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Tap system issues - reducing foam for first pour?

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  • Tap system issues - reducing foam for first pour?

    Hi all,

    I am running a 3BBL brewery in New Zealand. We've only been selling beer for about a month and things are going pretty well so far. I got my beer into a pub which required me to install my own tap system for them. So I installed a two tap beer tower on their bar, with the lines running pretty much straight through the floor into the cellar below where the kegs are in a refrigerator.

    The bar owner has complained that whenever he pours a beer for the first time in a while, that it pours a lot of foam before the beer starts coming out good. So he says that he looses a bit of beer because of this. If he pours pints within a few minutes of each other this doesn't happen.

    Do you guys have any tips for how I can modify the setup to reduce the amount of foaming? The beer lines are currently about 6 meters long from the fridge to the taps. The lines themselves are not refrigerated but I have put them inside insulative foam casings to try to keep them coolish. Obviously this doesn't work too well if the beer sits still in the line for too long.

    One option I have is to make the beer line about 1 meter shorter, I guess that will help a little but not a lot!

  • #2
    Your problem is no doubt lack of cold air/liquid leading into the tap tower, the last 8-12 inches of beer line. Depending on how your system is set up, you need to either facilitate more cold air or cold water flow into the tower. In Europe I have seen water used for this, but most US systems use air. Talk to a local draft installation company about your particular scenario, as things may be set up differently in NZ. Should be an easy fix.

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    • #3
      cooling a must...

      Ditto on the cooling. Your taps aren't even "coolish" if you haven't poured anything in a while. Force cooling the tap lines is mandatory. You can do this with a pipe in a pipe setup to force cool air up and back down the lines. Good luck.
      Phillip Kelm--Palau Brewing Company Manager--

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      • #4
        Thanks for the tips guys. So where do I source the cool air from? From a fridge? I'm operating on a pretty low budget here. Do you think it would work, if I had a small freezer in the cellar (no room at the bar itself) with a 10-20 litre reservoir of glycol in there, and put my beer lines inside bigger hoses which contained glycol, which pumps the glycol around intermittently (perhaps thermostat controlled) to cool the beer lines?

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        • #5
          John, what you need is a python: http://www.valpar.co.uk/pdf/Python.pdf

          Alternatively you could perhaps fit a small under-bar cooler unit that will drop the temperature of your beer immediately prior to dispense.

          Hope that helps!

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          • #6
            Maybe you could upload a picture of the dispensing area (tower/taps), especially from the inside. And do yourself a favor and get temperature readings on the "foamy" beer so you know if what you are doing is working.

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            • #7
              Originally posted by KWLSD View Post
              John, what you need is a python: http://www.valpar.co.uk/pdf/Python.pdf

              Alternatively you could perhaps fit a small under-bar cooler unit that will drop the temperature of your beer immediately prior to dispense.

              Hope that helps!
              I second the under-bar cooler. a flow control tap can help as well for intermittent lines. (start slow pour and speed up as line cools down.

              Pax.

              Liam
              Liam McKenna
              www.yellowbellybrewery.com

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              • #8
                Originally posted by liammckenna View Post
                I second the under-bar cooler. a flow control tap can help as well for intermittent lines. (start slow pour and speed up as line cools down.

                Pax.

                Liam
                We use flow control taps and we do exactly what you say. We start slow so that only a small amount of beer comes out frothy, the lines then cool down and the rest of the pour is without foam. If done right there is no need to dump any beer at all even when our first pour is our 4.75oz sampler glass. Our outside temp is 30C and out T-towers do have air cooling inside but the horizontal part of the T doesn't really cool at all. We are also working on extending the air line inside and putting a t connector at the end inside the tower so that cold air can flow into the horizontal part of the tower.

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                • #9
                  We have flow control taps when we first started with a Keezer type setup. They served their purpose of reducing foam when we had issues. However now that we have a glycol long-run system and the taps are dripping with condensation we have no foam issues and pour at full speed at all times even in 5oz samplers.

                  If you have the right cooling all the way to the faucet you will save beer, time and money.

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