No collar, picnic tap keezer - is it possible?

[sparkshooter]

Hi guys -

I live in a big (for a major city), old apartment. Tons of living space, but almost no storage, and no private basement access. I've got plenty of space in my living room to stash a 7cft keezer in a corner. I'd love to move to kegging/easy fermentation control, and the keezer seems like a good for-the-moment option. If/when I own a place, I want to do a through the wall build if there is a good location...

ANYWAYS, the point of all this is that I want to get a quick and dirty keezer operation up and running. Would it be possible to buy a used freezer, get the temp controller, and then just stick everything inside with picnic taps? I took a look at the schematics for all the 7cft freezers and it seems like lots of them are tall enough to not require collars...yet no one seems to post about their non-collared keezer.

thoughts? experience? I don't currently have any of the equipment and could go with the shorter pin-lock kegs (well, if I could find them) if that would make a difference.

 

[Robs56]

Yes. I had this setup for a month or so before I built my collar. I could fit one less as the collar allows me to rest a keg on the hump.

 

[Setesh]

I have exactly this setup and have for a long time. I have to be able to walk in front of my keezer and there is only about 2ft of space there, so taps would be a major PITA. I just lift the lid and pour from one of 8 picnic taps. It works just fine. Sure, I would love to have nice stainless faucet's but I just don't have the room right now.

 

[sparkshooter]

That's great to hear - which freezer model did you have and did you have ball or pin lock kegs?

 

[rgauthier20420]

This is a very viable option for a keezer. The typical keezer will have a coffin box with taps or taps through a collar. A friend of mine did the same thing your saying before he made his with a collar. He just had to open the top each time he wanted a beer.

You'll just need to keep the CO2 tank on the hump which is fine and you should be able to still fit atleast 3 kegs I'd say.

 

[iijakii]

I have exactly this setup and have for a long time. I have to be able to walk in front of my keezer and there is only about 2ft of space there, so taps would be a major PITA. I just lift the lid and pour from one of 8 picnic taps. It works just fine. Sure, I would love to have nice stainless faucet's but I just don't have the room right now.

Do you ever have leaking issues? I always hear about the cobra taps being cheap and finicky, but that could just be us homebrewers justifying the precious shiny.

 

[Robs56]

I have the GE 7.2 cubic feet freezer. I have pin locks and it fits three w/out a collar.

My friend has the same freezer and ball locks. He fits four with cobras and has for about a year. One of his taps leaked very slowly. His solution was tying a ziplock bag over it. He just got around to building the collar w/ faucets so that's no longer an issue.

 

[Newsman]

Yes, you will definitely have to watch out for the cobra taps. They do have a bad habit of leaking.

 

[BigFloyd]

Do you ever have leaking issues? I always hear about the cobra taps being cheap and finicky, but that could just be us homebrewers justifying the precious shiny.

There are plenty enough threads posted by people who first bought a set of cheaper faucets, had problems with leaking and/or sticking, then later ended up buying a whole new set of 525SS Perlicks. I didn't want to end up buying two sets, so went with the Perlicks from the start. I've had zero problems.

 

[Skep18]

I have that with 3 kegs now in a GE freezer, 7cf I think? But the pain is the taps do leak, not from the faucet, but from where the hose meets the faucet.

For fear of this, I disconnect them every time after I use them at the end of the night. By disconnecting them a lot, I get some spray that I have to wipe up every time after disconnecting the ball lock. This spray turns into mold all over the top of my keg if I don't get it all. No huge deal, just annoying. Obviously does not effect the beer.

Also, it seems the frequent opening of the keezer allows moisture to enter a lot and that condensates all over everything.

For these reasons, I really want to build a collar when I find a spare ~$150 for fancy faucets n such.

 

[Setesh]

Do you ever have leaking issues? I always hear about the cobra taps being cheap and finicky, but that could just be us homebrewers justifying the precious shiny.

I have had a leak one time. Emptied an entire keg of oatmeal stout that I had pulled exactly one pint from, and my CO2 bottle. The problem was the little handle on the picnic tap got pushed down by the center depression in the lid. For some reason this freezer has a huge plastic cowl over the light in the middle that hangs down about 3 inches. I have to be careful about the taps in the center to make sure this cowl doesn't depress the levers and drain all my beer.

 

[sparkshooter]

You guys have been insanely helpful. I'm going to start trolling kijiji ASAP for a freezer now that I know I can get up and running without having to commit to building a collar/deciding what I want the keezer to look like long-term.

 

[Skep18]

There are plenty enough threads posted by people who first bought a set of cheaper faucets, had problems with leaking and/or sticking, then later ended up buying a whole new set of 525SS Perlicks. I didn't want to end up buying two sets, so went with the Perlicks from the start. I've had zero problems.

Read this after my post. This is why I'm sticking with the picnic taps until I get the flossy money. Cheap faucets probably result in coming home to an empty keg, an empty CO2 tank and beer all over your floor... Do not want.

