So this project started as many projects do for married men. Our kitchen had an open space in it. My wife wanted an island and, as a homebrewer, I wanted a kegerator. As I wanted harmony in our home, I came up with a plan to make an island and a kegerator. What you see here is the result.
The kegerator was designed using Sketchup and built using the hand and power tools I own and my father's table saw. The shell of the island is made from 3/4” maple plywood and a solid oak front. The top to the island is a Karlby countertop from IKEA. I designed the island to house four corny kegs as I prefer a bit of variety. I harvested the cooling unit from a Habco ESM5 commercial merchandiser/refrigerator and am controlling it with an Inkbird ITC-1000. The cool portion has 1" thick rigid foam for insulation.
As far as non-brewing related features go, it has a spice rack on one end and a towel bar on the other. The island also has led lighting inside the cold portion and underneath the exterior.
Unfortunately, with the way things turned out, I can only fit three corny kegs and a 128oz Man Can. I bought a used tower from a local auction and drilled two holes in it. I filled those holes with Intertap stainless faucets due to their affordability, quality, and adjustability. The island contains both a 20cf nitrogen tank and a 20oz co2 tank I refill from a 20lb tank.
The last feature also took the longest to put together. I have family who looks down on imbibing of any type of alcohol due to religious convictions (no hate please) and to keep things peaceful when they are over, I decided that making the tap tower disappear into the island would help ease that tension. It would also allow the entire island to be used when necessary, would keep the faucets cold to reduce initial foaming and just be cool as hell. It took me several iterations to get right but the final version of the automation stuff uses two linear rails, a piece of 3/8" aluminum to keep things rigid, a NEMA 23 stepper motor and an Arduino. The video below shows the unit in action, though I sped it up to 2.5X to keep things from being boring.
xposted on reddit
The kegerator was designed using Sketchup and built using the hand and power tools I own and my father's table saw. The shell of the island is made from 3/4” maple plywood and a solid oak front. The top to the island is a Karlby countertop from IKEA. I designed the island to house four corny kegs as I prefer a bit of variety. I harvested the cooling unit from a Habco ESM5 commercial merchandiser/refrigerator and am controlling it with an Inkbird ITC-1000. The cool portion has 1" thick rigid foam for insulation.
As far as non-brewing related features go, it has a spice rack on one end and a towel bar on the other. The island also has led lighting inside the cold portion and underneath the exterior.
Unfortunately, with the way things turned out, I can only fit three corny kegs and a 128oz Man Can. I bought a used tower from a local auction and drilled two holes in it. I filled those holes with Intertap stainless faucets due to their affordability, quality, and adjustability. The island contains both a 20cf nitrogen tank and a 20oz co2 tank I refill from a 20lb tank.
The last feature also took the longest to put together. I have family who looks down on imbibing of any type of alcohol due to religious convictions (no hate please) and to keep things peaceful when they are over, I decided that making the tap tower disappear into the island would help ease that tension. It would also allow the entire island to be used when necessary, would keep the faucets cold to reduce initial foaming and just be cool as hell. It took me several iterations to get right but the final version of the automation stuff uses two linear rails, a piece of 3/8" aluminum to keep things rigid, a NEMA 23 stepper motor and an Arduino. The video below shows the unit in action, though I sped it up to 2.5X to keep things from being boring.
xposted on reddit
