Brewery Equipment! Perlick Kegerator
So.... how do I say this.... a single keg machine was just not enough for this hobby, as it will hold either 1 sankey keg, or 3 cornelius kegs... that will just NOT do! so I bought a 'project', a 3 keg Perlick Keg Cooler


Automatic HLT temp control
I had my Johnson Controls A419 temperature controllers now, and had just hooked one up to the HLT and fixed the leak in the Thermometer hole due to the incorrect design of the Zymico style- ebay thermometer.. there was no seal from keeping water from traversing the pipe threade all the way through, so I carefully welded the washer to the thermostats pipe thread base to seal it. Did I mention that the most important time saver in breing all-grain is having enough hot water? The temp controller worked like a champ.


Note: I think I could do one cheaper with a water heater thermostat as long as it goes to 170 degrees... guess what, a neighbor down the street has a water heater they are throwing out, I made a visit to it with a few tools, and got a thermostat, someone went and got the other one before me, rats... After getting back home, I started thinking that the elements may be good, so I made a trip up the street with a multi-meter and a wrench and scored two working 3000W@208V elements, I cleaned them up with some phosphoric acid in a plastic bucket overnight and they looked like new, I tested, and at 120V, they drew 6.4 amps(versus the 10.0 amps of my old 6000W@240 hot tub element that I put in the HLT.

Mash Tun Valve
Trick new spigot for the mash tun, constructed from a 1/4" stainless ball valve with a support plate welded to the removable part of the valve so that the valve can be opened and closed with one hand and not work it's way loose.. Into that I screwed a hose barb, soon to be replaced with Stainless. Screwed into the business side of the valve is a fitting made from a piece of 3/8" stainless tube welded to half of a stainless 1/4" vlose nipple, with a 3/8" stainless nut drilled out and welded on afterwards so I have something to turn it with. The sealing to the mash tun is done with a stopper stuck in from the inside. Also in the pic is a 3" dial thermometer that I installed last week, it seals by using a 1/4" plastic line 'push-lock' fitting with the locking part removed, so it is essentially just there for the o-ring that it houses nicely. The thermometer is physically held in place by the 1/2" pipe threads just screwing into the outside part of the shell.


counter pressure bottle filler


Sankey Fermenter


I would like to list the things that I would upgrade from a basic kit if you are thinking about getting a kit adn trying hoimebrew... 1. Auto siphons rock.... don't leave home without it... 2. Upgrade the capper to the stand type... 3. buckets are great, but spring for one 5-gallon carboy.....

shorty corny kegs
I cut two kegs with my bandsaw, slowly rotating around the seams to make a very straight, fairly deep groove, then cut totally through on the next rotation, leaving a couple spots in tact to maintain rigidity while cutting and tuning. I then cleaned up the edges inside and out with a deburring tool and a file. I set up the TIG to about 30 amps, hooked my extra argon flowmeter to 20ft/min, and piped the argon through a installed corny lid relief valve and then through a flexible baffle I made to try to keep the argon in the area of the weld so those nasty black caterpillar looking things did not form on the back of the welds. the first one was a learning experience in keeping the two kegs round, aligned on all sides at once, and evenly spaced. The top and bottom metal are slightly thicker than the sides, so it would have been best to have them higher than the thinner metal the sides were made of, but the argon is heavier, so I had to pick the lesser of two evils and put the weld on with the heaviere metal on the bottom. I had a few burn throughs abotu 1/8" around, but fixable after a little grinding.I I got a little practice and finally got to where I could have the max on the TIG at 25 amps and have good precision with the pedal and still enough to lay some heat into the puddle. The second one went smoother and quicker, I learned that after tacking, I could go about an inch before getting the end hot enough to soften the rubber top/bottom piece and I would move 90 degrees or so and do another inch, having the entire thing welded in 4 rotations... the labor spent was sufficient to have to charge $100 a keg to do for someone else, but maybe with a quicker cutter (high $$$ blades for stainless, or plasma?) and a jig/clamp/back-gas device that could be inserted (and removed) into the keg, hold the two pieces firmly in place and round, along with supplying a small chanber behind the weld for argon to flow without using half a tank of it for two cornies. I could get down to $40-$50 per keg for labor, which still means people should buy the 3-gal corny's unless they need an exact height for some reason. if you do, email me. :-) I also thought of welding just the top of a corny to a sankey, like a sabco unit, then having a nice stainless piece that could be used for a 5 gal trash can or something. Any way, here is a pic of the completed 2.5 gallon kegs
Also, here is the full 4-megapixel image |