Forced to use 1/4" (not 3/16") for 15' beer line?

[conpewter]

Hmmm, further research turned up a Canadian Conservation article that the Tygon B-44-3 is still vinyl tubing. From that article it sounds like Tygon SE-200 is FEP lined, much the same as Bev Seal. Looks like USPlastics has it "on order" in 3/16" ID.

Wow that's over $100 for 50 feet. I got 80 ft of 1/4" ID Bev-Seal tubing for $36 from Better Bottle. I know it is meant for the application, PET lined, can deal with the pressure. For a balanced system I'll just use the little epoxy mixers to reduce pressure in the lines. They are HDPE plastic, just like our fermenting buckets so I don't have any issues with beer contact.

 

[JoeHo]

Reviving this topic, Im about to use 1/4 inch poly as suggested to get little to no plastic taste in my lines. The problem is, i only have about a 6 foot run to make so 6 feet of 1/4 would bw way to much pressure. My solution to this is to cut a 15 foot line and just coil up 9 feet of it in the kegerator before exiting for the 6 foot run. I havent seen this proposed though, so im not sure if its a bad idea. Thoughts?

 

[kal]

It's perfectly fine.

Kal

 

[willpower101]

Can anyone give insight on how Kal wrapped the copper tubing so tight without kinking it? I got soft 1/4" copper from lowes and it's just too difficult to bend without kinking!

Any insight on how to do this would be awesome!

 

[kal]

I didn't think much of it at the time... the tubing was soft (from home depot) and was easily bent without kinking.

That said, my stainless tubing in my HLT I also didn't find hard people people are having a real tough time doing that one as well!

Kal

 

[willpower101]

Cool, thanks for the quick reply, I bought plenty of extra because I'm doing the exact same thing. I'll just try to practice a little more

 

[kal]

The other option is shank chillers: They clamp on to the shank and you pass a bigger diameter copper tubing throug it to chill. Better to have larger diameter copper than smaller to get good flow.

I know that http://www.cdnbev.com/ had them but that was a long time ago.

The other option is to get a tower or something with integrated glycol lines. That's what I did with my bar setup now.

Good luck!

Kal

 

[willpower101]

I managed to wrap it. A few kinks but it's not terrible thanks for the input! (it's reversed for fitment, not much room to work in the closet.)

http://instagram.com/p/a_zEtFGr7d/

 

[spaceyaquarius]

In my experience, "Midwest Brewing" has a plastic taste, while the beer lines (3/16" inner diameter with a very thick wall) gave no plastic taste at all.

The Tygon B44-4X food grade vinyl lines (3/16" inner diameter) I bought had such a thin wall the barbs were nearly rupturing the plastic even before the gas was turned on. I sent it back.

 

[DHdriver]

Kal,
Sorry to bring up old topics but... just wondering what you ended up with for length and rise in your beer lines and how was the pressure/pour with the 3/16" lines. I'm looking at doing a similar length and rise as you originally mentioned and I'm hoping to do it just once.

Thanks

 

[kal]

I use 1/4" lines now. For complete details on the serving setup, see the second post in my basement build:

http://www.theelectricbrewery.com/basement

If you read forward (quite) a bit in that thread, I also took a punch of pictures while I installed the tap/tower setup too.

Kal