Mirage
Well-Known Member
That is really nice looking! Good work!
Show us your Kegerator
- Thread starter Flyin' Lion
- Start date
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
starrfish
Well-Known Member
I was about to post mine... but my fridge stopped cooling after 3days!!! makes a weird clink noise and motor is hot to the touch. no coolant lines in the top on the Danby. didn't nick any lines while cutting. voided warranty when I made my first cut and removed door self panel. Which had nothing to do with tap install...
I AM SOOO BUMMED! was hoping to have 2 on tap by christmas!!! Now I need to find a fridge repair guy locally to take it to. Worked before I did my cuts. worked while I was making cuts. installed last bit... no chill. Right now it's a pretty looking 2 tap door stop. AAARRRGGHHH!
I AM SOOO BUMMED! was hoping to have 2 on tap by christmas!!! Now I need to find a fridge repair guy locally to take it to. Worked before I did my cuts. worked while I was making cuts. installed last bit... no chill. Right now it's a pretty looking 2 tap door stop. AAARRRGGHHH!
sensibull
Well-Known Member
Thanks. All our appliances are brushed steel, so I was pretty psyched to find the fridge for $35 on Craiglist.
klyph
Well-Known Member
starrfish
Well-Known Member
how would that be done? I un plugged it and had to walk away... majorly frustrated. I can post a pic when i get home...
There is a small chance that the fridge had short-cycled and liquid refrigerant got into the compressor and locked it up, especially if you have a different controller on it. This problem would clear after being unplugged for 10 minutes or so.
I had my freezer on it's side for a day or so while gluing wood to the sides. When I was ready to plug it in, I left it sit upright for 24 hrs and after a few days it was barely cool and the motor was hot. I let it sit for about a week unplugged, and after that it was good. It took a long time to cool down (presumably because the wood surround has no breathing room), so I mounted a PC heatsink and fan to the compressor motor, and a couple of other PC fans to vent the hot air out of the motor area. It runs nice and cool now, and cycles infrequently.
1990dtgl98
Well-Known Member
Had my own thread, but figured I'd contribute here:
So, my parents had an old chest freezer that they didn't use anymore, and I thought it would make a perfect kegerator. It's almost 15 years old, possibly even older than that. Made my Roper.
I was going to take pictures during the build, but once things get going...I kinda forgot. I got excited and it wound up getting finished over the course of 2 weekends.
Collar and rest of the wood is cherry from a tree that used to be on our property that we removed, kiln dried, planed and finished (yeah, me and my dad do a lot of woodworking).
Perlicks, 3-way reg from kegconnection and the assorted goodies.
Paint was Rustolium all purpose paint (not the appliance paint)
Pics:
So, my parents had an old chest freezer that they didn't use anymore, and I thought it would make a perfect kegerator. It's almost 15 years old, possibly even older than that. Made my Roper.
I was going to take pictures during the build, but once things get going...I kinda forgot. I got excited and it wound up getting finished over the course of 2 weekends.
Collar and rest of the wood is cherry from a tree that used to be on our property that we removed, kiln dried, planed and finished (yeah, me and my dad do a lot of woodworking).
Perlicks, 3-way reg from kegconnection and the assorted goodies.
Paint was Rustolium all purpose paint (not the appliance paint)
Pics:
Very sharp. Love the cherry. I need to pimp mine out a bit.
I bought some chalk board paint to paint some of my freezer to use to label what beer is on what tap, worked great...can have your local hardware store such as Home Depot or Lowe's mix any color tint you want for this paint...my daughter selected Purple for ours turned out great...easy on fast drying, used two coats.
1990, that is one of the sharpest, nicest looking collar keezzers i have seen. The cherry and black is a real classy look. I also like what you did with the controller. The rounded corners on the collar and drip tray are a nice touch too.
What controller did you use?
What controller did you use?
adamziegler
Well-Known Member
8 CF Frigidaire Freezer
4 Corneys (with room for two more, or room for 6 gal lagering carboy)
2x8 Collar
Johnson Controls A419ABC-1C
I posted this a couple years ago, but never showed any pictures of the inside.
1990dtgl98
Well-Known Member
Thank you! If there's one thing I know how to do, it's work with wood!
