Mobile water using corny kegs without making soda water?

I'm designing an onboard water solution for our off road vehicle, and I have a couple of questions that can probably be better answered by home brewers than by overland vehicle tinkerers...

I've searched through this forum (thank you all so much for your posts and ideas!) and have determined that I can probably run 3 corny kegs horizontally by using the 'gas in' port as my water out as long as I keep that port on the bottom when they're laid down. I would then pressurize the system by sending CO2 into the 'beer out' port.

I would like to carry 15 gallons of fresh water in the truck, and be able to dispense it with a small lever-operated spray head like you see in many kitchen sinks:




I would think that I can attach a CO2 bottle to the first keg at the 'out' port, and run the kegs in series until the last keg has the shower head attachment on its 'gas in' port.

CO2 bottle --> Keg 1 'out' - pressurizes K1 and forces water out of the 'in' port
Keg 1 'in' --> Keg 2 'out' - flows water through K2 out of the 'in' port
Keg 2 'in' --> Keg 3 'out' - flows water through K3 to the shower head via the 'in' port

A picture is worth a thousand words:




I remember just enough chemistry to recall Henry's law about dissolved gasses being more likely to go into solution at higher pressure and lower temperature (this has been demonstrated by the way you guys force carbonate in kegs by keeping them cold and at ~30psi for a couple days and/or shaking them to agitate the gas into solution).

I want to AVOID sending the gas into solution, so my question is this: how much pressure do you need in order to force the gas into solution, and if my serving pressure stays below that for around 5 days, will the water absorb the gas all the way down until the system equalizes at 0psi?

As much as we enjoy drinking soda water on a regular basis, I'm sure showering in it would be quite the experience.

Our use case:

TIME - Offroading in our Toyota Tundra for a few days at a time before refilling the water, possibly up to 5 days.
SHAKING the bejeezus out of the kegs as we drive. Imagine these kegs will be on a paint can agitator for a few hours at a time.
TEMPERATURE - We live and drive in the deserts of Arizona, California and Mexico so these kegs will see temps in excess of 140* F when parked in the sun.


I'd love to have some feedback from you about the suggested PSI for this idea to function/store at.

Thanks!

I'd use nitrogen. That's what they use to serve wine from a tap so that it doesn't carbonate.

Also, keep the nitrogen bottle out of the sun!

To avoid carbonation, use a small air compressor instead of a CO2 tank. Hell you could probably figure out a way to hook a bike pump up to the thing with enough duct tape and tubing.

I like the air compressor idea better than carrying around a pressurized tank in the desert.

good ideas. I had considered a compressor, but most onboard air compressors are not food grade, and so they pass some oils and stuff into the air, then the water (could be filtered, but then also requires power for the compressor).

Nitrogen could be a useful option to prevent carbonation, and maintains the zero-moving-parts aspect.

come to think of it, a small scuba tank could provide compressed air...

Have you seen where people make air tanks out of bumpers and roll cages? Could go that route, won't take much pressure unless you plan on using this as a shower... Stagger mount the tanks or mount them vertically so the top drains into the middle and it drains into the bottom with no need for pressure, all gravity fed.

A simple portable 12v compressor for emergency tire fills is probably best. For one thing it's a backup for your tires if you carry a plug kit. I doubt it would contaminate the water all that much if at all. Once the first keg was full of air and no water you won't need to run the compressor anymore.

More great ideas! thank you so much!

i was originally thinking of a compressor, but I've seen so many failures from the abuse we put them through offroad, I started thinking along the lines of a system with no moving parts.

I've also updated the idea to use N2 instead of CO2 - thanks for the suggestion! It actually solves four issues at once by going to N2.

1. Pressure for the water system
2. Can fill the tires back up after airing them down for offroading (or flat repair)
3. Used to fill adjustable shocks and bump stops in the suspension
4. can run air tools like impact wrenches or air ratchets for trailside repairs

Why not an rv water pump? Space for a couple of 6v batteries is probably less than for an air tank.

