TAP-A-DRAFT: first impression...

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do you inject the c02 at the coldest temps possible? I thought I read that somehwere, but the instructions I have say tap it and then chill it down.

thanks
 
My TAD arrived today just as I was preparing for my first brew after many years away. It seems to me that tapping would be best cold...just like a corny. The colder the liquid the better the CO2 absorption.
 
Does everyone store them laying down like the instructions say? I have mine standup because that is much easier for me. I don't think this will be an issue, but when I tap them I will have to carefully lay them down so the sediment doesn't mix in.
 
I am thinking about adding a tire valve to the side of one of the bottles, maybe ill go buy a 3 liter bottle and try that on first then connect it to the TAD. I know it defeats the purpose and it might leak and might not work, but it would cheaper than purchasing the cartridges every time. What do you guys think?
 
I just tapped mine for the first time. It wasn't cold when I added the CO2, but I guess it should have been. I put it in the fridge immediately after and waited about 4 hours. My first pull was great, though it does help when the beer is DELICIOUS. I still need to get used to how much to open it. Slightly open gives way more foam than all the way open. I'm loving it so far and I think I'll try my next one with nitro.
 
Yeah. If you open it all the way until your glass is almost full, then you can close it most of the way and give it a shot of foam for the perfect head. :D
 
Very nice to hear. I have a brew in primary now that will be one week on Saturday. In another week or two, I'll be using mine.
 
Ordered mine and should be here tomorrow. How are most people filling the bottles? Racking to bottling bucket and then to TAD bottles? Or racking directly from fermenter?
 
Mike613 said:
Ordered mine and should be here tomorrow. How are most people filling the bottles? Racking to bottling bucket and then to TAD bottles? Or racking directly from fermenter?
Click to expand...

I've done it both ways with equal success. You can prime each TAD bottle individually (plus a couple of 12 ouncers for your leftovers) or use the bottling bucket.

If priming individually for a 5-gal batch, make your priming solution, figure out how much you'll need for the 12 ounce bottles, set it aside, divide the remaining solution into 3-equal parts and put it in the TAD bottles before filling.

If using the bottleing bucket, just fill like you would normally, treating the TAD bottles as really big bottles.
 
Since I bottle part of mine in the TAD and part in bottles, I just bulk prime in the bottling bucket, fill my TAD bottle(s) and then my 12 oz'ers. Techincally, it's overpriming the TAD bottles, but I've never had any problems.
 
ChshreCat said:
Since I bottle part of mine in the TAD and part in bottles, I just bulk prime in the bottling bucket, fill my TAD bottle(s) and then my 12 oz'ers. Techincally, it's overpriming the TAD bottles, but I've never had any problems.
Click to expand...

Why would you consider this overpriming? Is it because not as much priming sugar is required due to the CO2 cartridges?
 
The instructions say to prime a TAD bottle with less sugar than you would normally prime. Works fine for me though.
 
My first batch has been in primary since 13 Nov. We have a fridge in our garage that has room to cold crash my primary. I think I'll put the primary in that fridge for a day or two and then into the TAD on Fri or Sat.

This time I'm using regular priming sugar. I plan to transfer from primary to a bottling bucket, add 4.5oz of priming sugar and then split the batch evenly into the three TAD bottles. The rest will go into beer bottles.

I do have a question:
Has anyone tried Munton's Carb Tabs with the TAD? I just ordered more TAD bottles and cartridges along with a packag of these.
http://www.northernbrewer.com/brewing/munton-s-carb-tabs.html
 
I read that people are adding tablespoons of corn sugar to the TAD bottle. Are you adding it directly? or boiling it with water and then adding.

I just did mine like I would do bottles from my bottling bucket...I'm so psyched to try it.

I wound up using 38mm wine caps instead of the cheap caps that came with the bottles. They have a nice plastic gasket in them and are a bit deeper and seal perfect.
 
How long can you store beer in the PET bottles before it starts oxidizing?
 
bguzz said:
I read that people are adding tablespoons of corn sugar to the TAD bottle. Are you adding it directly? or boiling it with water and then adding.

I just did mine like I would do bottles from my bottling bucket...I'm so psyched to try it.

I wound up using 38mm wine caps instead of the cheap caps that came with the bottles. They have a nice plastic gasket in them and are a bit deeper and seal perfect.
Click to expand...

I bought extra caps with all my TAD bottles. But, I'm going to get some wine caps. Did you go with metal or plastic wine caps?
 
I went with the plastic ones from midwest supplies. They work great.

I think the TAD bottles are just PET, so even under pressure, the beer can get oxidized as oxygen will pass into the bottle. Betterbottle fermenters are PET, but they do something special to them so that they don't transfer oxygen like normal PET.
 
mrgstiffler said:
http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=5643

Those caps are listed as being the ones to use when priming. I bought enough for all my bottles. Will use them when I bottle in a week.
Click to expand...

Those are the ones I ordered and they are indeed black as stated on the MW site. The ones that came on the bottles were also black. I also went back to MW and ordered a 4-pack of TAD bottles and extra caps. These black caps have a white liner but don't really have a gasket in them (I guess the white liner is the gasket).

MW has these wine caps but I can't tell what type of seal is inside:
http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=4336
http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=4878

AHB has these which definitely have a different type of seal:
http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?cPath=178_356_291_294&products_id=2446
 
whoops, I goofed. I got the same caps you have listed from AHB, but I got them at my LHBS instead of Midwest. I ordered the TAD caps from midwest and got the standard ones with the waxy cardboard seal.