The controller is a Love TSS2 2-stage. Currently only have it for cooling, but I figured if I bought one, might as well make sure I could use it as a fermentation chamber if I wanted to. Might not ever do it, but it saves me about 30 bucks down the road if it comes to it.
munkyhead8
Member
Work in progress. I have the colar complete. Just need to delete the lid, give it a paint job, and install the taps. I think I am also going to distress the copper, so it looks a little more "vintage". The wood is Spanish Cedar, and smells fantastic. I wish the smell would stick around. . . It's a 5 cft Kenmore, and with the colar, I can get four kegs plus the 5 lb CO2, if I take the regulator off of the tank. I'll have to find some high pressure line first though. For now, I'll keep it at 3.
starrfish
Well-Known Member
That must have been what happened. cooling nicely now!
Kegging 2 batches this week.
will post picks when I get home pic on cell isn't good
Thank you! If there's one thing I know how to do, it's work with wood!
The controller is a Love TSS2 2-stage. Currently only have it for cooling, but I figured if I bought one, might as well make sure I could use it as a fermentation chamber if I wanted to. Might not ever do it, but it saves me about 30 bucks down the road if it comes to it.
I'd put some sort of cover the back wiring though. Keezers even mine with a fan and damprid in it are notorious for having condensation issues and that wont mix well with electricity.
I'd put some sort of cover the back wiring though. Keezers even mine with a fan and damprid in it are notorious for having condensation issues and that wont mix well with electricity.
Plus, since you have the collar attached to the body and not the lid, you could end up banging it with kegs.
ezzieyguywuf
Well-Known Member
I've often wondered at what effect the wood collar has on the insulation of these things. I would imagine that heat would permeate through the wood a lot easier than through the insulation in the walls of the original freezer. For example, I would expect that looking through some thermal goggles at a running unit would show a major cold spot at the collar, as it would not be as insulated from the inside as the rest of the freezer. Is this addressed somehow in your guys' mods?
adamziegler
Well-Known Member
Wood acts as an insulator. Is it as good as foam insulation of the same thickness?... no. Is it as good as the freezer walls itself?... no. However it is still good enough. My metal facets are much much colder than the collar, but rarely do they ever get cold enough to have condensation form on them. I have never had any condensation on the outside of my collar. Also keep in mind that the cold air in the freezer sinks to the bottom.
ezzieyguywuf
Well-Known Member
Yea, I realize the cold air sinks to the bottom, but I also know some people (and me, if I ever make one of these) put little computer fans in there to circulate the air. It makes sense that your faucets are much colder than the collar, but the fact that the collar is cool at all indicates heat transfer. Me, I'm a mechanical engineer so I really geek out about this sort of stuff and always try to maximize mechanical efficiency, just for fun. In this case, mechanical efficiency = thermal efficiency, and that collar just looks like a big ol' black hole of heat loss (to me). I'm not bashing anyone's build at all, b/c obviously this works and works great for many. I'm just doing some pondering and was wondering if any had done some pondering along these same lines before.
cyberbackpacker
Well-Known Member
There have been others that voiced similar concerns to yours, and if you peruse this site enough you will see some people have gone to the effort of adding insulation to their wood collars to rectify this problem.
It all depends on priorities. For some people it is not worth the effort/cost, and others it is.
It all depends on priorities. For some people it is not worth the effort/cost, and others it is.
ezzieyguywuf
Well-Known Member
Good to know. I'll do some more perusing around these forums then. They are quite vast, and its easy to get lost on various tangents.
cyberbackpacker
Well-Known Member
That is for sure... there is tons of information. I often find myself coming on here to look for one specific bit of information and getting pulled in two or three other directions!
A layer of insulation makes a huge difference with the collar. As for the taps they are like a heat sink (cold sink in this case, lol) since there is a shank sticking into the cooler and a big metal tap sticking out but there isn't all that much you can do about it.
adamziegler
Well-Known Member
Implying that the wood was cold was probably an overstatement. I cant tell the difference between the temp of the side of my freezer and the outside of the wood collar.
While I am not specifically mech-e, I am a professional engineer with experience in thermodynamics. I too pondered this when putting my kegerator together. A softwood 2x8 could have an R value over 2 per inch. Foam insulation is obviously higher than this. Assuming that you have everything sealed up properly, energy cost savings over the life of the kegerator compared to the extra cost / effort of adding insulation is something that could easily go either direction.
ezzieyguywuf
Well-Known Member
Yea, I realize the taps are a 'lost cause' any way you go, unless you get them made out of some exotic material: but this would be at the cost of potentially affecting the beer taste! My feelings are such that the wetted surface of the taps compared to the walls+collar is small enough that the heat loss is minimal.
