Northern Brewer 4 Pack Kegs for $123 shipped

Northern brewer's email ad today lists a 4 pack of used ball lock kegs for $115. It appears to be eligible for their $7.99 flat rate shipping, so each keg comes to just over $30, and each keg comes with an o-ring rebuild kit. A decent price to buy from an established business.

Has anybody had experience ordering kegs from Northern Brewer? I'd like to hear from some people about the condition the kegs were in.

Thanks!!!

damn that's a great deal. I've never ordered kegs from them but I have had some pretty large orders and it went just fine.

I was just about to order this set along with the extras to be tapping into one of them. It occured to me that I'm not sure how to store the empty kegs until such time as I am going to be using them. Does it hurt the metalic surface to leave a santaizer on the inside for an extended period, or does one just make sure they are very dry on the inside?

Sorry if this was asked, I've been looking and can't find the answer. And I have Christmas gift money burning a hole in my pocket

I leave Star San in mine. No problems so far.

Thanks that was a great deal!

I store my kegs dry but pressurized, that way when I go to uses them, if they don't hold pressure, I know its time to rebuild them.

After killing a keg I usually wash with oxyclean and just rinse with water. I don't dry them out or anything. When ready for more beer, I'll use starsan to sanitize.

Starsan is slightly acidic, but the soda syrup these things were made for is way more acidic. I highly doubt you'd ever have a problem storing starsan inside one for an extended period of time.

I leave a few ounces of starsan in and pressurize for storage.

Thanks for the storage tips guys. Looks like it's time I traded in my bottles for some kegs

Now I just need to figure out how to split my gas line to two kegs, a tee, or a distributor. NB has the foam-free tubing kit and the gas line kit available, but my CO2 tank has only one outlet and I want to have two styles on tap at a time.

If you're independently wealthy I'd recommend a secondary regulator so you can independently control the pressure to two different kegs. It's useful if you want to force/quick carb one keg while continuing to pour from the other one.

Otherwise, a distributor with backflow check valves is the cheaper way to go. I wouldn't recommend the tee because you are bound to get one type of beer backing up into the other keg and/or your regulator.

You'll inevitably find yourself forcecarbing one keg. To do this, you shut off gas to the other keg and increase the regulator on the tank. When you are done, you need to decrease the regulator pressure and bleed the keg you had been force carbing. If you forget to bleed (and you will despite your best efforts not to, trust me) the 30psi in the keg you were force-carbing will make the beer in that keg flow into the lower pressure keg once you open that valve.

The check-valves are cheap insurance to protect both your $30 keg of beer, and your $80 regulator on the tank. Good luck.

mattjmac said:

If you forget to bleed (and you will despite your best efforts not to, trust me) the 30psi in the keg you were force-carbing will make the beer in that keg flow into the lower pressure keg once you open that valve.

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I do agree that a check valve is cheap insurance for your regulator.

But... Beer will only flow between 2 kegs via the gas line if you have them incorrectly connected (gas on the beer out post), or have them overfilled. The gas tube in the keg is short and should not contact the beer, so you may blow gas from one to the other but beer shouldn't go.

Ed

Thanks Mattjmac and Ohio-Ed!
Sadly I don't have the hassle of being independently wealthy so I'm going to go with the CO2 distributor 2-port with 1/4" barbed shut-off valves with an integral check valve.

Now just to order it and wait...patiently...patiently...wait.

I would recommend one extra port. My fridge holds 4 kegs. I have a 5 port distributor and always have that line available for force carbing without the hassle of disconnecting one of the kegs.

mattjmac said:

If you forget to bleed (and you will despite your best efforts not to, trust me) the 30psi in the keg you were force-carbing will make the beer in that keg flow into the lower pressure keg once you open that valve.

Click to expand...

This shouldn't happen unless you overfill the kegs. The IN/GAS dip tube should be above the beer.... Just the CO2 will flow back...

OOOPS. Ohio-Ed already mentioned that.

Ideally I would wait until I had a dedicated fridge in which to store my kegs so I would know how many I could fit.
Pragmatically if I get a three-port distributor now, I can always add another distributor if needed, and it gives me access to the beer and an extra line for keging what will be conditioning.

Thanks again for all the help with this guys :rockin: I wouldn't have thought about all these details without your input.

DanPoch said:

Ideally I would wait until I had a dedicated fridge in which to store my kegs so I would know how many I could fit.
Pragmatically if I get a three-port distributor now, I can always add another distributor if needed, and it gives me access to the beer and an extra line for keging what will be conditioning.

Thanks again for all the help with this guys :rockin: I wouldn't have thought about all these details without your input.

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You will appreciate the extra port. I also use it to flush lines with santizer and blow them out. And you can definately add on later.

FYI more beer deal of the day is a rebuilt keg for 28.95! That's 4 for 115.80 and shipping is free! As of this moment only 15 are available at that price.

also check out Kegconnection.com for great deals on kegs.

4 pack of rebuilt kegs is 124.95

4 pack of "B" grade kegs is 98.95

I have a few of the "B" grade kegs and they work great.

I'm in the market for some kegs, as I put my system together. Being a complete n00b when it comes to kegging, I don't know the first thing about all of this. I see kegs being referred to as new, reconditioned, rebuilt, etc.

I know I don't need a new keg. It's just silly to pay the $100+ for a new corny.

From what I've been able to understand reconditioned vs rebuilt is a everything is clean enough and parts re working vs everything replaced (0 rings and poppets/pressure valves(?))

I want to get a bunch of kegs that I don't have to worry too much about for a bit. I don't mind having to replace O rings, but I don't want to bother with getting a deal on crappy kegs that need all the miscellaneous parts replaced.

The deals above, what state are these kegs in? How much of this stuff will need to be replaced immediately? I see poppets for $7.95, Relief valves for $14.95. How much are the deals really saving if stuff is going to need to be replaced?

I ordered from ChiCompany, got mine about the same price as the NB set after shipping (just a little cheaper), and though they aren't the best looking things, they came holding presure and seem just fine. I haven't started serving beer from them yet, but I don't forsee needing to replace parts on the any time soon, besides gaskets.

janzik said:

I'm in the market for some kegs, as I put my system together. Being a complete n00b when it comes to kegging, I don't know the first thing about all of this. I see kegs being referred to as new, reconditioned, rebuilt, etc.

I know I don't need a new keg. It's just silly to pay the $100+ for a new corny.

From what I've been able to understand reconditioned vs rebuilt is a everything is clean enough and parts re working vs everything replaced (0 rings and poppets/pressure valves(?))

I want to get a bunch of kegs that I don't have to worry too much about for a bit. I don't mind having to replace O rings, but I don't want to bother with getting a deal on crappy kegs that need all the miscellaneous parts replaced.

The deals above, what state are these kegs in? How much of this stuff will need to be replaced immediately? I see poppets for $7.95, Relief valves for $14.95. How much are the deals really saving if stuff is going to need to be replaced?

Click to expand...

I think all these deals are for good working kegs. Even the "B" grade kegs from kegconnection work perfectly. One of the handles may be broken but they seal up fine. Plus they throw in a full set of replacement seals for down the road.

I keep all my seals lubed with food grade grease and that makes them last a long time. You can get a tube of this grease from kegconneection for a few bucks. One tube may last you a lifetime.

I just placed an order for a 4pack of cornies and some other odds n ends this morning. I had a $150 gift cert from NB I got for Christmas, so this was an even better deal for me