As some of you know I make mostly Belgian beers. However I like all my beers finished in the bottle via natural carbonation. I think it provides a softer flavor than force carbonated beers. I have also been making larger than 8 gal batches which forced me to get creative when bottling. The biggest easy to handle bucket is 7.9gal which is marketed as a wine fermentor. I thought about buying one of the 10 gal plastic fermentors but thought they might be flimsy or difficult to lift to bottling height. I decided to find a way to bottle off my 10 gal cornys I use for primary fermentors.
Here's some pics of the set up. I will be giving the first run next week on a dubbel I brewed 3 or 4 weeks ago. It works great with water/starsan at the moment with out a low pressure regulator. This will theoretically allow me to bottle around 1 vol of residual if I seal up the keg and slightly force carb or if I buy myself a spunding valve setup. This will allow for a pulled in CO2 blanket and if I adjust the regulator up a touch I should be able to get very low pressure to assist with the bottling.
The parts consist of a 12" length of 1/4" 304SS pipe. A 90 degree 304 SS elbow, a threaded ball lock liquid fitting, 1/4" flare thread to 1/4" pipe adapter (cannot find in SS at all), and finally the pipe is capped off with a 1/4" pipe to 3/8" barb.
The flare to pipe adapter is not a common part and you will have to order it online unless you have a VERY well stocked parts store. I could only find it made by one manufacturer and that was Parker. It was much cheaper through Portage Specialty as I have listed below. Also as you can see I had to bend the pipe to get as parallel to the keg as possible. I just heated it with a torch and bent it by hand against a concrete step. I'm sure some of you guys have a vise or something to use.
This will work on both 5 gal kegs and my 10 gal kegs. I might work on a neat little set up for injecting CO2 while the bottle is filling too that is pressure activated by the bottle filling or something. That way you can prevent oxygenation of IPAs and stuff where oxygen kills hop aroma.
Parts list:
12" Pipe 4830K142 $9.86
90 Degree Elbow 4464K12 $4.53
3/8" barb for 1/4" pipe 362113 $13.41
1/4" female flare to 1/4" MPT adapter 664FHD-4-4 $1.30
Total cost if just ordering one of everything is $29. It would only be $16 but the pipe to barb is a pack of 10 and $13 for the pack. I'm actually glad it's a pack because you can replace it with frequency if you'd like.
Here's some pics of the set up. I will be giving the first run next week on a dubbel I brewed 3 or 4 weeks ago. It works great with water/starsan at the moment with out a low pressure regulator. This will theoretically allow me to bottle around 1 vol of residual if I seal up the keg and slightly force carb or if I buy myself a spunding valve setup. This will allow for a pulled in CO2 blanket and if I adjust the regulator up a touch I should be able to get very low pressure to assist with the bottling.
The parts consist of a 12" length of 1/4" 304SS pipe. A 90 degree 304 SS elbow, a threaded ball lock liquid fitting, 1/4" flare thread to 1/4" pipe adapter (cannot find in SS at all), and finally the pipe is capped off with a 1/4" pipe to 3/8" barb.
The flare to pipe adapter is not a common part and you will have to order it online unless you have a VERY well stocked parts store. I could only find it made by one manufacturer and that was Parker. It was much cheaper through Portage Specialty as I have listed below. Also as you can see I had to bend the pipe to get as parallel to the keg as possible. I just heated it with a torch and bent it by hand against a concrete step. I'm sure some of you guys have a vise or something to use.
This will work on both 5 gal kegs and my 10 gal kegs. I might work on a neat little set up for injecting CO2 while the bottle is filling too that is pressure activated by the bottle filling or something. That way you can prevent oxygenation of IPAs and stuff where oxygen kills hop aroma.
Parts list:
12" Pipe 4830K142 $9.86
90 Degree Elbow 4464K12 $4.53
3/8" barb for 1/4" pipe 362113 $13.41
1/4" female flare to 1/4" MPT adapter 664FHD-4-4 $1.30
Total cost if just ordering one of everything is $29. It would only be $16 but the pipe to barb is a pack of 10 and $13 for the pack. I'm actually glad it's a pack because you can replace it with frequency if you'd like.
