First time kegging

I picked up 5 ball lock cornys second hand. The first 2 were given to me, the other 3 I bought myself. When I was given the first two, they were empty, I didn't talk to the person that used them last. When I just recently purchased the other 3, the guy I bought them from had put some pressure in them - he said I'd know they hold pressure that way.

I am trying to get my keezer setup for a pot luck we'll be having in about 3 weeks. So far I have the collar screwed together, need to drill holes for the taps and bolt the collar to the freezer, and make some tap handles. I also have wired an STC-1000 for temperature control, so that is good to go.

I haven't gone so far as to think about running the lines or anything involving the kegs themselves. Is there anything I need to know about doing this? I tried searching the wiki but came up empty.

My plan is to go to a local brewpub and have them fill 3 of the cornys for the potluck, and eventually fill the other 2 with homebrew.

I have a distributor with 4 valves as well as 4 regulators, of which I was planning on using 2 regs and the distributor for the setup.

Sounds like you've got your plan pretty well thought out. As far as the only question you seem to be asking, (Beer Lines). You need to balance your line length, and pressure to get perfect pours. Personally, I would start with 10ft of line per tap, thats about right for typical serving pressures (Around 12-15psi). If you are going to be running a tower, then you need to think about cooling, if you run the taps thru the collar it eliminates that need.

Make sure they don't leak before you get them filled, you might need to replace some of the o-rings. And remember you might need to hit the keg with 20-30 psi to get the lid to seat initially. I'd also try to allow a couple days of everything chilling in the keezer before you serve. Try to get the volumes of CO2 from the brewery and set your pressure accordingly. If you're going with standard 3/16" ID vinyl beverage tubing, you might want to start with 12 feet or so of tubing per line.

I'd recommend a fan in the keezer to help keep everything cool. And a dehumidifier (eva-dry) is a good investment as well.

Should I fill them with water and carbonate it to test if they leak? Or how should I do that?

You don't need to carbonate it, but it is a good idea to fill with water (so you aren't using a ton of CO2). Fill with water at room temp, pressurize and spray star san or diluted dish soap on the seals to check for leaks.

Are there three seals: the lid, the liquid connect and the gas connect?

weeple2000 said:

Are there three seals: the lid, the liquid connect and the gas connect?

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Yes, and there are inner seals on the dip-tube, but I'm betting those are fine if your pours are fine. Just throw some water in them, a gallon or so, seat the lid, add 30psi and vent some quick bursts, then stop and listen for any hissing. You can hit the lid/posts with a spray bottle of soapy water and see if there are bubbles, too. Connect your QD's and make sure they don't leak either. The o-rings are pretty easy to tell if they're shot or not. Then turn down the Co2 to 12, bleed the keg until you hear Co2 coming back in, and serve some of your water just to make sure you have no bubbles coming into the stream, etc.

tre9er said:

Just throw some water in them, a gallon or so

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Agree with everything but this. Put in 5 gallons otherwise you're pressurizing the empty 4 gallons with 30 psi a few times and that's a significant amount of wasted CO2.

zachattack said:

Agree with everything but this. Put in 5 gallons otherwise you're pressurizing the empty 4 gallons with 30 psi a few times and that's a significant amount of wasted CO2.

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Well, yeah. Water is cheaper than Co2 in most places. I wasn't thinking about wasted Co2 at the time.

I would suggest rolling them on the ground under pressure as well (like you would to force carb). I had a keg leaking from the bottom and lost about 2 gallons of Oatmeal Stout in the bottom of my keezer.