I see what you mean about the cost going either way. Well, I can definitely see myself doing some quick calculations when I get around to a build: estimate coeff. of heat transfer for the wood/freezer wall, take the difference over the course of a year, compare to energy costs. If the costs of extra insulation etc doesn't result in a simple payback period of, say, less than 1 (maybe 2) years, I'll mark that as 'not worth it'. This is how I decided that purchasing one of these was actually worthwhile, as the payback period in beer savings is roughly 9 months for me. Yay math!
http://www.bonemopbrewing.com -- been meaning to throw this up with the pics of my keezer for awhile now. The tap handles were hand made from stainless steel pipe and welding wire by my father. They're welded on the back, then ground down on the front to make them convex, then polished and shined.
ezzieyguywuf
Well-Known Member
I tried three times this past year to make homemade mozz and failed miserable each time. I think it was my milk. What kind of milk did you use?
mcwarhammer
Well-Known Member
Shorter shanks. Mine protrude 1/2" beyond the insulation. However in this case it may be desirable to keep the taps cold to reduce foaming. I could go either way on this one, but the shorter shanks help getting kegs in and out with a collar-on-body keezer.
Tons of information and tons of opinions. The hardest part is to tell which is which.
those tap handles are awesome! I'm jealous
+1. very cool.
Those tap handles are the best handmade ones I have ever seen! Outstanding! Like stainless jewelry. I still wonder how he did the rope around the round pieces. It is probably no coincidence that you have one of the shiniest kegs I've seen too.
1990dtgl98
Well-Known Member
I'd put some sort of cover the back wiring though. Keezers even mine with a fan and damprid in it are notorious for having condensation issues and that wont mix well with electricity.
I talked with Dwyer a bit about it, and the Love controllers are meant to work in a range of conditions. The guy basically said that a fridge setting shouldn't warrant any issues with condensation causing shorts/rust. I guess the controller circuit panel is coated. Personally, I can't see enough condensation forming to cause a short on the back exposed terminals.
That being said, I will probably coat each terminal with liquid electrical tape (since covering it with a box inside the freezer will be worse IMO since you probably wont get a perfect seal with various size wiring coming in/out of the controller).
Possible, but for me I doubt it. One of the benefits of loading trailers for UPS for a living. One 50lb keg is cake compared to 1600 boxes of 60lb anvil metal parts a night.
As everyone else said, easier, yes, but not a huge issue. Wood I believe has an R-value of 1 per inch. Foam has an r-value of 3, roughly. Even if the freezer is newer (say an inch of foam sandwiched between plastic and metal, that means a 2" pine collar (or other soft wood), still has 2/3rds the insulating capacity of the freezer itself. Add some thin foam and the difference will be negligable.
FWIW, my electric bill is normally around 58 dollars (gas heat, water, range, dryer, etc). After hooking up the kegerator (12v fan included), my bill was 62 bucks. That difference could be anything really. Pretty much no difference with a 9 +/- cu/ft freezer with a hardwood (which lowers the R-value) collar and cheap (=crappy) foam insulation I had lying around.
So, ummmm.....he should start making and selling them on a larger scale. I'd buy 2 in a heartbeat.
Those are ridiculously cool. People that can make art from metal never cease to amaze me. I can make pretty much anything out of wood, and make it well; but could never do anything with metal that looked remotely close to good.
Not sure on that. I don't see the extra inch or 2 contributing a lot to thermal mass that makes a huge difference in foam issues or whatnot. Now, I do think thicker collars will make a difference. They may insulate better, but if you don't allow some "breathing" room with the shank/collar fit, then 2-3" of wood means 2-3" where the shank is at room temp, or at least noticeably warmer than the freezer itself.
Doing some tests, for me, the shortest shank possible as well as a 1" (not 7/8") gave me the lowest amount of foam. I think having that air gap, which basically surrounded the whole shank to the faucet with cold air, helped.
I ran 22psi in 8' lines for my hefe with a 3" shank and got maybe 40% foam on my first pour, and the perfect amount every glass after (so long as it was within a 30-40 min window from the previous pour).
BrokenDog
Well-Known Member
Subscribed. I just got a holiday bonus so I will be shopping around for my kegging and kegerator setup this week.
BlackHillsBrewing
Active Member
That is really way to great... good job.. How big is the keg on inside.. I'd like to get one to fit a 5 gal korny../?// Any Ideas!
