My turn at a keezer build

After all the reading I have done on here, I have finally decided to try my hand at a keezer build. I was able to pick up a plain 8 cu ft freezer from someone for cheap on craigslist, and the attached images show what I finally was able to come up with.

My inspiration for the build came mostly from the fact that I have always wanted a kegerator in the house, but I have never home brewed my own beer before (That's going to change very soon) so I figured I needed to start with some way to dispense. After looking heavily at the collections of pictures and methods on here, and taking a lot of inspiration from Jester and Crashmeister, here is what I have come up with. Bare with me, I am new to these forum posts and I may not have attached the images properly, but let me know if it doesn't work. Also, I know the quality of the pics isn't great either (Crappy camera, bad lighting, intoxicated operator...) but I did what I could. Let me know what you think, and what you would have done differently

My many thanks goes out to each and everyone of you who inspired me to do this. I couldn't have done it without you guys.

Awesome...! From the pics it looks like the lights may be a little too bright for keezer mood lighting, could just be the pics though. Also I have 4 taps on my ugly ass keezer that yours puts to great shame, and some days I wonder if I should have more. Is it built for future expansion?

Billy, great job man! I think that it looks great!!!

Thank you! As far as the lighting goes, it's actually not very bright. It's perfect for my needs. I don't know why, but the camera I have makes it look WAY brighter than it really is. I'm also by no means a photographer, so I'm sure the error is all on my part. Far as expansion goes, yes it CAN be expanded, but currently I don't really see a need for doing so. I'm sure once I start brewing my own beer that mindset will change, but for now I am very happy with the way that it came out. I DO have build pics available. If anyone is available, I will post them. The keezer itself is sitting in my "Man cave" (Hence the concrete floor, and the brick behind it)

billybryson54 said:

Thank you! As far as the lighting goes, it's actually not very bright. It's perfect for my needs. I don't know why, but the camera I have makes it look WAY brighter than it really is. I'm also by no means a photographer, so I'm sure the error is all on my part. Far as expansion goes, yes it CAN be expanded, but currently I don't really see a need for doing so. I'm sure once I start brewing my own beer that mindset will change, but for now I am very happy with the way that it came out. I DO have build pics available. If anyone is available, I will post them. The keezer itself is sitting in my "Man cave" (Hence the concrete floor, and the brick behind it)

Click to expand...

Good to hear. More pics are always a good thing.

I'll begin with letting everyone know that I am a carpenter by trade, and have always been taught to overbuild EVERYTHING. So certain areas are built much stronger than what is really necessary, but why chance it?

So here's the pics of the base going together. The back is 2x6, everything else is 2x4, and all the corners are half-lapped. I didn't want to use pocket screws cause I wasn't sure that would be strong enough. Then some casters were added, and you can see a quick test fit:

After that, I assembled a frame out of more 2x4 around the mobile base. I intentionally held it back a bit, to allow breathing room around the freezer itself. I used biscuits at all the joints, along with glue and 2 1/2 inch long screws. After that, I wrapped the front and sides with a single sheet of oak plywood. It did come up a little short on the back of the sides, but I didn't mind because the face frames would hide that

After the plywood was mounted to the face, I added the lid, which is nothing more than a scrap sheet of MDF that I had laying around. I like this stuff because it's not going to twist or warp, and this surface will be accepting the floor tiles later on. I simply glued it on, no bolts. I used loctite's general purpose adhesive that comes out of a caulking gun, directly to the freezer lid. The back was held flush, and the sides were held out about 13/16's of an inch. In the pic you can see I had to find some stuff to weigh the down the lid while it dried. I then attached a perimeter skirting out of red oak around the top.

That skirting was glued, biscuited and brad-nailed. I really went overkill here because this is probably the area that I will be grabbing when I open the lid, so it needs to be strong. Even the mitered corners got biscuits, for strength, and to keep them from opening up

After this, another skirting went on the top, laying on the flat, and mitered at the corners. No biscuits here, except in the miters. Over time, with changes in humidity, wood expands and contracts, and miters may open up and look ugly, so the biscuits are some cheap insurance. Now I don't know why, but I never took pictures of this going onto the keezer, but I do have pics of the miters coming together.

Something to note, the size of this was very critical. I knew that the inside dimension had to be completely perfect, and it came out to 48 5/8's. This is the size of four 12 inch tiles, plus their 8th inch spacing in-between for grout.