Yet another beer line length question

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drunkatuw

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I recently built a kegerator with a sanyo 4912 and I hooked up my keg a week ago and when I went to pour it last night, the beer barely poured out.

I started with the pressure around 12 psi. With nothing coming out, I bumped it up to 15 psi for a few hours and when I went back, it still barely pushed the beer out.

The tower I bought came with 5' of 3/16" tubing. Using the calculations from this page, http://hbd.org/clubs/franklin/public_html/docs/balance.html , it seems like at with the pressure at 15 psi, the faucet approx 2.5' above the center of the keg and the resistance on the line being around 2.2 (according to morebeer.com's listing for their 3/16" tubing), that means I should need a beer line of approximately 5.5', so if anything, the beer should be coming out too fast and foaming.

Or the other answer could be that I have a leak, but if that was the case, I would guess that my 5# co2 tank would be empty after being hooked up for a week.

What beer line length and pressure do most people use with a sanyo 4912?
 
Sounds like you have another issue because with 5.5' of 3/16" beer line you should have a good flow regardless of what model refrigeration unit you are using.

I know you must have verified that the regulator is actually registering pressure correctly, and that if there is a shutoff valve somewhere, that it is actually open. And also that there are no other points of restriction in your air or beer system.

What kind of keg and what kind of couplers are you using? Are you sure the air and beer lines are properly connected? If you are using a Sankey coupler, did you see a one-way gasket/valve on the coupler or air lines? That could possibly be installed backwards, as could a check valve somewhere.

I have 2 separate kegerators, one chest freezer, and one commercial unit with towers. They have 5 and 6 foot beer lines. Even with 3psi I get beer flowing, and at 10~12psi it is perfect. With your setup there is no reason to go past 12psi to get a decent flow unless something is connected or configured incorrectly.

Hope any of this helps ya! Feel free to drop me a PM if needed.:mug:
 
I feel like a bonehead. I double checked everything after work today and the valve on the manifold was closed. The the only pressure pushing the beer out of the keg was the co2 being released from the beer. So today the beer is a little more flat, but still ok, probably by tomorrow it will be back to normal.

That's what you get trying to troubleshoot a problem after a few homebrews :)
 
drunkatuw said:
I started with the pressure around 12 psi. With nothing coming out, I bumped it up to 15 psi for a few hours and when I went back, it still barely pushed the beer out.


For future troubleshooting pressure changes at the regulator will show immediately in the beer flow.
 
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