Brewery Upkeep

Over the past couple months I have recommitted myself to brewing. Part of that is doing more of the little things between brew days to ensure that I am getting the most out of the beer that I am working so hard (...right...) to make. Some of the things I need to keep on top of are:

• Equipment Cleaning - having the mash tun, pots and other associated equipment clean before the next brew day
• Manage Fermenters - checking the temperature of the closet, keeping enough sanitizer in the air lock, etc.
• Keg/Keezer Maintenance - cleaning kegs, cleaning beer line, keeping inside of keezer ice and mold free

There are probably more things that I should be doing, but already I am seeing an improvement in not only my product, but the brew day as well. Tonight I spent time cleaning kegs to have them ready for the beers that are currently fermenting. I also cleaned 2 lines that were about to be hooked up to kegs. If I am going to be serious about making good beer, these are the kinds of things I need to keep in mind between brew days. I'm not on a break because I got the beer in the fermenter.

Just Dumb...

Last night I cleaned out the beer line that the Guinea Pig IPA was on and hooked up the Haus Pale Ale. Only problem was the pale ale was flat. It turns out that I never turned on the gas when I put the pale ale in the keezer. Looks like having a full tap list is set back again.

Keezer Improvements

It's been awhile since I have posted. That's because I haven't done much brewing. I need to hurry up and do that because I have nothing in the pipeline now. I just stopped in to mention a couple updates I've made to the Keezer.

First up is the new tap handles. My wife gave me these for Christmas. The wooden handles are branded with "Cedar Rose Brewing" across them. Definitely gives the keezer some great character (especially compared to the standard plastic handles). So far I have just had simple print outs to say what beers are on tap, but as I have more time


The other addition to the keezer was a drip tray. I made wooden supports for the drip tray that are attached to the keezer by magnets. The drip tray is then attached to the supports using velcro. I used rare earth magnets for the supports. I have had at least a couple full beers sitting on the drip tray without it moving at all. It is very sturdy.


Stay tuned to the blog. There are a few new gear posts coming. Then back to brewing!

Freezer + Kegs = Keezer!

After months of looking at a lot of keezer threads over at Hombrewtalk.com I finally took the plunge and decided to build one of my own. I decided to go with a collar rather than a tower because I didn't want to deal with cutting through the lid of the freezer. I received a lot of inspiration from this design. The addition of a door on the front of the keezer gives the benefits of the tower with the convenience of a collar. The door minimizes the additional height a keg must be lifted in order to get it into the keezer.

I found a killer deal on kegs on Craigslist. Then ordered a custom kit from KegConnections. I have a dual regulator with one leading to a 3-way manifold for the taps. This gives me four CO₂ lines so I can carbonate a keg while having 3 others tapped. This way I will have a keg ready to go when one blows. The freezer is a 9 cubic feet Frigidaire that I got from Lowes. It can hold 6 kegs with plenty of space for the CO₂ tank.

I apparently forgot to take pictures in the beginning of the build so you'll just have to imagine the first few steps. First I built a base collar out of cedar 2x2s. It is probably good that I don't have pictures of this because my cuts were not pretty and required quite a bit of touch up. After I had the base collar, I built 3/4 of the upper collar out of cedar 2x6s. I put the back wall and sides together then glued the base collar and upper collar together with liquid nails.

Once I had the rigid portion of the collar built, I drilled out the holes for the taps and added the door to the collar. I carved out a portion of the side wall to hide the hinge of the door. It gives the keezer a slightly cleaner look.

Door slightly open

The door has a slight sag when fully open, but that is expected. I did have a problem with the door staying shut. I added a latch to keep the door pressed against the foam tape to minimize air leaks. I added the foam tape on both edges of the door to help keep the freezer more efficient.

Door latch

I attached the collar to the top of the freezer with silicone. I then started installing the hardware. This step actually gave me some problems. The faucet on the far right just did not want to sit properly. This resulted in me spraying sanitizer all over the front of the keezer because it was coming out of the sides of the faucet. After taking it apart and putting it together a few times, I finally got it to sit properly.

Starting to look like a keezer.

I reattached the keezer lid by putting the hinges onto the collar. I then installed the temperature controller into the keezer. I cut the main power to the freezer and wired the controller in to turn it on and off in order to keep the freezer above freezing. Surprisingly, this was probably the easiest part of the whole build. I was expecting issues with the controller.

Keezer!

I had two kegs ready to go into the keezer. The Caribou Slobber and vanilla stout. After a few days of waiting I was finally able to pour some beer!

mmm beer...

I had the double brew day to get the keezer filled at full capacity. The pale ale should be a quick finisher. It will be great to have all three taps pouring. Let me know if you have questions or want more pictures of anything!