since sankey couplers connect both the liquid and gas simultaneously, you need to make sure the liquid side is connected to a (closed) faucet, or replace the liquid side coupler tailpiece with a penny, otherwise it will spray your beer everywhere as soon as you turn the gas on.

Micromatic sells them as "cleaning cans". They have a 4 head that you can order with whatever combination of valve types you want. Looks exactly like two of yours-

http://www.micromatic.com/draft-keg-beer/line-cleaning-pid-201-420.html

Looking at the price tag, your best bet might be selling those to a beer distributor that does their own line cleaning or to a line cleaning service, and using that to buy a bunch of standard sankey or corny kegs that don't have so many extraneous parts and potential leak points.

Ok, cool. Didn't realize all of these were cleaning cans / pub kegs.

So to be clear, these aren't sankey kegs (or is it sanke? wikipedia has both), but they can be used for homebrewing provided that the liquid side is closed, correct?

Lastly, if that is correct, is the gas in a one-way valve that I just need to connect my regulator to, or will it take some fidgeting beyond that?

Thanks again for your help. Sorry that you're having to explain it to me like I'm a three year old!

JuanMoore said:

Micromatic sells them as "cleaning cans". They have a 4 head that you can order with whatever combination of valve types you want. Looks exactly like two of yours-

http://www.micromatic.com/draft-keg-beer/line-cleaning-pid-201-420.html

Looking at the price tag, your best bet might be selling those to a beer distributor that does their own line cleaning or to a line cleaning service, and using that to buy a bunch of standard sankey or corny kegs that don't have so many extraneous parts and potential leak points.

Click to expand...

ipe: Dang! Yeah, that's not a half bad idea! I'll see what I can do on that front. Cheers!

Shelby said:

Ok, cool. Didn't realize all of these were cleaning cans / pub kegs.

So to be clear, these aren't sankey kegs (or is it sanke? wikipedia has both), but they can be used for homebrewing provided that the liquid side is closed, correct?

Lastly, if that is correct, is the gas in a one-way valve that I just need to connect my regulator to, or will it take some fidgeting beyond that?

Thanks again for your help. Sorry that you're having to explain it to me like I'm a three year old!

Click to expand...

Yeah, you certainly can use them for homebrew. See my edit above for my suggestion though.

See the picture of a standard sankey coupler below. The red line is the gas in, and the clear line is the beer out. It's just like corny QD's, except there's only one coupler for both lines. Connect the lines to the coupler, and then connect the coupler to the keg. Although most couplers have a check valve in them, they're often cheap duckbill type and I wouldn't trust them enough to call them "one way".