Show us your Kegerator

runningweird said:

I just picked up a massive freezer, 26 cubic feet and I want my build to come out something like yours. did you take build pics of this? it looks great from your photos.

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Well here is my kegerator and kinda some pictures along the way of my build. It is not complete but functioning. I first started off with a 14.8 cubic foot haier chest freezer that I purchased new from Menards. I had also purchased a piece of counter top wood that was 30 X 60 for the top.

I put the 6 kegs I had in there and realized that I could easily fit 8 kegs inside of this freezer.

I had purchased 3 towers for the kegerator which consisted of 2 triple tap towers and 1 double tap tower so I can have 8 taps. I placed them on top to get an idea of where I thought they looked best and which was 12" apart with the double tap in the middle.

I then routed the edges of the top and sanded down so I can stain it.

After staining the top and painting the freezer flat black I put the top on to see what it looked like. I quickly decided to encase the freezer in wood since I did not like the way it looked.

Continued

I then decided to build a new base for the freezer out of 2 x 4's so I can attach some better casters and something I can attach the wood to without drilling into the freezer. I had removed the old casters and used the holes that were already in the bottom of the freezer to attach the new bottom.

I then used 1/2" mdf and created sides and a front for the kegerator. I attached them to eachother and the new base that I had made for the kegerator. I also left a cutout for the original handle and lock.

Next I used some pine 1 x 3's for decor and made it look more like furniture than a freezer.

I then attached the top with screws from the inside that went into the top for a clean finish. I also finished the top with a satin varnish from minwax.

I then attached my 3 towers and already had all of the plumbing inside for the beer out and the gas in. I have a 10 pound co2 tank and a dual regulator that splits off into two 4 out manifolds that I had pieced together.

I have a a419 controller for the freezer and still am not done with the build. I am painting the base flat black chalkboard paint so I can write whats on tap for all 8 taps. I am also going to build 2 smaller cabinets for the sides. One for the co2 equipment and the other possibly for glasses or something.

Damn you!

Some of these are simply amazing. I definitely plan on making a really elaborate keezer at some point in my life. I can't stress how difficult it was to build mine here in Thailand. From finding CO2 tanks with American valves to getting my hands on a corny keg, it took a lot of scrounging. Had to have a friend who was coming back from the states bring back all the tubing, clamps, pin locks, the works.

So last Saturday, I drilled the holes and assembled. I'm planning to add another tap so it'll be a two tap system. There's just enough space inside, so I'm just waiting for the opportunity to get another corny keg, though something just came up this week which means I could have my final kegerator finished sooner than later!





It's been almost exactly a week since I've turned the regulator to 13PSI. I couldn't resist last night and poured myself about a third of a glass of cold, fresh beer. Just slightly undercarbed, but the head was there. Pure magic. After tasting my homebrew through a tap system I can only say:
Buck Fotteling.

To dttk0009,

Thats a pretty sweet kegerator for scrounging up parts. I also like kegging better than bottling. Clean and sanitize one keg opposed to 50 or so bottles.

dttk - looks good, especially for the global scrounging! I just brewed my second batch ever and can't wait to get all the kegging supplies for homebrew. Already have the kegerator but still have commercial beer flowing.

Except for a drill, that is.

I'm humbled by the kegerators some of you are able to put together. This is my first woodworking project since I made some really bad salt shakers in 7th grade, so take it for what its worth. Made from a new kenmore 8.8cu foot freezer, it can hold 6 kegs of brew and a 20 lb co2 tank, although it is very tight, and moving stuff around in there is a real pain. I've got to dream up some method of managing the madness of tubes in there.

I used red oak from home depot for the collar, built it with butt joints and screws, which I countersunk and filled with putty. I mounted the hinges to the collar and used clear silicone to stick the collar to the freezer lip. The gasket remains the stock one, and seems to seal well. I glued insulating foam board onto the inside of the collar, r-5, I think, and then taped everything over with this shiny duct tape I had laying around from another home repair.

I use an analog johnson controller to regulate the temperature.

I used a small PC fan I had lying around and mounted it to the collar, ran it off a spare wall wart I had lying around, and it seems to help a little with cooling the faucets down some.