All I can tell you is the polyseal caps were in the wine section of the store, but they are the same and work great.
 
bguzz said:
whoops, I goofed. I got the same caps you have listed from AHB, but I got them at my LHBS instead of Midwest. I ordered the TAD caps from midwest and got the standard ones with the waxy cardboard seal.

All I can tell you is the polyseal caps were in the wine section of the store, but they are the same and work great.
Click to expand...

Excellent! Those polyseal caps are the ones I'll get to replace the black ones. Unfortunately, BMW does not have wine supplies. I'll probably order them from AHB.
 
I have been using the ones you mentioned from AHB with the "different" seal. I bought them from my LHBS and they have worked out great for me. Much better than the original caps.
 
Hey Guys,
I placed my primary in the garage fridge tonight after 19 days at 69F. I plan to transfer to a bottling bucket for priming on Friday night and then into the TAD. I just pulled out the instructions to my TAD and it is basically a pamphlet. There is no mention of natural carbing...only using the CO2 cylinders. I haven't thought about this until I really started looking at the components and now I have another question for those of you who have been using the system:

Do you simply remove the cap and then attach the dispensing head and cylinders? That seems like the only way and I have to assume that as long as the beer is nice and cold that most CO2 remains dissolved in the beer and what is lost is replaced when the CO2 cylinders are added.

Oh, another question:
Do any of you guys add gelatin anytime in your process? I think it is probably too late for me to do that now since I plan to transfer to TAD on Friday. But for the next batch...

We have a function on Dec 19 and I'd like to tap one of the bottles. I'm hoping 15-days is enough time conditioning in the TAD.
 
Yeah, throw the TAD bottle into the fridge for a few days before tapping. Then you pull it out, screw the dispensing head on, lay it on it's side and screw in the CO2 carts one at a time. Gotta screw them in fast though, or you'll lose a lot of CO2. Make sure you put the head on with it upright, but put the CO2 carts on with it laying down.

Haven't tried gelatin with the TAD, myself. Seems like it would work though. Cold crash with gelatin and then bottle. It'll take a bit longer to carb naturally, but you always have CO2 for backup.
 
Since my system only came with a small instruction pamplet, I did some googling and found this which provides better cleaning and carbonating detail:
http://morebeer.com/public/pdf/KEG920.pdf

Since my bottles are brown, I'm going to sanitize with an iodophor solution. I have some Star San on the way, but it won't be here in time.
 
My first TAD batch has been in the basement naturally conditioning for seven days now. Next Saturday, we are having a family gathering and some of them like a good beer. I plan to start cooling one of the TAD bottles a day or two in advance and then charging with a CO2 cylinder...keeping my fingers crossed that it turns out well.

On another note: Now that I've assembled some new gear to brew 5gal batches (RIMS), I'm wondering why I need that much beer of the same style. My wife drinks very little beer and I have one buddy who lives close that enjoys really good beer. I've started thinking about brewing smaller batches. I now have seven TAD bottles and if I were to brew 3gal batches, that would fill 2 TAD bottles. This means I can have three different brews in TAD bottles and have a spare bottle. We have a lake house and I could keep a few there as well and never get bored with a beer style or have to worry about beer spoiling...the horror. All I need is a second tap for the lake. This BYO article has inspired me:
http://***********/stories/article/indices/15-brew-on-premise/1410-small-scale-brewing
 
limulus said:
My first TAD batch has been in the basement naturally conditioning for seven days now. Next Saturday, we are having a family gathering and some of them like a good beer. I plan to start cooling one of the TAD bottles a day or two in advance and then charging with a CO2 cylinder...keeping my fingers crossed that it turns out well.

On another note: Now that I've assembled some new gear to brew 5gal batches (RIMS), I'm wondering why I need that much beer of the same style. My wife drinks very little beer and I have one buddy who lives close that enjoys really good beer. I've started thinking about brewing smaller batches. I now have seven TAD bottles and if I were to brew 3gal batches, that would fill 2 TAD bottles. This means I can have three different brews in TAD bottles and have a spare bottle. We have a lake house and I could keep a few there as well and never get bored with a beer style or have to worry about beer spoiling...the horror. All I need is a second tap for the lake. This BYO article has inspired me:
http://***********/stories/article/indices/15-brew-on-premise/1410-small-scale-brewing
Click to expand...

Thanks for that link! I've been kicking around the idea of doing 1 gallon SMaSH batches the past few days. It couldn't have been better timing.
 
What is the reason why the instructions say that the TAD must be on its side once you connect the tap/cartridges to it? I would like to hook mine up and leave it upright in my brew fridge before I bring it up my regular fridge for a few days and I don't have the room to leave it on its side. Is there a danger to it?
 
Yea - what bguzz said! It's kinda confusing because the MoreBeer pdf said that when force-carbonating with the Tap-A-Draft "Note: bottles must be upright during carbonation." Do you have to lay it down to insert the cartridges, then stand it up for carbonation?
The system seems perfect for me, but now I'm not sure.
 
I won't be tapping mine until next Saturday. But, I've been under the impression that you should leave them upright during a normal natural carbonation period to avoid leaking.
 
Carbonate them naturally upright. Chill them in your fridge. Attach the tap with the bottle upright (obviously), lay it on its side, then insert C02 cartridges, keeping it on its side. Stick it back in the fridge and keep it cold and on its side from then on.

I'm attempting to naturally carbonate with the full amount of priming sugar this time. I'll report back with my experiences. The worst thing about TAD is the way the carbonation changes over time as the CO2 cartidges add forced carbonation, but the extra head space causes the carbonation to change again, and as the CO2 runs out it changes, etc etc. It's very difficult to have a consistent pour from it. I'm hoping a full natural carb will change that.
 

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