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Author Topic: heincans  (Read 2105 times)

Offline weithman5

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heincans
« on: April 26, 2010, 10:11:29 am »
has anyone tried to reuse one of those 5L heinecan kegs for homebrew, or have any ideas for kegging smaller batches 2-3 gallons.  just thinking of reducing my batches.
Don AHA member

Offline enso

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Re: heincans
« Reply #1 on: April 27, 2010, 08:31:30 am »
You can reuses many of the 5L mini kegs.  However, I believe the newer Heiniken mini kegs are not reuseable.  I believe they have some sort of patented co2 charger which is not reusable.  All the other mini kegs work on gravity dispense.  They have a spout at the bottom and a pressure relief bung at the top. You can buy them new for about $10-12 a piece from homebrew shops, though they are becoming less available.  The down side of these are they are not made to be force carbonated and you need to rig up a method of dispense for long term useage.  Meaning they are intended to be emptied in a short amount of time since the allow air in when dispensing, so you will need a dispense method that tops up with co2 rather than air.

You can get corney kegs that are 2.5 or 3 gallons.  They are not very plentiful and so, not very cheap when you actually find them.  The ones I have seen were three times the cost of a used 5 gallon corney.

There are other systems out there too like the tap a draft which uses PET bottles and CO2 chargers.  Or the party pig which is another PET bottle system.

You could always go to bottling...

 :-X
Dave Brush

Offline tygo

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Re: heincans
« Reply #2 on: April 27, 2010, 09:04:49 am »
I have a little CO2 dispenser that came with my 5L mini-keg set.  But it's still not the most airtight setup and they really are designed for relatively fast consumption.  Honestly the few times I've used them they haven't worked all that well.  But I do have a starter batch fermenting right now that I don't want to bother bottling so I'm going to mini-keg it.  Maybe it'll work better this time   :-\
Clint
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Offline majorvices

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Re: heincans
« Reply #3 on: April 27, 2010, 09:40:02 am »
My dad got a "Beertender" for Christmas from my mom (she didn't know any better) and we both tried to figure out a way to get a decent beer in those cans but to no avail. Too bad, the Beertender is a nice set up. Would be nice to see some decent beers available for it.

Offline weithman5

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Re: heincans
« Reply #4 on: April 27, 2010, 07:39:04 pm »
probably still easiest to stick with 5 gallon cornys.  thanks
Don AHA member