Came home to 4 gallons of beer on the floor

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Mallcrawler

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So this was my first time kegging, kegged my Dundalk Irish heavy that had just finished up. Force carbed at 20 psi for 3 days, checked it, everything was going great. Had great taste, good carbonation so I dialed it down to serving pressure. I had it at 10psi for almost 2 weeks and was pouring one or two a night from a picnic tap with no problems. Well SWMBO got home before me and immediately called me saying my keg exploded all over the floor. I came home to see my Co2 bottle all iced up and beer all over my carpet spilling out of my mini fridge. I have no clue what happened. The only thing I can think of is when I would put my picnic tap back in the fridge I would place it on top of the keg and I think that it got to cold up there and froze which allowed the valve to open just enough to allow beer to flow and ruin my day. Anyone else have this happen or have any insight on what could have happened? On the plus side SWMBO saw how bummed I was and said I can stop at the LHBS and pick up more supplies to make another batch tomorrow
 
What a huge bummer and waste of beer! I'm not very experienced with kegs but is there a change the regulator failed?
 
Yes that has happened but I caught it right away. The picnic tap got wedged between the keg and door and turned on. The tap can be easily turned on with little pressure
 
I think you are on to something with a leak in the picnic tap. The other possibility would be a leak in the liquid post. If it was a leak in the gas side or the lid I would have to assume you would have lost gas and not beer.
 
Ouch. On another thread earlier today, I had posted that I don't leave my Co2 connected to kegs as I've twice lost the Co2 contents due to leaks, once with a 20# container. This is yet another reason why. (Although a lot would still be lost with the residual pressure in the keg.)
 
Thats kind of what I figured. I just thought it was strange that it was fine this morning, at least I think it was. I had not touched it since last night when I put away about 7 pints. Possibly in my drunken state I managed to wedge it against something.
 
Im almost positive it was the tap. I left everything the way it was and filled the keg with water and checked for leaks on gas and liquid sides and found nothing. Im thinking that some beer was left under the rubber plunger and froze which expanded the tap to open. Either that or I did wedge it agains something. All I know is there is a ton or frozen beer all along the top and sides of my mini fridge. I managed to suck out a majority of the beer from the carpet with the carpet cleaner. Nothing worse then seeing beer coming out of the carpet and knowing you have to dump it
 
picnic taps were never meant to be a continuous-use, highly-reliable product. By design, the little spring inside is the only thing preventing beer from escaping. Turn up the pressure too much, and the spring gets overwhelmed all on its own (no positive-closed, fail-safe features here).


the moral of this story: dont rely on a $3 picnic tap to hold back $50+ worth of beer 24/7, especially while the beer sits in finished areas of your house. When you are done drinking for the day, pop the tap off.
 
More than once I'd get the picnic tap handle snagged on something and made a huge mess. I was lucky enough to catch it though. Such a dumb design that it opens either way you pull/push the handle.

Sounds like the tap being forced open not only vacated the beer, but also most of the CO2. When the CO2 moves quickly through the regulator, it can ice it up.

If you are going to stick with the picnic tap, I agree it is worth popping off the disconnect.

You have my sympathies, I dread coming home to that. Good luck with the next batch
 
copyright1997 said:
Ouch. On another thread earlier today, I had posted that I don't leave my Co2 connected to kegs as I've twice lost the Co2 contents due to leaks, once with a 20# container. This is yet another reason why. (Although a lot would still be lost with the residual pressure in the keg.)
Click to expand...

I don't agree that this is at all a good solution. the solution to a problem with losing CO2 is to find the leak, no matter what. I don't think anyone wants to or should bother with disconnecting and reconnecting the gas. Find the leak.


OP: when I got my first 2 tap system with cobra taps I saw this thread here. I immediately crafted something similar using the binder clip and two command hooks (removable hooks) stuck on the side of my fridge. The binder clips were used as the way to hook the tap upright against the side of the fridge and out of the way of the door. Worked well. I already experienced my first day kegging how quickly and easily those silly taps would let beer flow. Up or down the beer comes out, bad design imho but for $3, what do I expect? I'm onto faucets now but still.
 
Kegerator is set to 38 but the top few inches run way colder. That's why I had possibly thought it may have frozen. As far as SWMBO drinking my beer I would say not as she is 3 months pregnant right now. I don't plan to use picnic taps long term, I just used it for now while I finish up my tower and can hook up my taps.


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I've got everything I need for the kegerator for right now. I'm building my own tower out of billet aluminum. That's all I need for it to be done. It will be double wall with insulation in between. Just have a little welding to do and then it's off to get powder coated. She's a keeper for sure. She lets me buy what I need/want all within reason. Once we get our house she has already agreed to let me build an electric brewing setup.


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audger said:
picnic taps were never meant to be a continuous-use, highly-reliable product. By design, the little spring inside is the only thing preventing beer from escaping. Turn up the pressure too much, and the spring gets overwhelmed all on its own (no positive-closed, fail-safe features here).


the moral of this story: dont rely on a $3 picnic tap to hold back $50+ worth of beer 24/7, especially while the beer sits in finished areas of your house. When you are done drinking for the day, pop the tap off.
Click to expand...

+1000, never trust a picnic tap. I have some that I use for sampling from kegs and I never leave them hooked up to a keg. I put it on, pour my beer and then take it off. I also double check to make sure the poppet is properly in place after I take it off
 
I had something similar happen but it was just about a quart or two. The picnic taps are worthless. I already have 3 Perlicks in an online shopping cart and only wait for SWMBO to approve. The finicky-ness of picnic taps is getting ridiculous.
 
Yea now I know better. Hopefully won't have to mess with the picnic tap anymore. As far as the tower it will be 2 machined tubes. The outer tube is 4" OD 3.5" ID and the inner tube is 2.75" OD and 2.5" ID I plan to fill the void between the 2 tubes with spray foam. I water jetted a flange for the bottom to tie the tubes together an welded it. Then water jetted the base ring out of 1" aluminum and drilled and tapped 4 blind holes in the bottom to mount it to the counter. My tower also extends past the base 4" straight into my kegerator. That way everything stays cool. I'll try and remember to take pictures this weekend or put up my solid works rendering. The whole thing is 6061 aluminum and is getting sent out to be powder coated hammered bronze to match the colors of my bar.


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That it is. I had toyed with the idea of doing it out of stainless but opted for the alum. as I have a ton of it laying around. We will see how it comes out and if there is any interest in them by forum members I possibly may start making towers to order. Even if they were just .125" or .250" wall tubing it would still be sweet and relatively cheap. I just have a hard time spending the money most companies want for these towers.
 
I wish haha. With her being pregnant right now she wont let me touch her


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Mallcrawler said:
I came home to see my Co2 bottle all iced up and beer all over my carpet spilling out of my mini fridge. I have no clue what happened.
Click to expand...

Ok... so what's up with the CO2 tank being iced up?? The only time I've seen that happen is either just when the tank has just been filled, or if there has been a VERY QUICK release of all the contents of the C02 tank. I think one of the earlier posts suggested a faulty regulator, and I think that has some merit.
 
I'd say it's from dumping the contents of the keg and then continuing to release co2 until the valve was closed. Reg is fine. Checked the whole system with water and it was fine


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I had a faulty ball lock stem valve recently. Pulled off the party line from one of my cider kegs and did not check until over a week later. By then the Keg was empty and keezer had 2.5 gallons of cider inside.
It looks like the outlet ball lock stem did not close properly when I pulled of the tap. Since then I have replaced all the seals on my older kegs. I hope this will not happen again.
 
Damn that's gotta hurt, not experienced with kegs so i really can't help you.
 

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