Anyone made a spunding valve?

[Hawkbox]

I'm kind of curious about messing around with letting my beers naturally carbonate in the keg even if just to get ahead of oxidation and reduce CO2 usage. Anyone made one and have a parts list handy or recommendations?

 

[thunderwagn]

The Blowtie works great and is dirt cheap.
You can get a kit with a very nice gauge also.
https://www.morebeer.com/products/blowtie-diaphragm-spunding-valve.html

 

[Nosybear]

I've seen instructions in BYO or Zymurgy, can't remember exactly which. Google?

 

[oliver]

If you've got ball lock kegs and are certain you want to build it yourself,

Ball Lock Gas Connector with 1/4" MFL, and then a 1/4" FFL x 1/4" MPT screws into that. On the MPT side goes into a SS FPT Tee 1/4" FPT on all sides, and on the top side of the Tee goes a CO2 regulator gauge (at least 30 psi gauge is plenty), and on the continuation side of the Tee goes the actual spunding valve with adjustable threading. the spunding valve is like a keg PRV but it doesn't have the pin to pull and instead threads that release some pressure. Hope that makes sense? use teflon

 

[Hawkbox]

I don't inherently want to buy it myself, but stuff is harder to get and considerably more expensive in Canada most of the time.

 

[GFHomebrew]

AS Thunderwagon put the new blowtie has a guage built in looks pretty compact as with most things in this Hobby you can either make it yourself or buy it. I know which ones more satisfactory.

 

[HighVoltageMan!]

I bought the blowtie and used it to ferment under pressure. It’s work very well so far, it uses a diaphanous and is easy to set fairly precise pressures. It seem to creep up each day by a 1/4 pound or so, but it just needs to be tweaked a bit. It’s not very expensive.

 

[Ward Chillington]

I'm not a kegger but you said DIY and peaked my interest!

Cool!

https://www.homebrewfinds.com/2011/02/build-spunding-valve.html

 

[Bubba Wade]

I naturally carbonate in the keg without a spunding valve. For my 2.5 gallon kegs, I add between 1.8 and 2.5 ounces of sucrose at kegging (dissolved in boiling water). I make sure that that be is fully attenuated prior to kegging. I leave the keg a room temps for 1-2 weeks before chilling.

This saves a lot of CO2. Also, after chilling, the residual yeast cakes up on the bottom of the keg. I get clear beer (after the first half pint) as long as I don't jostle the keg.

 

[Hawkbox]

Interesting. I never thought about that as an option too.

 

[Pricelessbrewing]

I've built a few spunding valves, they're very useful tools to have.

Pressure ferment.
Long term secondary fermenting without needing to top off airlocks, especially useful for bretts and sours or aging on wood etc.
Closed transfers wiith zero oxygen.
Isolating kegs and keg system to find a leak.
Combine with an inline regulator to harvest c02 from fermentation which can then be used to recycle c02 for carbonating or serving without a tank. Portable c02, or just being cheap / green.

 

[Empire Hops]

I've built a few spunding valves, they're very useful tools to have.

Pressure ferment.
Long term secondary fermenting without needing to top off airlocks, especially useful for bretts and sours or aging on wood etc.
Closed transfers wiith zero oxygen.
Isolating kegs and keg system to find a leak.
Combine with an inline regulator to harvest c02 from fermentation which can then be used to recycle c02 for carbonating or serving without a tank. Portable c02, or just being cheap / green.

Tell us (me) more about harvesting CO2. Special setup or builds? Always love a new way to complicate things!

 

[Pricelessbrewing]

Sure thing.

So you have a beer fermenting in some sort of pressurized fermenter, mines a keg. Hook up a gas disconnect to another pressurizable container, then use the spunding valve on the container to capture c02.

Could be a keg, mini keg, paintball c02 tank, or even a 2L bottle if you want.

To serve/force carbonate, you use the c02 capture vessel with the in line regulator.

Say the capture container was spunding to 30 psi, you can use the regulator to bring that down to 12 psi and use it to serve and not have to bring your c02 tank, and regulator out of the kegerator.

Or you could use it as a dedicated for force carbing, or really any way you would want to use c02.

 

[Steve SPF]

@Pricelessbrewing

Genius: wish I could like that twice!

 

[Empire Hops]

Sure thing.

So you have a beer fermenting in some sort of pressurized fermenter, mines a keg. Hook up a gas disconnect to another pressurizable container, then use the spunding valve on the container to capture c02.

Could be a keg, mini keg, paintball c02 tank, or even a 2L bottle if you want.

To serve/force carbonate, you use the c02 capture vessel with the in line regulator.

Say the capture container was spunding to 30 psi, you can use the regulator to bring that down to 12 psi and use it to serve and not have to bring your c02 tank, and regulator out of the kegerator.

Or you could use it as a dedicated for force carbing, or really any way you would want to use c02.

Outstanding. Appreciate the detail. Off to draw up some plans and hit the store. Cheers!

 

[Mase]

Hmmmm....

Doing some quick math:
50 kegs (we’ve brewed ~50 - 5 gallon kegs to date)
x 5 gal/keg x 128 (oz/gal)
= 32,000 oz divided by 12 oz/serving = 2,667 12 oz pours.

We’ve get roughly 10 kegs out of a $15.00 CO2 tank, and we’ve went through 50 kegs, so I’ve purchased 5 refills of CO2 @ $15.00 each = $75 for CO2 for 50 kegs.

$75.00 worth of CO2/2,667 beers = $0.0281 per beer. So each beer costs ~$0.03/beer in CO2.

So it costs roughly $1.50/keg to use purchased CO2.

Although I enjoy gadgets and tweaks as much as the next guy, I can’t see the saving. It’d take ~50 kegs to save $75 in CO2. I’m not sure you could capture the CO2 from spunding any cheaper when you cover equipment costs to capture CO2

 

[Pricelessbrewing]

Hmmmm....

Really it depends on what you include in your costs.

I already have kegs, and I use my spunding valve for other things. The in line regulator is like $6, so it doesn't take much to catch up to that.

It also comes in hand as a portable c02 source, if you need c02 but don't want to unhook your tank and move it.

 

[thunderwagn]

The captured c02 comes in handy for cleaning and purging for sure. Not to mention closed transfers. My c02 tank is kept in my keezer so having a keg outside the keezer with the captured gas is nice. I've got the equipment so it just makes sense to capture the gas.
I think free is always a savings

 

[Ward Chillington]

Although I enjoy gadgets and tweaks as much as the next guy, I can’t see the saving. It’d take ~50 kegs to save $75 in CO2. I’m not sure you could capture the CO2 from spunding any cheaper when you cover equipment costs to capture CO2

Savings?? Doing stuff for free....PRICELESS!

Yours truly,
Ward Chillington
Noted Proud Cheap Bastard

 

[thunderwagn]

I could definitely see your point though @Mase. If you had to buy a bunch of stuff just to capture the 02, it probably wouldn't be worth the small savings you might see. I never went through my c02 tanks very fast at all. That did change when I started fermenting under pressure and doing closed transfers. It just made sense for me to start utilizing what I was basically just purging off.