Did you drill a hole in the bottom of your keg?

Seems like a silly question but I have encountered more than one person who seems to have mounted their bulkhead straight through the bottom of a keg. I mean the concave, "this is the part that I sit on" bottom of their keg, not the lower part of the side of the keg.

I feel like there's a big secret thing going on and I don't know about it. So if you have a drainage system set up through the bottom of your keg, please discuss why and preferably post a picture or two. I'm curious how the are used in various setups and the like.

Also if anyone that has done this has attempted to make a washtub bass out of a keg, please send audio samples.

Hey TerapingChef, which keg would you be referring to? HLT, MLT, or BK? I haven't seen that done yet, but I can make a couple of guesses why not:

1) If you use a false bottom or filter then you will have to create some sort of 'U' shaped connector because a false bottom requires a connection from the top.

2) You need to design your brew sculpture such that you have enough clearance underneath.

3) If you put a valve on the output of your coupling then you have more difficulty reaching it under the keg.

Just my initial thoughts.

Jared311 said:

Hey TerapingChef, which keg would you be referring to? HLT, MLT, or BK? I haven't seen that done yet, but I can make a couple of guesses why not:

1) If you use a false bottom or filter then you will have to create some sort of 'U' shaped connector because a false bottom requires a connection from the top.

2) You need to design your brew sculpture such that you have enough clearance underneath.

3) If you put a valve on the output of your coupling then you have more difficulty reaching it under the keg.

Just my initial thoughts.

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While it's not the "standard" way, it can be done.

#1 is not true at all. The way you'd hold the FB down in a bottom mount bulkhead is to run a nipple up through a hole in the FB, put the FB over the nipple and hold it down with a pipe cap. The wort would enter the nipple by drilling a bunch of holes around the circumference right at the bottom near the bulkhead. Another way would be to tackweld a couple stainless bolts to the bottom, place the FB down over them, and put some acorn nuts on top.

#2. You can run a horizontal tube and relieve the keg skirt with a notch. This requires that the bulkhead is slightly offset from the center so that it doesn't hang down too far.

#3. You'd put the valve on after enough horizontal pipe so that it was still out towards the front of your keg. No reaching under.


This idea will work very well on an HLT but it can be tricky on a direct fired MLT or BK because of potential scortching of the wort in the horizontal pipe. The main benefit to the bottom drain is it doesn't require a siphon tube and it will drain completely no matter what level you start draining at. In traditional designs, you couldn't start draining at 3 gallons because it's below the bulkhead and the siphon won't start.

I can't argue with Bobby_M, he actually knows what he is talking about.

It seems to me that there would be an issue with wort scorching in the tube below the keg not to mention the cleaning. I was thinking of converting a keg for a fermenter and putting a valve at the bottom.

We never discussed if this mashtun was going to be direct fired or not. If it is, you need a heat sheild over the tube and have run it as a RIMS to keep the wort moving. I think it would work better has a HERMs tun. I think the best use of a bottom drain in any case is for an HLT.

Well, I was going to add something to this thread, but that dang Bobby sucked the wind right out of my sails!
So, "What he said" is the best I can do.

I've seen a few people do this....for the life of me I can't find their builds. This method seems to work better with electric setups. You could also do as Bobby described if using direct fire.

There's more than one way to skin a cat....that's why I love the engineering side of this hobby. Seeing how other people design things is really interesting.

I have often thought about a slightly concave bottomed vessel for mashing or boiling - usually when I see how much dead space there is! What I envision is a very shallow conical bottom, with burner jets mounted in a wide ring, away from the center drain pipe. The horizontal part of the drain would actually be routed under the burner, so scorching shouldn't be a problem.

I have my keg sitting on two parallel bars over a burner. I simply sit the mash tun down and turn it so the nipple and valve swing out the side. I did think about the wort scorching in the tube so I just ditch the first quart or so and start to vorlauf after that. The nipple and valve sit about 2" below the keg skirt. Works well for me.

silvervan83 said:

I have my keg sitting on two parallel bars over a burner. I simply sit the mash tun down and turn it so the nipple and valve swing out the side. I did think about the wort scorching in the tube so I just ditch the first quart or so and start to vorlauf after that. The nipple and valve sit about 2" below the keg skirt. Works well for me.

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Pics?

Also jester...
I think that there might be a problem with that setup. If you've ever seen the way a commercial deep fryer works you might know what I'm talking about. They're pretty much a conical shape, but rectangular. The heating elements are about 4" over the top of the conical slope. The particulates (solid food matter) settle into the bottom of the cone, which is a cooler zone. This prevents them from burning and contaminating your oil. I'm worried that in a boil kettle with the rings above the bottom of the cone, your protein matter that would normally be kept moving would settle into the bottom.

Also to clarify, I am in no way considering doing this. I just caught wind of it somewhere and was curious how many people have done this.

TerapinChef said:

Also jester...
I think that there might be a problem with that setup. If you've ever seen the way a commercial deep fryer works you might know what I'm talking about. They're pretty much a conical shape, but rectangular. The heating elements are about 4" over the top of the conical slope. The particulates (solid food matter) settle into the bottom of the cone, which is a cooler zone. This prevents them from burning and contaminating your oil. I'm worried that in a boil kettle with the rings above the bottom of the cone, your protein matter that would normally be kept moving would settle into the bottom.
.

Click to expand...

I must confess I have not really plotted this project out yet - just daydreaming when I should be working I was thinking a much more gentle slope, maybe only an inch, possibly less, from top of the cone to the bottom - just an incline to get all the fluid down.

Don't get me wrong, I LIKE IT! I just shot out the first thing that came to mind.

Well, if I ever do get to try it out, you know I'll post pictures and results

I agree this might be very valuable for an electric setup, and on a stand so you don't need to cut the skirt at all, just come out below it through the stand.

I don't think it would have that much advantage on a HLT, other than not needing a dip tube, but then you also need to modify your sight glass hmm. If you put the valve at the end of your pipe coming out from underneath you could just run a sight-glass off that and up the side of the keg. You would no longer waste a few gallons of water in the HLT so you could get up to sight glass level.

Have put a tube in the curved bottom to overcome the air bubble in the inlet tube problem with the mash tun. Drlled the skirt and installed a swagelok bulkhead fitting and then drilled the keggle bottom where the curve bottom steps to flat in the center and silver soldered a piece of 1/2" ss tube for a drain. False bottom still is retained by original dip tube assembly with capped outlet. This solved the mash pump priming problem as the system tubing grades up from pump and tube fills when strike water is added, bubles vent to underside of false bottom.

I have a single tier system and all three kegs have the drain at the bottom. After many questions for Bobby I decided to go with this design. I drain all but 1/2 cup of liquid from each. I saw some concerns about scorching of the wort in the pipe and this was a legitimate concern of mine as well. The solution, I run my march pump while boiling. This keeps the wort from staying in the drain and prevents any scorching. I have two false bottoms made by Sabco and they are nice because they have two SS bolts welded onto the bottom of them. My first batch had a 13 pound grain bill and I had no problem what so ever in draining the MT. The only thing I recommend is to find a welder who is up to the challenge of doing the bottom drain. I used elbows and cut them in half with a 3" nipple going on the outside of the skirt. My welder had a hard time getting them to seal and recommend this bit of advice. He said next time he would have drilled a hole large enough for the OD of the elbow, welded the elbow onto the bottom and then gone inside and cut/ground the rest of the elbow off. I'm sorry I didn't see this thread sooner and I hope this helps.