4-Way Cross Options

[ere109]

Call me crazy. I have four keggles, each with one 1/2" NPT fitting. I'd love to have temp, ball valve, and a sight glass, but don't particularly want to drill and weld new holes. It seems to me that I could simply buy a standard 4-Way Stainless Steel keg cross:
https://www.homebrewing.org/SS-12-NPT-4-way-cross-_p_2929.html
Then run the sight tube out of the top, the temp gauge in the side, and the ball valve out of the bottom. Has anyone done this? Is there a problem I'm not seeing?

 

[apache_brew]

Try it out and see. Ball valve might be awkward and even too low to sit flat depending on what your surface is. Not to mention, if your pot is on an open flame, your ball valve/tubing connected to it is likely to get scorched.

I don't see a need to a temp gauge in a keggle (at least a boil keggle). A handheld thermopen works great (and much more accurate). I've never used a sight gauge so I can't vouch for their worth, but my boil keggle has some scratched in hash marks for gallon levels inside that do the trick for me. I've finally gotten to the point where I've dialed in my water volume absorption/boil off rates to where the only time I measure water is when I fill my boil kettle to heat up strike water and then make wort the same for all beers.

 

[sibelman]

I use a tee with sight glass and thermometer on my HLT. Your cross/4-way arrangement will work, but I strongly suspect that your sight glass level will shift downward and read very inaccurately when the valve is open.

 

[ere109]

Thanks. That makes sense - when I'm pouring. It will be good to get a baseline, the rest of the time. I ordered a set of tees, last night, and will try the whole experiment next week. I ordered Camlocks, while I was at it.

 

[sibelman]

Fwiw, back when I had a sight glass in my keggle I repeatedly broke it during cleaning. Enjoy your plumbing experiment!

 

[odie]

If I did it all again I think I would only do the single hole and something similar. My site tube and temp are already combined.

You could put the 4-way horizontal and add a 90' for the site tube and have the valve go to the side and not down.

 

[Jbrown57]

I did something similar on a keggle and had problems with the pump losing prime due to the air pulled in thru the sight glass.
i think it was because the path of least resistance was thru the SG.
YMMV
jb