Liquid CO2?

[Camping57]

The entire process needs to be conducted in pressure vessel in order to carbonate the sorbet. It would need to be similar to a sorbet keg! The slushee stufff needs to be able to absorb the CO2 and then not immediately lose all of the carbonation. You will have to maintain the finished mix under pressure until it is served in order to keep any dissolved co2 in the mix.
With the correct cryogenic alloys your mixing equipment won't blow up, but then those alloys aren't cheap either.

 

[Thanat0s]

The entire process needs to be conducted in pressure vessel in order to carbonate the sorbet. It would need to be similar to a sorbet keg! The slushee stufff needs to be able to absorb the CO2 and then not immediately lose all of the carbonation. You will have to maintain the finished mix under pressure until it is served in order to keep any dissolved co2 in the mix.
With the correct cryogenic alloys your mixing equipment won't blow up, but then those alloys aren't cheap either.

Hm. MIT disagrees.
I have to conduct further research.

 

[freisste]

I think part of the appeal to doing this with liquid co2 is the interesting mouth feel that it creates.

Obviously this is an opinion, but Guinness uses nitrogen which (IMHO) is more interesting than carbon dioxide. It is going to be basically boiling either way ...

 

[mattd2]

Obviously this is an opinion, but Guinness uses nitrogen which (IMHO) is more interesting than carbon dioxide. It is going to be basically boiling either way ...

I think you meant to say, Guinness pour through a stout tap or with a widget in the can/bottle....

 

[Thanat0s]

Obviously this is an opinion, but Guinness uses nitrogen which (IMHO) is more interesting than carbon dioxide. It is going to be basically boiling either way ...

How do they carbonate it without carbon dioxide?

 

[freisste]

My understanding was that they used nitrogen instead of CO2. What's the difference? It is a gas dissolved in a liquid which is in equilibrium under pressure, but when the pressure is released (when you open the bottle, can, or pour from a keg) the gas comes out of solution.

I don't know.... Maybe they use CO2, I was just under the impression that they used N2.

 

[mattd2]

AFAIK most kegs are purged after cleaning with nitrogen (again it is cheaper than CO2), beer is CARBonated with CO2. When the keg arrives at the pub they hook it up and push the beer out with beer gas, a mix of CO2 and N2. Most pubs need to use beer gas anyway since the lines from the keg cooler to the bar are so long they require the head pressure on the keg to be above the normal carbonating pressure. What the bee gas does is allow for the high pressure but since it is only partly CO2 the beer only "sees" part of the total pressure as CO2 (so you can have the pressure up at 50 PSI but the beer only sees 12 PSI of CO2 on it). Nitrogen will not disolve into water as easily as CO2. Stout facuats have restritor plates in them which intentionally breaks the CO2 out of solution (it's like when you drink Coke with a straw - it is more fizzy), the downside is you need a high pressure to push the beer through the stout tap = you need beer gas.
The widgets are another tech story which involves them droping a bit of liquid nitrogen into the can/bottle just before the seal it up.

 

[freisste]

Cool. Thanks.

 

[RobertRGeorge]

Hm. MIT disagrees.
I have to conduct further research.

You know Thantos, I'm beginning to wonder if that may be your real name. Again, just my opinion but it seems to me that this is probably not the kind of research one would reasonably want to do on the cheap.

 

[mattd2]

Hm. MIT disagrees.
I have to conduct further research.

I skimmed the MIT paper and I would say that they actually agree with Camping57!

 

[Obliviousbrew]

This thread is dated but I really want to know what the OP wants to achieve, I know my fare share of molecular cuisine so maybe I can help if I ever understand this thread

 

[acidrain]

Thanat0s last post was 10-22-12... one day after starting this thread. I don't think he's coming back.

 

[Thanat0s]

What? No, I'm still here! haha
Once I get to an actual computer I'll type up my plan.

 

[Obliviousbrew]

What are you trying to achieve?

 

[zeg]

FWIW, the how-to starts on p.33 of the Baker thesis.

This is all done at very high pressure---the relief valve in the proof-of-principle apparatus is rated at 1420 PSI. No obscure cryogenic materials seem to be used, just stainless steel.

Really, though, this isn't in the realm of a garage project unless you know what you're doing. You've got to be maintaining high pressures throughout the system, including the ingredient and product containers, and you're dealing with liquids that are intended to freeze solid. That introduces opportunities for things to clog, running the risk of vents failing to vent, which could lead to catastrophic (deadly) failures. This is far more involved than offgassing CO2 into a keg of beer.

If you can get your parts machined and/or buy parts intended for this kind of use, that's one thing. But I would really caution against kludging something together by the seat of your pants on this.

 

[Obliviousbrew]

OK ok so the Op wants to make some kind of sorbet with carbonation: using "liquid" co2 is not the way to go, a better explanation of the desire final product is needed, do you intend it to be fizzy? or just sorbet with solidify bubbles in it?.

 

[zeg]

OK ok so the Op wants to make some kind of sorbet with carbonation: using "liquid" co2 is not the way to go, a better explanation of the desire final product is needed, do you intend it to be fizzy? or just sorbet with solidify bubbles in it?.

From the thesis, it certainly does seem like liquid CO2 is a viable way to do it, it's just more involved than spraying that CO2 into a bowl of liquid. Also, I think the intent of the flash freeze is to get finer ice crystals, which will give you a finer texture. At least, that seems to be the idea for ice cream.

 

[RobertRGeorge]

It has been my hypothesis all along that someone who comes to a homebrew forum to get detailed engineering advice for a project that has all kinds of ways to go haywire is an underfunded dilletante that is very likely to injure himself and/or any garage-band collaborators involved. I certainly could be wrong but I still maintain that this is not the way a serious product developer goes about this kind of thing.

 

[Obliviousbrew]

Low temperatures reach fast will give smaller ice cristal in icecream and because of that a finner texture, I don´t understand why using co2 when you can perfectly use an ISI shipon (or any rechargle whipe creamer) and liquid nitrogen. That works perfectly. And if you want bubbles adding dry ice to a fruit juice works, Arzak makes a dessert like that, and well nitro icecream is been around for quite some time

 

[zeg]

From the thesis (which I lean on simply because I have no first-hand experience), regarding use for flash freezing, "Other cryogenic gases are not practical for this because either the critical point is much lower than the desired temperature of ice cream (i.e. Nitrogen), the gas is not consumable (i.e. Ammonia), or the gas is prohibitively expensive (i.e. Krypton)." I think the key is that you can get liquid CO2 near 0°C at a high but reasonable pressure, though I'm not certain that's the reasoning.

For the OP's application, whatever it is exactly, I don't know whether this is relevant.