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shroomzofdoom said:
Ok, decided to build a keezer. Wife didn't like the look of through-collar designs; showed her this thread and JUST MY LUCK, she settles on the Jester design! Amateur carpentry aside, I surprised even myself. I took a week off of work and built this.

Now if anyone has any good coffin cooling secrets, I am all ears. MY PC fan is pretty underpowered. I am thinking of trying this as it looks like pretty happy campers over there. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/pvc-tower-cooling-solution-43072

IMG_2880.jpg

IMG_2930.jpg

IMG_2875.jpg
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Alright, I've been lurking for awhile here, but this is the one. I just bought myself a 5.0 cf Wood's freezer on CL for $50 and I've been thinking of doing something like this. It definitely has to have a coffin or tower (I've got a 21 month old and a 7 month old who I'm sure will be grabby if it's too low). It also has to be tasteful enough to live inside the house and fit with the wife's idea of decor. Did you make the sides so they can come off or is that just a pic of the build? Great looking keezer btw.
 
Open liquid in the door? Why will it smell?

if you are talking about the beer dripping into the drip tray and then going into a bucket, what you need to do is get a jug with a carboy stopper. put the stopped on, put the hose in one hole and a airlock on the other. It won't smell.
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I didn't want to go through that much trouble. For me, just not putting a drip tray in was the easiest thing to do. Plus the kids would be screwing with it, it was just easier. I'm not saying I don't think drip trays are the way to go, they are if you have a drain for it. If not you have to empty it, and if you don't keep up on it, it gets disgusting. I can't even keep up with my espresso maker drip tray, and when I pull it out, I get gross coffe smelly water all over the place. So for someone else a pull out tray would be an option, for me it is not, I know how I roll, LOL.
 
bruguru said:
I didn't want to go through that much trouble. For me, just not putting a drip tray in was the easiest thing to do. Plus the kids would be screwing with it, it was just easier. I'm not saying I don't think drip trays are the way to go, they are if you have a drain for it. If not you have to empty it, and if you don't keep up on it, it gets disgusting. I can't even keep up with my espresso maker drip tray, and when I pull it out, I get gross coffe smelly water all over the place. So for someone else a pull out tray would be an option, for me it is not, I know how I roll, LOL.
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No problem man, just putting some ideas out there.
 
mcberry said:
Hi, here is our just finished keezer build. Our goal was to as taps to the bar and have it look clean so we went for a window in the wall style. When pushed up to the wall it looks built in practically so we are quite pleased!

(apologies if the pics are huge. I am sending this from the android app so not sure if it scales them. I will resize when I get to a pc.)
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This is almost exactly how I want to to taps for The Pub, but don't have the space behind the one wall I could put the taps.

Glad to see my idea looks so good.. ;-)

:mug:
 
brewmcq said:
This is almost exactly how I want to to taps for The Pub, but don't have the space behind the one wall I could put the taps.

Glad to see my idea looks so good.. ;-)

:mug:
Click to expand...

For anyone looking (like I was) the post in reference here is on page 256.
 
joety said:
How do those work? Do you just turn the key, or do you have to remove the lock itself to serve?
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The Perlick locks are surprisingly handy. The key turns a tightening screw that clamps down the neck of the tap handle. You do have to remove the lock to serve, but it's very lightweight and can just sit on top of the keezer while you pour a pint. They're all keyed the same so I just leave one key in a lock.

The stout tap lock is another story, though. Kind of a PITA, it's got a steel rod with two O-rings that you have to cram up into the faucet to keep it locked.
 
wedge421 said:
HAH yeah ive got a 15 month old who has been eyeing up my taps every time I pull on. Luckily he is still to short!
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And that's why I'm building a tower on my keezer. I've got a four year old who kept trying to get into the root beer I had on tap in the garage fridge with a picnic tap. Now I've moved them into a Ranco controlled freezer inside, still with picnic taps, but once I get it finished it's got to be tall enough to keep her and the 22 month and 8 month old boys from dumping everything on the floor.
 
