El_Borracho
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One day I'll fill a keg. This day is not that day.
KitrGy said:check out these pics of my scab together counter pressure filler it worked like a charm
http://dccounterpressure.shutterfly...66CF5A5E72CC0022F17CB7?a=67b0de21b32b5e66c445
BierMuncher said:But it's the moving the cane fro bottle to bottle that drips everywhere.
At the end of a 12 pack (all I can fit in a bucket), I end up with the better part of a 1/2 cup of beer at the bottom.
Uh oh...Funkenjäger said:Got all the required parts today from my LHBS:
Cornelius liquid QD, 4 feet of 1/4" ID tubing, cobra tap, short racking cane, little drilled rubber stopper, and a bottle of Samuel Smith's Imperial Stout - all for $24, including the $2.25 they overcharged me but wasn't worth going back to argue about.
Can't wait to try it!
Oh, I know, I'm already quite familiar with the liquid tubing dynamics, having a kegerator and all - but my LHBS is nothing but a few dozen square feet in the back corner of a health food store, and needless to say they don't stock 3/16" ID beverage tubing. And all the beverage line I own is already in use in my kegerator. I just wanted to be able to try it out to some degree tonight, thus 1/4" was my only real option. I'll definitely swap real beverage line on there as soon as I place an order someplace that carries it.BierMuncher said:You really want a standard liquid tube....3/16" inner diameter.
The 1/4" inch would be for longer push distances (like over 10 feet). I'm afraid the velocity will be too fast with a wider ID and you're going to get some excess foaming.
Give it a try, but you'll probably want to replace that hose in the long run. Also...go with 6 feet. The additional resistance will help you retain carbonation.
Yuri_Rage said:Cuz we like to share beer...kinda hard to send a pint to you without some sort of container around it!
the_Roqk said:Hey BierMuncher, I enjoyed reading this thread and your idea. But for the life of me I can't seem to wonder why everyone that kegs are going back to bottling. Nothing wrong with it, especially when it's nice to bottle some brew that's been forced carbed so you can take it on the go. So don't bash me all ye who post! I think it's a great idea! I'm just making and observation that's all. Seemed a little funny to me. Thanks again for the thread and pics!
BierMuncher said:The other thing is that I tend to grab the bottles out of the bucket to go cap and leave the cane sitting in the bucket while I'm off capping the bottles.
Just easier cleanup at the end.
I was at the LHBS at lunch today picking up some odds and ends and saw a beer gun for sale.
Man that thing looked complicated.
Cheesefood said:I used the BMBF tonight and I nominate it for DIY of the year!!!
Cheesefood said:A $.65 stopper and a broken racking cane. ... Filled 4 bottles in no time.
BierMuncher said:Even though you turned the PSI down...did you bleed the pressure from your kegs first?
I made that mistake.
Also, if you can get your cane down to 15-18 inches that might help.
One more thing. Is the tip of your racking cane cut at an angle. If not, this would cause a lot of back pressure where the cane hits the bottom of the bottle and cause foaming. If it's cut at an angle, the beer will flow with less restriction and less foaming.
Lastly...make sure to apply enough pressure on that stopper to slow the flow.
Sounds about right.pldoolittle said:Out of curiosity, I just filled a 12pk and caught all the overflow, drippage, etc. in a bucket. I made no abnormal effort to reduce spillage, all of the bottles were topped off. At the end, I dumped the contents of the bucket into a kitchen measuring cup. I had just shy of 8oz of beer.
Note: No beer was harmed in the filling of the bottles. All uncontained beer was safely stored in a warm, self-expanding container for further processing.
Funkenjaeger said:...Sorry the video quality isn't great, I should have had more light so you could see the beer level better - but take my word for it, there was not much more than 1/8" of foam on the beer while filling.
Sounds like a good idea. Though, when I was filling several in a row I had pretty good luck just going straight from one to the next while keeping the tube mostly full of just beer, though it would require someone handing me bottles quickly to keep that up.BierMuncher said:The only thing I do differently is to have a "spit" cup near by. I go ahead and start my flow into the spit cup to purge air out of the lines...then use my (clean) finger to cap the end and move over to start bottling.
I had it set somewhere in the neighborhood of 5PSI, though I'm not 100% sure of the exact setting as my regulator is hidden behind the kegs in the back of the fridge, so it was sort of eyeballed. I did purge the keg first. The faster filling is probably due to the fact that I'm using 1/4" ID tubing instead of 3/16" ID beverage line. So far I don't see much need to switch, as I can successfully fill without much foam, and it's plenty fast.BierMuncher said:It appeared to fill alittle fast...what was your PSI set at? Mine usually takes a good 40-45 seconds to fill at about 5 PSI...with the excess pressure bled off the keg.
Funkenjaeger said:Sounds like a good idea. Though, when I was filling several in a row I had pretty good luck just going straight from one to the next while keeping the tube mostly full of just beer, though it would require someone handing me bottles quickly to keep that up.
Oh, okay - in that case, I usually do the same, especially since I run some starsan through the line first so I need to purge the remainder of that anyway. I didn't do that in the video as we were too busy screwing around trying to get a decent 'take'BierMuncher said:I only do that for the first bottle. I usually set about 10-12 bottles inside a bucket, nice and close to each other so I can move about pretty quickly. The tube won't drip (and pick up bubbles) until you pull it completely out of the bottle and if they're very close, you can quickly move from one to the other.
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