be careful with portable co2 charger...

I just bought a portable co2 dispensor from my LHBS. I took it home, put a cartridge in it, hooked a QD to it. That was when I made a big mistake. As I was walking over to a keg to test it out, I gave just the smallest squeeze to the trigger. The pressure blew apart the QD in my hand and emptied the cartridge right onto it.

It HURT LIKE HELL. My hand was quite swollen for an hour or so. Luckily no long term damage, and I got lucky nothing flew into my eye. IT does say in the instructions to only hook it to a QD once the QD is attached to the keg. there is a very good reason why. The problem with hooking the QD to the keg first is the co2 in the keg starts venting out until you get the injector hooked to it.

You have been warned!!!


I do have a question concerning the QD. It came apart but doesn't apear to be damaged. The three pieces go back together fine. Has anyone taken their QD apart and used it again? do you think I should attempt to use this one, or chalk it up to lesson learned and toss it?

I always take my QD's apart to clean them or I'm never convinced they're totally clean. In your case I'd be concerned that the threads were damaged however. You could hook it up to a keg and see if it holds pressure, if so you're probably OK.

As for the charger, you can connect it to the QD before hooking up to the keg - just don't squeeze the trigger.

600 psi will do that. If you use it at a party, I strongly recommend you keep it in your pocket and re-charge the keg(s) as necessary. I wouldn't even connect it until 4-5 pints have been drawn. New relief valves aren't cheap.