goodolarchie
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2018
- Messages
- 213
- Reaction score
- 138
I bought one of these in November with one of the black friday sales, I did a basic tap water test back then to make sure the chilling and pumping works (Oh boy, it does). Seems like a quality unit overall.
But once I hooked it up for the long lager and got 8 gallons of water/glycol, I notice the brass drain plug compression + plug fittings leak, considerably. For those who aren't aware, Morebeer runs a vinyl hose through the bulkhead which just terminates open, they give you a push-on fitting that's threaded on the other side and the plug has no gasket, like you'd find on garden hose threads. As it stands I am having to catch and replace about 40oz of leaked coolant per day. Meaning I have to tend to my 64oz catch that fits below the plug every 32 hours... for an 8 week lager, that means I get to do this 42 times minimum. Fun! Also in that process all the dust and crap in the air is settling into that catch can, wasting $60 of propylene glycol.
So I'm curious if anybody has run into this issue, and found a fix. Somebody on Morebeer said they succeeded hitting the threads with keg lube, I was thinking teflon tape. It's pretty much impossible to get tape on while slippery glycol is running past it so I may unscrew it a few threads (coolant will leak) and try the keg lube with a couple catch cans handy. This is just obnoxious because it's the only point that can't be serviced while the unit is filled, and if I pull all the coolant out I'll have to turn it off and hope the beer doesn't warm up (It warms pretty quickly as it's quite hot here), and it's low enough that you can't fit any kind of bucket underneath. It's a drain plug afterall.
But once I hooked it up for the long lager and got 8 gallons of water/glycol, I notice the brass drain plug compression + plug fittings leak, considerably. For those who aren't aware, Morebeer runs a vinyl hose through the bulkhead which just terminates open, they give you a push-on fitting that's threaded on the other side and the plug has no gasket, like you'd find on garden hose threads. As it stands I am having to catch and replace about 40oz of leaked coolant per day. Meaning I have to tend to my 64oz catch that fits below the plug every 32 hours... for an 8 week lager, that means I get to do this 42 times minimum. Fun! Also in that process all the dust and crap in the air is settling into that catch can, wasting $60 of propylene glycol.
So I'm curious if anybody has run into this issue, and found a fix. Somebody on Morebeer said they succeeded hitting the threads with keg lube, I was thinking teflon tape. It's pretty much impossible to get tape on while slippery glycol is running past it so I may unscrew it a few threads (coolant will leak) and try the keg lube with a couple catch cans handy. This is just obnoxious because it's the only point that can't be serviced while the unit is filled, and if I pull all the coolant out I'll have to turn it off and hope the beer doesn't warm up (It warms pretty quickly as it's quite hot here), and it's low enough that you can't fit any kind of bucket underneath. It's a drain plug afterall.
