CONVERTING AN ICE CUBE 15 GALLON COOLER
You can get a 60 quart ice cube cooler from Sam’s club for
$19. Unthread and remove the factory
bulkhead fitting for the drain and installed the weldless fitting as shown below
(note that the washer and o-ring on the inside is not required when attaching
to a cooler).
On the inside use a stainless steel washing machine hose
braid to hold back grains. Cut off the
ends of the hose and pull out the rubber inside, leaving only the stainless
braid sheathing. Hose clamp this onto
a copper tee. The one in the picture
below was a hard tee, with short pieces of hard tubing shoved into the tee with
Teflon tape to seal it. The tee was
likewise pushed onto the ½” NPT x ½” soldered copper fitting with teflon tape
to seal. This can be fully
disassembled and cleaned.
This is
what a cross section of the weld-less fitting looks like.
WELDLESS CONVERSION (FOR KEG)Get parts from wwww.mcmaster.comMcMaster Part No. Description Cost4464K214 Stainless full coupling, 1/2" pipe size, $3.424830K171 Stainless Steel 1/2" Close Nipple, Fully Threaded, $1.6998126A797 Stainless Steel Shim(sold only as a pack of 10 @ $10.38) $1.049396K32 Silicone O-Ring (sold only as a pack of 50 @ $14.53) $0.29 (x2)4429K124 1/2" Locknut, Brass (with groove for o-ring) $1.304190K22 1/2" Brass Ball Valve, Full Port $6.89---------------------------------------------------------------------------Total Cost $14.92
For a cooler with a thin walled section at the drain port
(like an ice cube or a gott cooler) omit the shim/washer and o-ring on the
inside an just put the coupling on the inside. The outer o-ring will seal
properly.