I'm just throwing this out there, they make a hand pump, that pumps air. The keg taps you see at college parties. If you want CO2 and your off roading anyway, lots of guys use CO2 to fill the tires, so it can do double duty. IMHO, I'd switch to a sanke 1/2BBL and only turn the pressure on when you want water, then turn it off and bleed the tank when your finished. But hey that's what I would do. If I got into a crash I wouldn't want that sanke keg flying around.
Best Mike

The N2 will also go into the water but not as much as the CO2 would. When you have a Guinness on tap and see all those little bubbles cascading, that is N2 coming out of solution.

i cant think of a reason why you cant just fill the kegs with beer and do this, but i have nothing to contribute to this thread

test test. I'm trying to reply to this thread and it disappears

Thanks to all your suggestions, we've solved a problem that never existed!

My buddies that I overland with have been giving me grief for half a year about how complex this whole thing is, and my answer has always been that the idea is complex, but the system is simple. The first video I made sounded complicated, so here's my simple version. Filmed around Christmas.


https://youtu.be/wLcuCXqM-Yw















and a shameless plug for our instagram if you want to follow the adventures.

www.instagram.com/__kevink__
www.instagram.com/uberfahrt


oh, we did buy an extra keg so we can bring nitro beer on the trail - best idea ever @mikescooling!

DragginFly said:

test test. I'm trying to reply to this thread and it disappears

Click to expand...

As a member with a low post count, your posts went into the moderation queue (an anti-spam tool.) I approved your multiple post attempts which resulted in several almost duplicate posts. I deleted all but the last of the posts, which as far as I can tell contains all of the info & pics from the other posts.

Brew on

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Rinse-Ki...417879_slid_&gclid=CLeDnpCq1NICFRSFfgod-n4Ing

I think that being in the mindset that you need to use kegs, you are limiting yourself.

I am assuming it's not for drinking, since you cannot produce enough pressure out of a keg safely to use it a shower, etc

30psi out of a keg would be plenty to shower by... and the keg can easily handle that. They are rated over 100psi... your city or well water is typically around 60psi is all.

When I was into Jeeps I ran air tools and inflated tires off a 20 LB CO2 tank. For a long time I didn't even own an air compressor, I'd just use the CO2 tank to run my impact wrenches and inflate tires. It worked very well, but the regulator I used put out 150 PSI which is obviously far too much to push water and enough to rupture your kegs. You'd have to run a secondary regulator to step down the pressure to push the water in the kegs.

MaryB said:

30psi out of a keg would be plenty to shower by... and the keg can easily handle that. They are rated over 100psi... your city or well water is typically around 60psi is all.

Click to expand...

Yep, pressure won't be an issue, volume will be i think.

but then I have never tried to hook up a shower to a keg....

good luck!

Yeah, the system typically runs between 30-50 psi, and is plenty for a shower or filling the coffee pot (we fill all 15 gallons with filtered water so we can use the same source for drinking or washing). Our primary regulator is adjustable from 0-400psi, so basically I bump it open to about 40 every once in a while and the kegs charge. I close the reg, and after several water uses, the flow slows down, so I bump the reg open again. depending on use, this is done every couple of days.

We also use the nitrogen for tire inflation and to charge offroad shocks. Hence the reason for the high psi regulator. I may add a secondary reg directly before the kegs just as a safety measure. This whole thing is still sort of in test mode.

Thanks for all your input guys! Keep the ideas coming - we love messing around with the truck systems.

Navy shower, get wet, turn water off, lather up, turn water on and rinse. I have done it many times from a hanging 5 gallon bucket while camping. Skip washing hair though, my hair is waist length and takes a lot of water to rinse out.

kristiismean said:

Yep, pressure won't be an issue, volume will be i think.

but then I have never tried to hook up a shower to a keg....

good luck!

Click to expand...

OK, we solved the onboard water thing, and even have a hot water heater for the showers - it's amazing!

Now we're on to how we can tap a nitro keg on the go. We have a fridge in the truck, and I'm thinking of putting a coldplate in the bottom of it. We keep the fridge at 33-35*F all day every day while we're on the trail.

I've seen a recommendation that you not use a coldplate unless you can keep the core keg temp below 55*. I _think_ that's mostly applicable to times when you're trying to pour constant like at an event as a beer distributor.

If I'm only pulling 2-3 beers every 10-15 minutes, do you think a 2-product cold plate, running one product twice, could work? Our core keg temp is likely to be in the 70-80s (inside the cab of the truck temperature).

I'm thinking of something like this, and running the keg through it twice if needed.

http://www.micromatic.com/cold-plates/10-inch-x-15-inch-cold-plate-2-product-cp-1015-2