Bottling from taps - BMBF alteration

Happy Thanksgiving, HBT'ers. I'm sure you're familiar with the BierMuncher Bottle Filler by now. I've been using it for the last few months and it always works a treat.

Today I wanted to bring a growler to Thanksgiving dinner at my brother's house. The keg I wanted was (of course) in the back of the fridge. As you can see it's no small task to get access to the rear kegs. There's also not a whole lot of room above the kegs to maneuver my arms.



It would have required a lot of time moving kegs, disconnecting lines, making a bloody mess in the fridge. My cobra tap was also already connected to my Apfelwein keg.

So I got all MacGuyver on the BMBF. I unscrewed the nozzle from the Perlick attached to that keg and forced a 5/16" line in. It was a *very* tight fit. Here's what it looked like:



Then it was just a matter of threading the nozzle back on and turning on the tap. With the growler it was very convenient to hold the stopper in place with my thumb and have my forefinger in the handle.



I'm going to see if I can purchase a plastic nozzle or two to dedicate to the task. I really like not having to disconnect any lines nor trot out my cobra tap.

-Joe

HA!
That's EXACTLY what I did to fill the growler I took to the outlaws!

GMTA!

Is it really necessary to go through all that with the hose? It just occurred to me that most brewpubs I frequent fill their growlers straight from the tap. No special hoses required...

Remember oxydation takes a couple months to develop in beer...and growlers are usually consumed within 2 days of purchase..

Not that I don't think it's a cool DIY idea...but isn't really an unnecessary thing to deal with to fill a growler for a party? I can see how it would be great for bottles tha tmay not be consu,ed right away...but a growler?

Nutten's too good for my beer!
6 hours, 6 days, or 6 months, I want it to have the best chance possible

I went through the same thought process, Revvy. But I came to the conclusion that this is very little extra work, and it reduces carbonation loss and oxidation from splashing. And like BK, since the beer has my name on it, I want it to be the best I can make it in the bottle. So there it is

-Joe

I agree that filling like this from the bottom of the bottle with a stopper that allows you to hold pressure to about 10 psi (I run this at 10 psi) makes for much better carbonation.

Revvy said:

Is it really necessary to go through all that with the hose? It just occurred to me that most brewpubs I frequent fill their growlers straight from the tap. No special hoses required...

Click to expand...

Most of the ones around here have a piece of plastic tubing that fits over the tap and just touches the bottom of the growler. This minimizes foam, thus decreasing fill time, as well as helping to purge out some of the o2. There is no rubber stopper acting as a counter-pressure valve but, the growlers I have had filled seem to last a few days with minimal co2 loss.

BigKahuna/nostalgia- Did you still lower the PSI for this? Because I know my local brew pub also goes straight from the tap to the growler, without lowering PSI.

I just ordered a picnic tap with my ingredient order the other day from nothernbrewer to make my BMBF- I think I still might use this method so Beer isn't going through 10FT line through tower and perlick (clean them regularly, but still).

All regards to Biermuncher, I think you should post this on his sticky thread as an alternative method.

MoRoToRiUm said:

BigKahuna/nostalgia- Did you still lower the PSI for this?

Click to expand...

If I am going from the tap...that already has 10" of hose, No I don't. If I am using a 3' Picnic Tap, YEA, I drop it to 2 - 3 # Just depends on weather I'm filling an "in Service" keg or a "in Waiting" keg.

Thanks BK (and Nostalgia)! Time to sanitize some Grolsch bottles...

For those interested in this idea. A dip tube from your keg works perfectly as well. Leave the O-ring in place and slide the Perlick Nozzle onto the dip tube. Then screw the assembly back onto the tap. Wiola! A BMBF on your tap!

Revvy said:

Is it really necessary to go through all that with the hose? It just occurred to me that most brewpubs I frequent fill their growlers straight from the tap. No special hoses required...

Click to expand...

While filling a growler with stout to bring to a party, I realized the other reason to use a stopper to create backpressure: foam.

For more experimentation, I pushed a 1/2" tube over the Perlick spout and put the other end of the tube at the bottom of my growler. Turned on the juice and ended up with over 1/3 of the bottle full of foam.

A few days later, I took the same 1/2" tube, but this time I added the racking cane and stopper, as in the picture above. I used a short piece of 5/16" tube as a bushing to make the 1/2" tube a snug fit. Using the same pressure on the keg, the backpressure from the stopper (and probably flow restriction from the smaller ID racking cane) prevented the foaming almost completely.

So this is my favorite method so far. The 1/2" hose slides onto the tap's nozzle just right and is snug and secure.

-Joe