Regulator purchase advice

A few quick questions:

brand quality: who makes good regulators? common ones i've seen are:
taprite
cornelius
economy (maybe not a brand, but probably of lesser quality parts)

regulator gauges:
since we should be carbing at lower pressures, is it better to get a 0-60 gauge or does that even matter? I assume the screw adjustment remains the same, its just easier to read a precise pressure level if there are 60 dashes compared to 160 (0-160 gauge) dashes.

thanks for the input. sorry if this is already in a thread, but i searched and got nothing to these questions.

I have a micromatic this one, actually

I like the hand dial, rather than the screw adjusment. No searching for a screwdriver to adjust the pressure on the fly.

0-60 psi gauges are for soda, 0-30 are for beer. The smaller increments on the 30 make it easier to change it from 11-12 psi.

The only suggestion I can make is to DEFINITELY get check valves with your reg. Sooner or later you're going to hook the gas up to a carbed keg, and if the pressure in the keg is higher than the reg setting, you'll possibly push beer into the reg. If you have a check valve, you wont' (*&^ up your reg if it happens.

B

good point. is the check valve connected to the co2 out then, so if the gauge is set to 12, but keg pressure exceeds 12, it vents that extra pressure. or does the brewer, me, have to release the pressure via the check valve manually?

a check valve just stops the flow in the reverse direction, so liquid can't flow into the regulator body.
You'd have to vent the KEG in that case. I have a 25# line set up to seal kegs/force carb. Once in a while I forget to vent the keg when I put it on a regular 12psi line. I sit and look at the gauge and wonder why it's reading 0. Then the light bulb goes off in my head and I vent the keg.

B

I have all taprites. I think they are made here locally in SA. They are a bit more expensive but good.

i got the economy one. Its been going strong for like 2 years. Even tipped the the bottle a few times and its still in OK shape. I am not sure if this is an issue with all regulators, but if I am increasing the pressure on a keg, I usually have to back the screw out a turn after I am at the desired PSI in order for it to stop hissing.