Kegging recomendations?

[elleric]

So over this presidents day weekend I managed to find a good deal on a refrigerator.

It's a 16cf top freezer style and will be just for beer and beer accessories. I am looking for recommendations on where to order the kegging set up from and any details about what to look out for when shopping around that might not be immediately obvious. Ball or pin? New or refurb? Co2 tank size/advantages? What makes a good regulator? Etc...

I'm looking at maybe a 2 keg set up. For now with hand held taps. I'd like to have the refrigerator set up and running at least a year before I bore a hole in the door for a tap just to make sure it's good before voiding a warranty.

My go to places have been northern brewer and morebeer; any others out there that I should be checking?

It's a big investment and I'd like to get it right

Thanks!

 

[rustym]

Check out Midwest Supplies 2 keg setup. I've been looking at it myself and it seems to be the best price around. The one I'm looking at is $284.00, comes with 2 refurbished ball lock kegs, a double dual regulator, CO2, and lines. I've been looking at everybody else online as well and can't beat that price for what you get.

 

[masonsjax]

Whatever you do, do not attempt to purchase anything from kegkits dot com.

I've been happy with my equipment purchases from brew masters warehouse, midwest supplies, williams brewing, rebel brewer, more beer, micromatic... Basically, you can't go wrong with HBT vendors.

 

[D_Ranged_Eskimo]

I hear a lot of good reviews from kegconnections.com and have been looking at a 3 tap system from them. Their prices seem to be competitive and they seem to have options to upgrade to a premium system (ss perlicks and ss shanks, dual body reg, etc).

 

[tekknoschtev]

I purchased my 4-keg kit from Midwest Supplies, which came with a new CO2 tank. Kegs were refurbished, and in really good condition. I want to say that they threw in a set of seals as well, but I can't remember if those came from them or Keg Connections when I bought 5 more kegs.

I seem to recall the price being significantly cheaper than it is now though, but I might be mistaken.

Ball or Pin is kind of a "pick one" argument. If you have nothing now, just make sure whatever you order is compatible. I went with ball lock, and fortunately found additional ball lock kegs on sale.

Depending on your comfort level though, drill that fridge! I put off installing shanks and taps, because of cost, and while it was fun being able to pour kegged beer, being able to do so without opening the fridge definitely enhances the experience. It helps that my fridge was a $25 craigslist find, made the potential loss pretty low.

 

[WA_Hophead]

I picked up my kegs from kegconnection.com they had the best price I could find and were really quick. I think most of there kegs are Firestone pin locks. The only problem I had with ordering from here was that the kegs weren't cleaned. Each keg comes with its own oring kit. Oh ya just so you know if you get the Firestone pin locks they don't have a pressure release so you have to depress the poppet on the gas valve every time you are removing head space. It's not a big deal but gets annoying taking off the gas in every time. Hope this helps!

 

[elleric]

I am not really concerned about me breaking the refrigerator by drilling out the hole; I'm more concerned with there being a factory defect that causes an early failure and the warranty was voided by the drilling.

Based on that I figured I would get the hand held taps until I know all is well and then make the switch over. If it really is that much of an impact maybe I'll consider the drilling right away and roll the dice.

 

[elleric]

another question...
I see this: http://www.midwestsupplies.com/kegg...lon-systems/homebrew-deluxe-2-tap-system.html

and the regulator has two gauges.

and then there is: http://www.midwestsupplies.com/kegg...ic-dual-tap-draft-system-w-pin-lock-kegs.html

and that regulator has three gauges.

what is the virtue of the extra gauge? I don't see an option for the three gauge regulator with the through the door type taps.

 

[day_trippr]

A dual-body regulator has a tank gauge and a low pressure gauge for each regulator body, hence the three gauges. The other regulator has a single body, hence the two gauges.

The dual-body reg allows you to set two different CO2 pressures, which can be a nice thing to have if you want to carbonate widely divergent styles of beer at the same time (say, a cask ale, which wants low volumes of CO2, verses a hefeweisen, which wants high volumes of CO2).

There's no relationship between any type of regulator and the style of faucets being used...

Cheers!