Bottling from taps - Perlick owners

Next order I make, I will definitely get a few #2 stoppers.

Thanks

Scut Monkey, Just My Own Opinion....

Hey, let me tell you, "I aint no expert."

I have started All Grain Brewing. I learned that putting dry ice into buckets, and bags of grain, kills all bugs and larvae. The CO2 is heavy and fills container to the point it kills all unwanted crawlies. So filling from the bottom of a bottle, pushing all oxygen out the top sounds good to me. I think that Nostalgia has it going on.
My Opinion Only.

On a side note, I like the idea of the same tube down in every bottle to get the same head space in all the bottles, all are uniform.

Man! Makes me wish I had gone with the 425's instead of the 525's in the last Perlick group buy! Doh! Oh well....live and learn, eh?

Im tracking this thread to order one, once I get my kegerator up and running.
Sounds like a must have!

Mike is going to make some money off me!
The rig worked great, I haven't tried any of the bottled beer yet. I went to bottle a few more so that I would have three different flavors of this wheat I am working to give away as gifts...."Where is my flipping rig?" I looked and looked, finally comming to the conclusion that after bottling six that first night, I set the rig on some paper that was in the recycling bin...Doohhh!

Maybe the Recycling man knew what it was and is using it now.

Nostalgia, thanks for the post. Just ordered one for my perlick(s).

Glad you guys are liking these. I just used mine to fill two growlers and a 1L soda bottle

-Joe

Could that guy make nozzles made for restrictor plates and flow straightners? Then we could have instant Stout faucets...
-Ben

nostalgia said:

Glad you guys are liking these. I just used mine to fill two growlers and a 1L soda bottle

-Joe

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Well after I got the replacement parts, I got my caps and capper out of the closet.... dang there that rig is! Well now I have two back ups.

Joe I do mine a little different than you do, as far as bottle washing and all. But I sure had them cranking out. I filled a case of bottles, emptying my two kegs for a new batch, in no time!

Ordered. Stuntmantoo how did you do yours?

Has anyone else tried bottling with the stopper? I have just been setting the keg on a lower pressure after bleeding the pressure and simply filling bottles, I don't get much foam and I don't have to deal with the stopper.

Is anyone filling grolsch style bottles for this? I assume it is still #2 stoppers correct? Is there anything I need to do different using these bottles?

underwaterdan said:

Ordered. Stuntmantoo how did you do yours?

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I sanitize bottles, then put them all in fresh water in my sanitized bucket, have the caps in sanitizer. Have a table set up by spouts, spouts all cleaned and sanitized, bucket-o-bottles on floor.

Hold one bottle and instead of using finger to press the side of stopper (after ten bottles my finger started telling me to switch up) I just slightly raise number two stopper until I hear the air comming out of bottle. When beer gets close to top, I grab a cap out of sanitizer, grab bottle from bucket, rinsing the cap at same time, bring the two to the pan with closely filled bottle, and do the switcharoo.

I am sure that Nostalgia is doing it faster than he shows on video, since it was for demonstration.

conpewter said:

Has anyone else tried bottling with the stopper? I have just been setting the keg on a lower pressure after bleeding the pressure and simply filling bottles, I don't get much foam and I don't have to deal with the stopper.

Click to expand...

I found that the way I do it, the stopper stops the flow so that I can work my other bottle and cap and all. I am grabbing the bottle with my left hand, and using my pointer and thumb to grab stopper, it regulates the flow so that I have time to shut spout, or whatever I need. I am sure there is always a better way, but I was pretty proud of myself.

The bubbles have CO2 in them, which will lay flat on top of beer (since CO2 is heavier than air). Even if you get a little Oxygen in the bottle, if bottle sits upright, I would think that it would store for a long time. I definitely got some to experiment with. Last night I drank four bottles, while moving my beer to newly cleaned kegs...All little less fizzy, but very good. They were put in refrigerator as soon as bottled, the day before.

Great post Nostagia, thanks again.

Update:
The ones that I gave away sat for about a month, unrefridgerated, today one guy had tried one, he said it was unbelievable (his first taste of Home Brew).

novafire said:

I've filled roughly half a keg's worth of bottles buy slipping a Grolsch style gasket onto my sanitized Perlick nozzle.

1. Bleed excess gas from the keg.
2. Set your gas to just enough PSI to dispense.
3 Push a bottle up onto the Perlick until it seals with the Grolsch gasket.
4. Turn on the tap and tilt the bottle ever so slightly to one side to let gas escape while the bottle fills.
5. You can straighten the bottle at any time throughout the filling process to slow or stop the flow of beer.

I've liked this process so far since the control of beer is easily within reach, you don't need any additional plumbing, and my drip tray can catch any excess foam or drips.

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I have been filling bottles using this technique. The only difference is that instead of a Grolsch gasket, I use a drilled #3 stopper, and slip it on over my Perlick faucet, for a nice snug fit. It's simple and works very well, thanks to novafire for the idea.

looks like single point cnc threading... hmm. what is the id, anyone?

