Keezer Build: w/ Hang-over Collar for Tower

Hey everyone,

New to this site and brewing- just brewed a NB Nut Brown Ale extract kit today and everything well really well.

This all started because I bought a vintage tower from Gold and Silver Pawn (Pawn Stars) while in Vegas:



My first setup was just the family's minifridge slightly converted. Problem here is it can only fit two corneys, and there's 3 taps!



Something had to be done. I decided to go with a keezer because I'd like to have 3 keg capacity with the CO2 inside, and didn't want to fool around with the huge modifications needed for minifridges.

Picked up a Holiday 5' chest freezer for $150 out the door at Lowe's. Tip: buy it online and pick up. It was listed as $169 in the store.

Wanted it black, so sprayed it with appliance paint. Seems to chip pretty easily but touchup is simple, and I don't plan on moving it much.



Now one of the big concerns is the tower. This thing is heavy, so it'd be risky to reinforce it and swing it up with the lid. I found another build on here with a collar that hangs off, so I ran with it. Here's the wood for the collar laid out. I just used 2x8s and oak panels, bracketed together and sanded.



And mocked up:



Stained and poly'd semi-gloss.



More updates to come, this poly is taking forever to dry in humid St. Louis. I'll be going with a tower cooler and plenty of insulation. Hope this helps someone else who wants a keezer with a tower. Suggestions are welcome!

i dig it.

Looks great.

Very jealous of that tower. That's an awesome find, and a really great build you have going there.

Looks good. I'm wanting to do a black keezer too, it's good to hear appliance paint is an option, as the black ones are always more expensive. Where are you in STL? I'm in Lake St Louis. Should be a nice day for a brew! Definitely not as hot as yesterday!

Thanks guys.

I'm in Ballwin. Seems to be a lot of STL guys on here. Going to try to finish this up today!

that looks really nice.
Damn! now i need to get a tower!

Got it almost finished today. Fully functional, just needs the tower cooler and I need to install (mostly decorative) black iron brackets that will make the "shelf" part look less awkward.

Mocked it up and attached the lid.



$10 for a huge sheet of insulation at Lowe's. Look in the scraps by the loading area because I had way too much.



Seeing how it'll look. Not bad, the brackets under the shelf will help.



Tons of room in this tower. One hole for beer lines, one hole for tower cooler line, one hole for venting.



Moved into the basement and hooked up. No pictures of it, but there's a Johnson thermostat hanging on the back. Seems to work great so far. Also Sharpied the weatherstripping on the lid.



It'll fit a 1/6 bbl and 2 corneys, or 4 corneys (ball lock), all with 5# CO2 tank. I'm happy with that! Once I get the pipeline going I can have 3 on tap and one conditioning.



Thanks for looking!

Damn you and your Schlafly keg!!

Looks awesome. I'm jealous, I bet SWMBO would even let me keep that inside.

Is this picture throwing me off or is the tower close to the same height as the fridge??

This is fantastic. I've been searching for a build like this for some time, and lo and behold I see this today!
My biggest concern is keeping the tower cool enough to prevent foamy pours. How are you accomplishing this?

Nice work and very cool! How much did you pay for the Warsteiner tower?

HokieBrewer said:

Is this picture throwing me off or is the tower close to the same height as the fridge??

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It's a little bit of an illusion because of the perspective. The tower would fit under the shelf with about 6 inches to spare. It is a huge tower though, no doubt about it.

jmalex said:

This is fantastic. I've been searching for a build like this for some time, and lo and behold I see this today!
My biggest concern is keeping the tower cool enough to prevent foamy pours. How are you accomplishing this?

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There will be a tower cooler fan running constantly right to the top of the tower, and proper venting back into the keezer. So it's not quite completed yet!

WhiskeyR said:

Nice work and very cool! How much did you pay for the Warsteiner tower?

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List price was $250 + tax, I was able to get it for $200 including tax. Not a bad deal, I don't think they realized at all what it was worth. Looked like they had just gotten it in. I'm sure someone was just getting rid of it and sold it to them for $100 so they marked up based on that.

pauljmccain said:

There will be a tower cooler fan running constantly right to the top of the tower, and proper venting back into the keezer. So it's not quite completed yet!