I built the drip tray from a standard 19" steel tray, and then built the surround out of "hobby wood" red oak, which is thinner than the collar so it wouldn't stick out too much into the room and snag SWMBO when she walks by carrying groceries. I glued this together around the drip tray, and used toothpicks as dowels to hold it in place. I used metal brackets which I screwed onto the bottom of the drip tray, and then rare earth magnets on the back of those to stick it to the kegerator face. The tray removes from the surround for easy cleaning. I found the tray was sliding down the face of the kegerator when I first attached it, even though it is so strongly stuck on that I cannot pull it directly off, so I covered the magnets with some duct tape, and now it doesn't budge at all.

The kegerator is in our laundry room, and I had to move the washer, dryer, and sink over as far as possible, then used every bit of space I had for this, so space is a premium.

Well, here it is!

Looks great!

First let me say that I have looked through all the pages of this thread and I am amazed! Everyone's kegerators and keezers are awesome. Except those awful Cubs and that Dreadful Capitals one. Haha JK.

Second, my buddies and I just started brewing and we picked up a a glass front commercial fridge for about $110. I didn't see any kegers on here that were glass front like our fridge. We haven't made it into a Keger yet but it is project we are excited about. If anyone has a glass door Keger we would love to see some examples.

And finally, Photopilot did you ever get the stout faucet and move the water faucet on that awesome Kegerator of yours?

ShortSpoonBrew said:

First let me say that I have looked through all the pages of this thread and I am amazed! Everyone's kegerators and keezers are awesome. Except those awful Cubs and that Dreadful Capitals one. Haha JK.

Second, my buddies and I just started brewing and we picked up a a glass front commercial fridge for about $110. I didn't see any kegers on here that were glass front like our fridge. We haven't made it into a Keger yet but it is project we are excited about. If anyone has a glass door Keger we would love to see some examples.

And finally, Photopilot did you ever get the stout faucet and move the water faucet on that awesome Kegerator of yours?

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Here is my old one...I tinted the glass on it

Very cool! We got a full size fridge that we were thinking about putting the taps on the side. It would be sweet if we could get them throughout the glass but I think that would be tricky.

I wouldn't recommend drilling through the sides. Not worth the risk.

How so? Aren't the non glass sides more easily drillable than the glass front?

ShortSpoonBrew said:

How so? Aren't the non glass sides more easily drillable than the glass front?

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coolant lines

and dead fridge

Is thy why people don't make kegers out of glass from commercial Fridges?

Glass front*

ShortSpoonBrew said:

Is thy why people don't make kegers out of glass from commercial Fridges?

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You might be able to go through the top. Depends on the fridge. There are a couple good build threads here for this project.

I can't go through the top as it is a large stand alone single door. I think it's a 6 or 7 ft tall fridge. It's not a little mini fridge

Bought it from graigslist very cheap, put all new parts on it and works like a champ. I use it for cold crashing too

IrregularPulse said:

I wouldn't recommend drilling through the sides. Not worth the risk.

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I may be wrong about this, but I don't think I am. If its a commercial fridge with glass front, it probably doesn't have coolant lines in the walls. That's a phenomenon for residential cooling only. Commercial units have a radiator like clump of coils and a fan that blows across them.

short spoon- If indeed there are coils running through the sides, you could always use it as a temperature controlled fermentation chamber, by only adding a temperature controller. Then, keep your eyes peeled for another sweet craigslist deal, unless you are limited by space.

Thanks for all the info guys! I'm loving this site more and more everyday. I promise to upload a photo as soon as we finish the project.

ShortSpoonBrew said:

Thanks for all the info guys! I'm loving this site more and more everyday. I promise to upload a photo as soon as we finish the project.

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Cant wait to see it. All of the ones i have seen are unique in their own way.

Found a small leak in regulator connection which may explain my CO2 usage. fixed that today, I think. Pics would be great. Love mine. makes me wonder why I ever bottled! Kegging is so much easier!

Managed to get my hands on a second corny keg! Dual tap set-up here I come!

dttk0009 said:

Managed to get my hands on a second corny keg! Dual tap set-up here I come!

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get a 3rd keg to keep that dual tap pipe line full otherwise you'll have 1 empty a good part of the time, found that out the hard way. I try to have 2 going at any given time brew a 3rd about 1/2 way empty on keg 1 and sugar prime (1/3 cup priming sugar for 2 weeks) the 3rd so when 1 kicks... ready to go on next. force carb as needed if 2 kick in close order. saves on gas with this method.

I decided to do it. I upgraded from my two tap Haier kegerator to this Kenmore 8.8 keezer. I used 1X8 Oak with red mahogany stain for the collars. 2 inch Tuff-R insulation for the top collar.

