Kevin Railsback

The making of a kegerator

I built my kegerator using a Sanyo 4910M mini-fridge. This model is perfect for adding a draft tower to since it does not have a freezer compartment, and is sized perfectly to fit two 5 gallon cornelius (soda) kegs. I used these instructions and Chad Dickerson's excellent photo how-to guide.

I decided to make my conversion a little more involved than just drilling a hole and installing a tower. I replaced the plastic top that comes with the fridge with a 2'x2' piece of 1/2" plywood. I'm going to use copper flashing (used for valley areas in roofing) to cover the plywood, hopefully making a nice looking small bar top. Later on when I add a larger bar the fridge will already have a nice looking top and I won't need to change that. As the copper ages it will look very cool. Anyhow, on to the pictures:

I installed 1/4" strips to bring the plywood up to the same level as the metal hinge plate that sits at the front of the top of the fridge.

After drilling two very shallow holes where the hinge pin is (and where the hinge pin will go if I ever change the fridge door to open the other way), the plywood sits perfectly level on top of the fridge, with a 1/4" gap between the wood and the metal fridge top.

Here's the copper flashing that will be installed at a later date, once I figure out the best process for either soldering it at the edges, or using Denise's idea of folding then hammering the seams flat.

The 1/4" spacers are glued to the plywood with normal wood glue. I also went ahead and drilled the 3" hole in the wood out in the garage, to minimize the mess in the dining room.

After clamping the edges to make sure the plywood doesn't move, I drilled through the metal top of the fridge and checked for hot-side coils . There is one about 1" to the rear of where I drilled. The coil tubing runs across the top of the fridge 8" from the back edge, connecting the left- and right-side coils. If you turn the fridge on with the plastic top removed you can easily feel this hot-side coil. I centered my hole 9 3/4" from the rear of the fridge to miss it by 1/4". All clear so I drilled on through to the inside of the fridge.

Hmm... a clear tower would show off the light shining through the hole, if I could figure out a way of bypassing the door switch. Maybe connect that to the faucet handles, so it lights up when you pour a glass? Or use a motion detector so it lights up when you get close to the fridge? A project for another day, since my tower is chrome anyway. =)

Plywood top and tower installed. The plywood is connected to the fridge using the screw holes along the front of the hinge plate, as well as the four machine screws that hold the tower down. Next step will be to move my regulator outside of the fridge, by drilling holes for the gas lines through the drip trough in the back bottom of the fridge.

The chrome tower and copper flashing should look really good together once it is installed. The copper will tarnish over time, and the dings and stains it gets will really give it a great character.

Finished! Time to find a nice looking drip tray next....

Posted by Kevin Railsback at October 25, 2004 12:12 AM | TrackBack