kanzimonson
Well-Known Member
If you've seen Oskar Blues on tap anywhere, you know how freakin' cool their tap handles are. I've been trying to think of a couple ways to do this myself and I thought HBT would have some good input.
I don't think getting the beer out will be too difficult... maybe messy, but not too hard. Obviously you want to maintain the top of the can, so you have to drill a hole in the bottom to drain it.
The biggest problem I can see is making the whole thing sturdy enough... an empty can would get crushed the first time you pull a beer on it. So you have to somehow fill the can so its walls are strong and almost "squeezeable." I thought of several solutions but I can't really decide:
-bag of flour (or some sort of tight-packing dust)
-ball bearings
-some sort of resin that will harden
I think the resin idea would be best, though I'm not sure what material is best. I think it also depends on how you're actually going to screw in the tap. Morebeer has the two options for making a tap handle, a ferrule/screw combo or just a dual thredded insert. I suspect you would need to have some sort of wood installed into the beer can to make sure you can screw something in.
You can either have a single small hole that mostly maintains the bottom of the can, or you can cut the bottom of the can out and put some sort of wood disc in there. Or maybe the wood you put in wouldn't necessarily be a disc, but would brace up against the walls of the can.
So these are all the things running through my head, and I suspect it's going to take some trial and error before getting it right. Anybody got some more advice?
I don't think getting the beer out will be too difficult... maybe messy, but not too hard. Obviously you want to maintain the top of the can, so you have to drill a hole in the bottom to drain it.
The biggest problem I can see is making the whole thing sturdy enough... an empty can would get crushed the first time you pull a beer on it. So you have to somehow fill the can so its walls are strong and almost "squeezeable." I thought of several solutions but I can't really decide:
-bag of flour (or some sort of tight-packing dust)
-ball bearings
-some sort of resin that will harden
I think the resin idea would be best, though I'm not sure what material is best. I think it also depends on how you're actually going to screw in the tap. Morebeer has the two options for making a tap handle, a ferrule/screw combo or just a dual thredded insert. I suspect you would need to have some sort of wood installed into the beer can to make sure you can screw something in.
You can either have a single small hole that mostly maintains the bottom of the can, or you can cut the bottom of the can out and put some sort of wood disc in there. Or maybe the wood you put in wouldn't necessarily be a disc, but would brace up against the walls of the can.
So these are all the things running through my head, and I suspect it's going to take some trial and error before getting it right. Anybody got some more advice?