This is also a dual hinge unit, using extra factory hinges from sears direct.

Overall it was not that hard to make, even in my one bed room apartment.

Here is my kegerator. I have enough room for 4 corny kegs and my CO2 tank.

HD Kegerator. Was fun to make but eats way to much electricity. Next one will be made from an energy efficient frige. I believe it will be worth the cost over the long run.

Heres mine

[/IMG] heres mine 2 taps for now although the thing can hold 6 kegs

oh and it is in my living room !!!

It was a pretty straight forward build. A couple of notes...

-used a small chisel to break the tabs securing the top to the front
-did not reuse the housing for the temperature gauge / door light
-soldered the connection closed for the door switch light and filled the hole with GreatStuff foam
-used the wires for the light, to power a fan box that cools the tower
-picked up a project box, 120VAC 4" fan, fuse assembly and 0.5Amp fuse from RadioShack
-cut off one side of the 3/4" coupler and epoxied it to the inside of the project box.
-used a whole saw for the fan cut out, but ran the drill backwards so that it would not bite into the plastic project box.
-I'm using pin lock kegs. It's a tight fit, but 2 will fit... you need to cut out some of the trim where the freezer shelf was to get it to fit.
-2x 12" long 3/4" copper tubing and 3/4" vinyl tubing sandwiched between the copper runs up into the tower.
-tied them together with tie wraps and yet loose enough, so that it was snug against the hole I drilled. This prevent it from slipping while I was filling in the gaps with GreatStuff Foam
-used 3/4" copper tubing b/c I could feed the brew lines down it without removing the fittings
-wrapped the copper tubing in the tower with pipe wrap
-used a 3/4" piece of plywood with pronged Tee-Nut to secure the tower to the lid
-used a Rotozip to make a 3/4" deep hole the same size as my piece of plywood
-secured the plywood with Foam glue
-used white duct tape to make the tubing coming down from the tower look neater and also cover any place I sprayed in Great Stuff foam.
-Cut out the door insert, but left the groove for the weather stripping.
-completely removed all of the closed foam insulation in the door and replaced it with vinyl-one-side fiberglass insulation (had some laying around from the garage door insulation kit)
-had the glass cutter at Lowe's cut the Lexan to size, to cover the hole in the door.
-painted the Lexan white on one side and siliconed the Lexan to the door with the painted side towards the insulation
-secured the air value header with doublesided High Bond tape to the wall first and then followed up with some sheet metal screws.
-the rails (sold as drawer handles) are secured to the lid with some washers and the screws that came in the package.
-secured the lid down with foam glue and construction adhesive around the outer edge.

Please excuse the grammar, spelling and typos... I'm on my 3rd pint of the Moose Drool clone.

Oh and it lives in my home office.

Painted chalkboard paint for the beer description and airbrushed the hop vines

77bawls said:

Is that an Ice maker or trash compactor on the left?

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Hey guys - sorry for the slow reply. That is an ice maker. Makes 25 lbs of cocktail ice a day. It's pretty neat - it freezes sheets of ice and spits them out onto a heated metal grid and perfect little clear ice cubes fall through. The ice storage area holds 50 lbs of ice, but isn't refrigerated, so it is constantly melting. That means that your ice is fresh and that it's relatively "warm" ice, so that it melts just right when you make a cocktail.

Someone else asked about the cabinets - they're from IKEA. My father in law is a tile guy and made the granite counter from 18"x24" tiles.

Sigh - unfortunately we sold that house in April and had to leave the bar there. That was hard to give up. But we got several offers on the house within days of putting it up for sale and I think the basement helped quite a bit.

Right now my wife and I are checking out this thread for ideas for a keezer.

Build another one!!

As a UI Alum I seriously dig this thing. Those are all just decals on there I assume?

wow. epic thread. BigKahunaBrewer mentioned it on twitter, and I had to take a look. Just lost the last 4 hours trawling through the kegerator awesomeness.

Currently designing my own kegerator setup. Needs include being pretty small, able to hold two (hopefully three) corny kegs, and being approved for the house by SWMBO...

I am buying three kegs on the weekend, and will be sorting out taps & CO2 shortly after. Then I start hunting for the perfect fridge.

So much inspiration here. Nice work all!

Hey Thewobblythong (your username cracks my a$$ up!) Give 'er all you got, you only live once. If your thinking 3 kegs....you just might as well go for 4 kegs with 4 taps and save you self some time upgrading down the line. No Mercy!