Brew Keggle

I am looking to purchase this kettle but dont know enough about welding. I been researching about it and I know a little. This guy is selling these for 90 says they were sanitary welded but they personally look like crap to me. Let me know because I may be just a perfectionist.

hard to say from the pic but that looks bad. id it rusted? def not sanitary welded. it may clean up.

Those weld's look like crap! Why so much splatter?? Better off buying a keg and having someone locally weld it.

I've heard of sanitary welding, but don't know much about it. It doesn't matter in this case...don't buy that keg.

agree with the other posters - that keg has been butchered. Stay away from it.

Duely noted thank you everyone that responded so quick.

Yeah, bad..... Looks like Stevie Wonder MIG welded it!

looks like a moron or a lobster welded that..

My local welder is great - $10 a hole, and they're beautiful welds !

A "sanitary weld" is a vague phrase. It can mean that the backside of the weld was purged of Oxygen by using Argon or Helium. But in regards to home brewing it pretty much means the back side weld is aesthetically pleasing. That kettle was not back purged and it most definitely would not be considered 'sanitary'.

Also that was welded using a MIG welder and not a TIG welder (hence the spatter). The keg is a backyard weld job done by some guy with a MIG machine.

With all the being said.... If the weld doesn't leak then it will still do the same thing as a sanitary TIG welded kettle. The weld just won't look as nice and it may be a little harder to clean (you can always clean it up with an angle grinder).

SpikeBrewing said:

A "sanitary weld" is a vague phrase. It can mean that the backside of the weld was purged of Oxygen by using Argon or Helium. But in regards to home brewing it pretty much means the back side weld is aesthetically pleasing. That kettle was not back purged and it most definitely would not be considered 'sanitary'.

Click to expand...

Time to put on my dairy plant hat again.

I don't have our exact corporate standards for a weld, but they do need to meet or exceed 3A sanitary standards. For a tank ferrule, that would generally mean TIG welding with a gas blanket on the back side to prevent sugaring. The interior surfaces would need to be within certain tolerances for smoothness and be free of pitting.

It gets tough when you weld SS tubes, because you can't go in and buff out the back side if you screw up and blow through.

Our ace welder at the plant can do a tube so well that it's hard to find the weld.

For home brewing purposes, I'd consider a weld that's been ground/polished to the same finish as the surrounding base metal inside and out to be sufficient. Even if the rest of your system isn't to sanitary design standards (threaded fittings, etc), you at least know your weld won't harbor any residues that would allow something to grow. If you can get that with a MIG, more power to you. A silver soldered or brazed joint that's been finished to similar standards would also be sufficient, albeit not as strong mechanically as a TIG weld.

To the OPs photos, there's no friggin' way those are sanitary welds.

I ended up with two of these. They may be knock offs got them today they are huge.


http://www.ebay.com/itm/360461506719?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649

you def got a nice pot with that. and bigger than the keggle. good job