Firestone VS Cornelius

I am confused on the difference between Firestone and Cornelius kegs ..

Is there a big difference, and if so, which is better (in your experience)

Also looking for best place to get a keg refrige (Sanyo mini ?) which will hold 2 kegs

Thank You all !

Sanyo 4912 can be had at Best Buy for $169. near any holiday...then find the 12% discount like I did...

Different manufacturers of similar kegs. The main difference (from a homebrewer's viewpoint) is parts for Firestone kegs are much harder to find.

They're all Cornelius kegs.

It is just that some of them were built undel license from Cornelius. Spartanburg, Firestone, and a few others were all contracted out by Cornelius. (In fact, you can see that on the kegs.)

Yes, some of them are hard to get parts for. (Try getting parts for a racetrack keg!)

steve

Reviving an old thread instead of starting anew- so are there any noticeable differences between the two? DOes anyone know if the dimensions are the exact same?
WOrking on a kegerator that will be a tight fit, and Keg Connection says you can specify if you want firestone or cornelius (although i did read the post saying they are all cornelius)

Sidenote- they are practically the same yet take different parts?

I have 2 cornelius, and 2 Firestone Challenger VI's they are pretty much identical. The rubber handles are slightly different in shape. The corny handles are a little bit more angled and sharp, the firestone's are a bit rounder, but all in all they are the same.

When you get your kegs who knows what soda company had them, and how many times they changed hands. You migh get differnet poppet valves, some will have the 11/16 connects, and some will have the 7/8. Some will have straight diptubes, others will have curved.

What I am trying to say is that if you specify Firestone or Cornelius, your parts won't necessarily be Firestone on Firestone, or Cornelius on Cornelius.

Another bit of info is that some of the later model Firestone kegs have plastic gas in tubes, and they suck! I got my 2 Firestone kegs from kegconnection, and the plastic gas in tubes were all deformed and one of them broke during reassembly after clean up.

I found a source for the plastic gas in tubes, but it is just easier to buy a SS gas in tube, and drill out the post on the keg to fit it, this way you never have to worry about one of the plastic tubes taking a crap on you.

Or...you can just order corny kegs and not have to worry about it because they are all SS. YMMV.

MRT888 said:

Reviving an old thread instead of starting anew- so are there any noticeable differences between the two? DOes anyone know if the dimensions are the exact same?
WOrking on a kegerator that will be a tight fit, and Keg Connection says you can specify if you want firestone or cornelius (although i did read the post saying they are all cornelius)

Sidenote- they are practically the same yet take different parts?

Click to expand...

Ball lock kegs are pretty much uniform in dimensions regardless of the manufacturer or model. Same story with pin locks, but ball locks are a different shape than pin locks, a little taller and skinnier. The posts are often interchangeable, so just because it has ball lock posts on it doesn't mean it's a ball lock keg.

SO.... its slightly a crapshoot but seems best to ask for Cornelius and hope to avoid getting stuck with plastic pieces or the firestone poppets I've heard about that can be tricky...

I know cornykeg.con sells converted kegs- and yes I have checked out the pinlock to ball lock size difference- but appreciate the intel that all ball locks are the same! (although I was hoping to find one ever so slightly smaller in diameter... might need a collar for the mini fridge if I want to squeeze 2 in

ok so im gonna dig this thread up because im curious about this too, since im thinking about converting a pin lock keg (which im getting from my father-in-law for free) to a ball lock, since my other 4 kegs are ball lock. i looked on my LHBS website and they have different poppets for different posts or kegs. here is the page im talking about: http://www.homebrewery.com/beer/beer-keg-gaskets.shtml so is the difference between the firestone/spartanburg/cornelius kegs really the poppets or can you interchange the poppets in the same posts? seems to me that maybe you would run into trouble with different poppets maybe not sealing correctly. just a thought.

Explained clearly here:
http://www.cornykeg.com/resources/corny-keg-tips/identify-keg/

You could always buy a few "universal poppets" that theyve got on many homebrew sites. I bought 3 when I first started kegging, along with QDs, o-ring sets, and relief valves in case I need spare parts. I've heard a lot of people have had succes replacing troublesome poppets with those