Soda carbonator

[baer19d]

I was given this about a year ago. It's a seltzer water carbonator for a coca cola soda fountain. Does anyone know if it could be used to carbonate beer? It might work similar to the Blichman inline carbonator.

 

[mredge73]

Should work great, just dial it down on your C02 regulator.
That thing is made to carbonate room temp water up to 5 vols at 60psi.
You don't really want more than 2.5vols for beer, so you will need to play around with lower pressures on your regulator until you get it dialed in right.

 

[baer19d]

Should work great, just dial it down on your C02 regulator.
That thing is made to carbonate room temp water up to 5 vols at 60psi.
You don't really want more than 2.5vols for beer, so you will need to play around with lower pressures on your regulator until you get it dialed in right.

Glad to hear it will work. Maybe I'll play around with water first to get the C02 pressure right.

Thanks

 

[TrevVB]

What about sanitation? I run into one or two of these a year at work and have always wanted to try it out for carbing too.

 

[baer19d]

What about sanitation? I run into one or two of these a year at work and have always wanted to try it out for carbing too.

That's also a concern of mine. Im not 100% sure how this thing works but I don't like the idea of running the beer into the pressure tank. It seems like something that could be hard to clean and sanitize. I wonder if the tank can be removed from the equation or is it necessary? If necessary running hot caustic, acid #5' or PBW through it followed by a hot water rinse and sanitizer would probaly do the job. After all, it "clean beer" and the process above works for kegs.

 

[TrevVB]

I think that is where the carbing is done. From what I have seen the tank is not easily removed from the system for cleaning.

Also there will be about a significant loss in beer. I have been sprayed by them durning removal with all lines cut.

 

[baer19d]

I didn't think about the loss of beer. The tank looks like more that a gallon. That's way too much. I was going to try the inline carbonation route but I've read some negative reviews.

 

[mredge73]

Why would you loose beer?
It is just a mini keg, should be a liquid output on the tank that has a pickup tube that runs to the bottom.
The gas in line runs to a carbonation stone inside the tank.
When you are done simply push the remaining beer out with C02 and rinse it with water then starsan like you would clean any keg.

 

[baer19d]

Why would you loose beer?
It is just a mini keg, should be a liquid output on the tank that has a pickup tube that runs to the bottom.
The gas in line runs to a carbonation stone inside the tank.
When you are done simply push the remaining beer out with C02 and rinse it with water then starsan like you would clean any keg.

You may be right. I'll try it one of these days and post the results.