 

[wilserbrewer]

Yes, you will definitely have to watch out for the cobra taps. They do have a bad habit of leaking.

I have used picnic taps for years without trouble. I think once the picnic tap had a slow drip leak, it simply needed to be taken apart and cleaned. They have worked so well for me that I haven't bothered to "upgrade"

IMO, when a keg is emptied by a tap being stuck open due to being caught in a keezer lid, this is user error, no fault of the tap.

YMMV

 

[Setesh]

IMO, when a keg is emptied by a tap being stuck open due to being caught in a keezer lid, this is user error, no fault of the tap.

Yup, totally agree. I emptied that keg, not the tap. 100% my fault. I have never had a leak caused by the improper function of a picnic tap. They have always worked flawlessly for me and are dead simple to clean, cheap to replace, basically the best bang for your buck you could possibly get in a tap.

 

[Darwin18]

I had used picnic taps in my GE 7.something freezer for several months. They worked fine for me and I never had any problems. I did eventually upgrade to a collar and Perlicks, but nothing wrong with the picnic taps. They're functional.

 

[Snicklefritz]

I've been using a system like this for over a year now. I think my freezer is 11 cu ft and I can easily fit 4 kegs in mine and a case or two of bottles on the hump/baskets. When I build out my brewery in my basement I'll put a collar on it and run the taps through the wall but for now picnic taps work fine for me.

 

[sparkshooter]

Due to this post, my husband and I picked up a craigslist chest freezer last night for $25. So excited! Ugh, now just have to wait for the STC-1000 to ship from China...(and clean frozen popsicle out of hte bottom of the freezer. Sigh).

 

[wilserbrewer]

Ugh, now just have to wait for the STC-1000 to ship from China....

While you wait for your STC-1000 to arrive from China, you could load up your keezer and simply plug it in for a couple hours a day ala
"manual control".

Not a long term solution, but better than NO BEER IMO....

 

[rgauthier20420]

Read this after my post. This is why I'm sticking with the picnic taps until I get the flossy money. Cheap faucets probably result in coming home to an empty keg, an empty CO2 tank and beer all over your floor... Do not want.

Have had 4 of the chrome faucets running for almost 9 months here now and haven't had any leaking issues at all. I've had the typical sticking issues if they aren't pulled regularly though. CO2 leakage wouldn't be due to the faucets either. You'd need to check all of your other connections.

 

[dirkomatic]

I ran mine this way for a long time. The one thing to be aware of is the condensation which will build up from opening the lid a lot. When I finally built my collar, it took so little time, that I wondered why I had never done it in the first place... Really, it took less than an hour to build. If space isn't the issue, IMO, you should work on the collar as soon as you have the opportunity.

 

[Setesh]

Due to this post, my husband and I picked up a craigslist chest freezer last night for $25. So excited! Ugh, now just have to wait for the STC-1000 to ship from China...(and clean frozen popsicle out of hte bottom of the freezer. Sigh).

If your freezer has a drain plug cleaning it is dead simple. Get some warm water and a scrub brush and go to town. You aren't trying to fill it up like a bathtub mind you, but you don't have to worry about a few inches of water. Then you just drain it and dry it. You can do the same if your freezer does not have a drain plug but you own a shop vac. I do this to mine every 6 months or so.

 

[sparkshooter]

If your freezer has a drain plug cleaning it is dead simple.

Brilliant! I'm not at home to check now, but I wouldn't be surprised if it did. I've never had a freezer before, so I had not really given any though to the idea that there would be a drain plug.

 

[Hello]

Due to this post, my husband and I picked up a craigslist chest freezer last night for $25. So excited! Ugh, now just have to wait for the STC-1000 to ship from China...(and clean frozen popsicle out of hte bottom of the freezer. Sigh).

What kind of popsicle?

I'm shopping for kegs and I'm actually doing what you're doing to save money and be able to get the kegs sooner rather than later. I did consider getting little 3M hooks and trying to "hang" the taps once I was done. I'm using a regular refrigerator though.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

As someone who has now lost two kegs being dumped into the bottom of my chest freezer due to a picnic tap getting wedged open when I close the lid i highly suggest you always disconnect your picnic taps. I started doing it after the first keg got dumped, and did it religiously, then the one time i forget to take it off it happened again.

That prompted me to finally build my coffin keezer thats in progress lol.

 

[ns.88]

This is an old thread but for anyone still using picnic taps with no collar - do you have any tips for running the wires from an Inkbird 308 and a small fan into the freezer? Since there's a chance I'll be adding a collar and taps later on down the line when space permits it, I'd prefer not to drill through the lid.

 

[day_trippr]

I think most folks just pinch thin wires like those under the lid gasket.
You might be able to thread them through the drain but then they'd be sitting out in front...

Cheers!