Keezer Rain forest

[SeattleMatt]

It's like the rain forest in my keezer. I bought a couple more cornies online and kegged my latest two brews (four kegs now). I didn't have enough room in my keezer for the fourth keg so I had to put it on the compressor hump and increase the size of my collar. I decided to go with weather stripping instead of silicone caulking to keep out the air. It seems pretty tight but every time I open the lid, I have to mop up a bunch of water that's dripping from the lid.

Today, I noticed a bunch of mold on the rubber of the keg on the compressor hump... the closest to the lid. I cleaned up the mold and hosed it down with Iodophor. The beer tastes fine.

Here are a few pictures. The two kegs on the left are on chrome taps, the two on the right are on picnic taps so I have to open the lid.



Any ideas?

 

[samc]

Damp Rid or similar to absorb moisture.
Look for air leaks and was the new lumber wet? could be sucking moisture from it as well.

 

[SeattleMatt]

the lumber was pretty wet but I thought it would be dry after a few weeks. you think its odd to have mold on just the one keg or is it expected since its closest to the lid?

 

[beaksnbeer]

Get some insulated board on the wood collar. And make sure the rubber handles/area is sanitized before it goes in.........my.02

 

[Derek713]

I have weather stripping in mine and would also get some condensation. I added damprid and it helped some, but I would still get about a half cup of water pooled in one corner that I would have to wipe up about once a week. I just added a fan a few days ago, and that seems to have solved that problem. It also allows the keg I have on the hump and the beer in my beer lines to stay as cool as the three kegs on the bottom of my keezer.

 

[audger]

ive noticed the rubber on a few kegs growing things like that picture when given the proper conditions. the problem went away after i cleaned the outside of all my kegs as well as i do the inside. that rubber is somewhat porous and holds a lot of dirt and grime apparently. scrub it well and soak in some type of sanitizer and that forrest should be drastically minimized.

 

[ozzy1038]

I'd suggest insulating that collar and damp rid as suggested. I would probably caulk around the bottom of that collar too, to be safe.

 

[944play]

I bought a giant jug of calcium chloride and leave a dish of it in the beer fridge. By about a week the crystals have turned into slightly viscous clear liquid, and the rest of the surfaces stay virtually moisture-free.

 

[SeattleMatt]

Great, thanks for the advice everyone. I don't know if I like the idea of using a desiccator and just throwing it away when it fills up with water. It seems a little wasteful. It looks like damp rid is (or is similar to) calcium chloride. 18 bucks for 50 lbs. at the hardware store.

Maybe the solution is a combination of all these ideas. I'll try to get a better seal/insulation and put a little calcium chloride in there.

Thanks

 

[Toneus]

If I'm correct, the wood you used is pressure treated lumber. If I'm remembering correctly, they use arsenic in it to weather proof it. I'm sure that it had a ton of liquid in it to start which is probably why you had so much moisture in the keezer.

 

[discooby]

I’m thinking water forms when warm, humid air enters a cold space and cools. My thought would be to get rid of the picnic taps in favor of permanent taps on the collar so you wouldn’t have to open the lid as much.

I would also think adding some plastic bottles of water to take up any dead (air) space inside will help, especially when opening the lid, thus limiting the exchange of warm and cold air (remove the water and you’ll remove the problem, remove the air (exchange) and you’ll reduce the problem). The bottles might be a tight fit so maybe something else that has some thermal mass might be appropriate.

 

[SeattleMatt]

Since I posted this, I have made a few changes. Yes, I did use pressure treated wood for the collar, and I think that was where the majority of the moisture was coming from. It was my wife's birthday in October so I bought myself some Perlick taps to replace the picnic taps (I took her to Disneyland as a trade-off). I added a container of Damp-rid which has helped a lot. Now, I rarely open the keezer and the wood has stopped contributing to the problem (for the most part).

I made a few more upgrades as well. I replaced all my tap handles with black neon dry erase boards... one is professional, three are homemade. I also replaced my gas manifold with ball valves instead of leaky quick disconnects. Oh, and I found a stainless drip tray at a local restaurant supply store. I had to cut the drip tray in half and glue on pieces of aluminum to make it work... anyway, here's a picture.