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I'll be keeping my eye on this thread. Be sure to keep us up to date on how well it's doing. Nice work!

pauljmccain said:

List price was $250 + tax, I was able to get it for $200 including tax. Not a bad deal, I don't think they realized at all what it was worth. Looked like they had just gotten it in. I'm sure someone was just getting rid of it and sold it to them for $100 so they marked up based on that.

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Are you trying to tell me that when they got that thing in they didn't immediately know everything there was to know about it without turning off the cameras and running to Google first??? BLASPHEMY!

Nice score

^^ Ha! I was there on Saturday so didn't see any of the "guys." They're only there a couple hours each weekday. The guy I talked to was actually quite knowledgeable on other things though, and straight up told me not to buy a trumpet I was looking at because it didn't work properly. This was before I knew anything about beer dispensing or homebrewing, but luckily a guy next to me who was looking around said he was a homebrewer and looked it over quickly, and said it looked good.

UPDATE:

I got a micro 12v fan from Radioshack (link), a PVC elbow, and some corrugated tubing, and cut out a tiny cardboard box and attached a 9v battery to run it. The fan is very small, 7.2 cfm, but it's running constantly. I'd like to avoid running it to power if possible, but next step will be kicking it up to a 12v adapter before upgrading fan size. I just put it in, so I'll report back shortly with the results. Not sure if it'll be enough to chill this huge tower. Pictures coming if I stick with it.

pauljmccain said:

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I actually saw that tower when I was there on vacation with the family. I am glad it went to a good home.

Dahoov said:

I actually saw that tower when I was there on vacation with the family. I am glad it went to a good home.

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Cool, when were you there?

pauljmccain said:

Cool, when were you there?

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On April 30th. My sister really wanted to go there. She watches the show all the time. I asked about the price but they didn't have a price on it yet. I figured it would be way out of the budget anyway. How did you get it home? I remember it was pretty big and heavy.

Took it right to FedEx and paid them to pack and ship it. I was up a few hundred from blackjack the night before so no loss! I bought it on the 14th.

pauljmccain said:

Took it right to FedEx and paid them to pack and ship it. I was up a few hundred from blackjack the night before so no loss! I bought it on the 14th.

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Your build is awesome. I showed the SWMBO and she said "Oh, yeah I remember that thing. Big ole porcelain thing right?" Then she looked at the pictures for a while. "Nice kegerator!" she said.:rockin: Yup, sometimes she does have good taste.

Call me sappy, but I think it's cool that the tower from NV has "connected" a couple HBers from different states.

That's cool karma right there.

Here is some more connection. SWMBO was actually in St. Louis last week for work. Well O'Fallon actually. Nothing wrong with Sappy. It is always cool to connect with others.

Pretty cool if you ask me! Cheers!

I've revisiting this thread to get the link to show my g/f (she thought the "connection" thing was cool too.. lol), and I took another look at the inside shot with the cornies in your keezer... do you *really* need the collar? It looks like they fit in there without it.

I'm asking because if this is the case, this freezer would just fit under my bar (I think) if I left it uncollared, which would solve a multitude of logistics for me.

You don't need the collar, but for my setup, I needed something to have the shelf. I could have just used 2x2s. But I used 2x8s because without a collar, you can only fit two corneys. With the higher collar, you can fit 4 total, 2 on the hump.

UPDATE:
Battery did not work. LOL. I lasted about 5 hours then died. I'm sure essentially freezing it didn't help either, though. Anyway, I was able to find an old 12v 1.4A power adapter, and hooked it up. Ran the tube right to the top of the tower, and after 2 hours, it was cold on the top. Now, 10 hours later, the faucets and most of the tower are quite cold to the touch, but not super cold. I am debating on whether to exchange for a bigger fan. I don't want to use more power and create more noise though, if I don't need to.

pauljmccain said:

You don't need the collar, but for my setup, I needed something to have the shelf. I could have just used 2x2s. But I used 2x8s because without a collar, you can only fit two corneys. With the higher collar, you can fit 4 total, 2 on the hump.

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Those darn humps. I'll have to go with a longer (wider?) one then.

Thanks!