The Perlick locks are surprisingly handy. The key turns a tightening screw that clamps down the neck of the tap handle. You do have to remove the lock to serve, but it's very lightweight and can just sit on top of the keezer while you pour a pint. They're all keyed the same so I just leave one key in a lock.
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Awsome build man, you can tell all the work you put into it. I have young kids too, and they are suprisingly good at getting to your taps and yanking them once in a while. As soon as I hear the familiar streamy splash of my beer hitting the floor, i'm up and running, Ha ha.
Hasn't happned in a while, I think they have forgotten about it. Again, great build
 
Yeah, I think putting locks on taps is really stupid. Everytime you decide you want a beer you gotta go through the trouble of unlocking it. If I had a reason to lock up my taps I would instead move it's location to a room where I can lock the door until said person is mature enough or I would beat someones butt =)
 
Okay, my first one died after 8 years. And as a Public Service Announcement - yours may too -

I talked to an HVAC friend of mine that runs the BBQ circuit around the SouthEast - he hauls a 40 ft trailer... he uses chest freezers for his pig because they're more convenient than a refrigerator - and he uses temp controllers too. He told me that these $200-300 big-box freezers aren't meant to come on for a few minutes at a time, once or twice a day - they're meant to run a while, freeze cold and hard, then stay off for a few days. Scott says if you get 7 years out of one - "good for you! now go buy another!"

with that out of the way, and my Master's finished, it was time to replace my 7 cu ft. But I have space constraints and couldn't go much larger. I went to the 8.8 cu ft - much easier to get 4 kegs in and out, and only 3 inches longer.

I also use the freezer to keep 5 gallons of glycol cool, which I pump through a heat-transfer assembly in the water bath of my fermentation tank to keep ferm temps consistent (62F).

So, with a 3/4" layer of 6x oak, two layers of 3/4 foam, and a bit of plastic trim I found at Lowes, I did this:

keezer-fermtank.jpg


insidekeezer.jpg


The drain is held on by hard-drive magnets. I haven't hooked that up yet, but it will have a laquered copper tube dropping into a brass spittoon.

Now that the glycol is cold - I can brew and fill my pipeline back up!
 
AZ_IPA said:
Looks great! :mug:

How'd your attach your drip tray?
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specifically - hard drive magnets - about 8 of them, countersunk into the wood. All that oak made it a bit heavy. There is a slant to the bottom and a drain hole, soon to be connected.

Any rare-earth magnets would do.
 
So, Im going to build myself a kegerator, but there´s currently no good, cheap fridges available in the area I live in on the norwegian craigslist. Then I got invited to a party, and being the impatient soul I am (also having bought all the equipment already). I decided to keg for the first time and bring it.

However, this posed some problems, as I didnt have a picnic tap, only a regular faucet. I could´ve just let the entire faucet + shank fly around wild on the beer line, but then I saw an old beer case lying around and decided to build a snug little house for my faucet.

This party tower will be complete once I place the bottom of the keg in some bucket of ice:
homebrewtalkpic.jpg
 
Just finished mine. Simple. Cheap. Useful. Found the fridge at Rent-a-Center for $50. Has a few dings but perfect for a kegerator. total cost $230 including 2 Corny kegs. And I have room for 3 more taps.

image-85445247.jpg


image-3682853972.jpg
 
JoshuaWhite5522 said:
Blue I like the tile work you did. What size freezer is that?
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Thanks! It was the prefab sheets from home depot. Just cut and pieced them together and got lucky with the sizing because originally wasnt going to go the tile route. Didnt need to do any actual tile cutting at all. The freezer is a frigidaire 7.2 with a 2x10 collar and a home built lid. Best 40 bucks on craigslist ever.
 
So, after a stressful build with a lot of wrong parts (nut on manometer didnt fit the CO2 tank, I got a 3" shank and a 4" while I should have had 2 4" ones, hose clamps that didnt fit on the CO2 lines etc.) and a limited amount of tools:
tools.jpg


I turned an old, white and brown fridge into:
kegerator.jpg


Needless to say, the holes through the door are a bit messy.. But it fits 3 kegs and some CO2, looks decent and will do great in parties during my four next years of college/grad school!
 
I like it man! Adding the wood adds a nice touch to a fridge. Typically since on a keezer build but yours looks great. Is the wood just surface mounted? I would add a opener. It adds that extra feature
 
pola0502ds said:
I like it man! Adding the wood adds a nice touch to a fridge. Typically since on a keezer build but yours looks great. Is the wood just surface mounted? I would add a opener. It adds that extra feature
Click to expand...

Thanks! Yeah it's surface mounted, it was my way to hide the ice maker on the left that didn't work and looked hideous. I took a sawzall and cut it flush, used a ton of liquid nail after staining and polyurethane. It's a really old fridge, you'd never tell after I was done.
 

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