chiller and carbinator questions

I am new to this forum, as well as the world of soda making. I installed a soda gun in my wetbar and have a carbonator with a cold plate, but it doesn't get as carbonated as it should. The soda water is coming out around 45°F. The syrup runs through the cold plate as well. I have a undercounter water chiller that has a small tank and thought about putting that into the system, but wasn't sure if it would be better before or after the carbonator?? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Do you use ice to cool your cold plate? Cold plates need just ice to cool them an ice water mix doesn't work as well. Cooling the syrup is a good thing to do but not 100% necessary. You want your soda water coming out of the gun at about 32 deg F. If you are using a motorized carbonator you should have your CO2 set at 100psi. One thing to take into account is you need to insulate the lines going to the gun.

I have a similar set up but i use a flash chiller to cool the soda water. That is a much easier way to deal with it but it is more up front money

Thanks for the response! I have a chiller that recycles the water and continually makes ice so the cold plate sits in a ice/water bath. The water makes 2 passes thru the cold plate before going into the gun. I do have co2 set a 100 psi and water pressure at 50psi. But the water is coming out at ~42°F at best. I do have all the lines insulated except the 3-4 feet to the gun is the flexible metal stuff so it can be pulled in and out of the counter. What kind of flash chiller do you have? I am not familiar with them.

I got mine on Ebay it is a micromatic unit. It has a glycol bath with 6 stainless coils in the bath. It also has a pump that recirculates the glycol to and from the manifold of the gun.

One thing that you can do is up the CO2 to 120 psi. Also pouring the soda over ice will help keep the CO2 in solution. Also you could prop up the cold plate so it just sits in ice that will help.