What size tubing do I need for this, and I am going to buy a new racking cane just to use for this, but I see there are two sizes, 3/8 and 1/2 which I assume is the I/D of the tubing I need, so I don't want to mis order. Thanks for any help.

3/8". I believe most racking canes are 5/16" ID, making the tubing you need to go over them 3/8".

-Joe

blackdot

10 characters

I just ordered mine, and Mike replied within about a minute with shipping info.!

I've been using the BMBF for a while, but I hate dragging my kegs out of the fridge to use it (I have a similar fridge set up to the pics the OP posted). This should make things much easier

orangebrew said:

I've been using the BMBF for a while, but I hate dragging my kegs out of the fridge to use it (I have a similar fridge set up to the pics the OP posted). This should make things much easier

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This was my biggest reason for wanting these - I'm freakin' lazy It's also great to not have to mess with the CO2 pressures.

I still use it all the time. I bottled a few dozen for Christmas gifts, and it's great for a quick growler fill.

-Joe

Thanks Joe for putting the idea into motion. We lazy guys appreciate it!

Got mine today and the machining is top notch.

It's so small!

I hear that all the time but never thought I'd get to say it.

I am working on a bottle filler kit that will work on the new 525 Perlick (solid piece units). I may also have a kit for the standard non forward sealing taps as well.

I will post here if and when they become avaiable.

Also as I reminder I do have these with the Ventmatic thread as well.

Good to hear about the 525 kit! My kegging kit should be here today and i was kicking myself for not getting the 425s

Just ordered one too

out of stock... hopefully he will get some more soon

Try shooting him an email. Mike's always been very responsive in the past. Maybe he can one-off one for ya.

-Joe

Has anyone heard anything about the 525 bottle fillers?

I just tried PMing BLUEZL600EFI but his box is full.

mazultav said:

Has anyone heard anything about the 525 bottle fillers?

I just tried PMing BLUEZL600EFI but his box is full.

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Try again I cleared my inbox, got an email saying I was full.

I have not made anything for the 525, I don't even have time to machine another run of the regular ones I have been so busy at work.

I bought one of these gizmos recently. Well made item.

However, I have double black stout stains on my ceiling after attempting to bottle. My beer flows slow when pouring into a glass (10 ft lines), but shoots out too fast with this method. I also tried the tire valve in the #2 stopper trick and nothing really worked very well for me. Any tips? or I might just go back to the Cobra Tap method which in all honesty was easier because it didn't hit the ceiling. (sorry forget the pictures before cleaning)

There is a learning curve to using it, you must keep the stopper on tight to create a airlock in the bottle to allow it to fill slowly. Then you very lightly vent the stopper in little "pssttttts" to allow the bottle to continue filling.

Can you describe your process samc? I bought one of these for my ventmatic and used it recently with great success. I've done the hose jammed in the faucet thing before and the picnic tap attached to the QD... this was by far the cleanest, least amount of carbonation lost, and most under control bottling I've ever done.

samc,

What size stopper are you using? I've found #2 works the best. Have you seen the video I did? That was at 12PSI.

-Joe

I used the #2 stopper and the bottle filled really fast, before I could push the stopper to vent it shot out all over the place. Then I tried leaving it with a slight venting and I got a lot of foam. I wound up with one fully filled bottle and 5 partially filled bottles and a mess of beer all over the place.

I tried the #2 with the air valve and the needle distorted the stopper edge so that I could not get a good seal.

my bottle stops filling while the stopper is in place, then I vent it slowly to allow more beer to enter.
How long is the hose you have coming from the tap? Mine was on the longer side (maybe 5 ft), so once I open the tap the pressure equalized with beer just starting to enter the bottle - I suppose if I used a really short tube the beer would start filling the bottle before I ever started venting the stopper.

I tried again with a long (10ft) hose and it didn't work any better. How slow/fast are your pours from the Perlick? I'm thinking I need to use the mixing sticks in the keg trick to get a slower pour going or this will never work for me. I notice from the Youtube vid by Nostalgia that he is using a rather short hose and his obviously works fine.

I tried it again and ended up w/ beer on the ceiling.. it has to do with how carbonated the beer is (and how much line you have to compensate) for sure. I had 3 beers I was trying to pour - two of average carbonation and a belgian. The two average carbonation ones are pretty easy to bottle, but the belgian (of which I have a hard time pouring without getting quite a bit of head in the glass) turned to foam and no matter how hard I tried there was just too much pressure. I'm planning to get the mixing sticks as well, can't get my Belgian carbonated right because I can't serve it at that pressure without getting lots of foam. Oh, BTW, I switched to a different stopper that's inverted - so the beer reflects off the top and back down - rather than going all over everything

http://morebeer.com/view_product/16655//Universal_Stopper_With_Hole

I made another video of my process. Hope it helps!



-Joe

I have found that freezing the bottles before filling makes it much easier. It does take a couple tries to get the hang of it. Use the shortest line from the faucet to the bottle as possible. Mine is only 3 ft. If it's too long the beer gets warm and foams up.