Hey, Rick Uzubell again from Cabaret Design Group, talking today about
"Bar Design - How To Size A Walk-In Cooler For A Draft Beer System" Coming up!
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What size walk-in cooler do you need? If you're planning a draft beer system, I'll help
you with the design criteria to select the right walk-in cooler. Stay tuned!
First, a little background information is necessary in making any purchasing
decision. There are two types of walk-in coolers: prefabricated and built-to-order,
as you see here. This story is about the prefabricated variety, as shown in this photo.
This type of walk-in cooler consists of
urethane panels and is economical, easy to expand and relocate. The elements that
compose the walk-in cooler are the walls, floor, door and refrigeration system.
The walls, which range from 3 1/2" to 5" in thickness,
consist of insulation sandwiched between thin sheets of galvanized steel
or aluminum. As I mentioned in an earlier post (reference below) walk-in coolers
used for beer walls require special design and engineering. Many owners will
utilize a rack system to make more efficient use of the cube and in such
applications, a floor system is impractical. Refrigeration systems can be
mounted overhead, as seen here, or on a side panel, if the room has a low ceiling.
The door should have a self-closing mechanism, such as the one shown here,
in order to conserve energy. Walk-in coolers can be installed indoors and outdoors
and are offered by numerous companies in a wide-variety of quick-ship sizes, as
shown in this chart. Up next: Be careful how you use your walk-in cooler!
Draft beer requires that the temperature be carefully maintained between 36 and 38
degrees Fahrenheit and this is impossible to maintain when the door is
being constantly open and closed. Rising temperatures in walk-in coolers -- even
one or two degrees Fahrenheit, will result in
excessive foaming and lost profits. Therefore, cased beer should never be stored in the same
walk-in cooler as your draft beer. The size of a walk-in cooler is driven by
the amount of beer you sell and the number of brands. A small walk-in cooler
can be selected if a bar sells a moderate amount of draught beer. The bar
shown here is a system featuring 10 brands of draft beer. As with most bars,
it's important to carry at least three of the largest U.S. domestic beers, such as
Bud Light, Miller Lite and Coors. Therefore, in this example, that means we
have to accommodate space for seven craft beers. As shown in this chart, the
U.S. domestics are commonly sold in 1/2 barrels, which are 15.5 gallons,
and craft beers are most commonly sold in sixtels, which are 1/6 barrels and 5.16 gallons
and less commonly in slim 1/4 barrels, which
are 7.75 gallons. Barrels need to be stacked inside the
walk-in cooler, as shown in this photo. Half barrels are normally stacked in
racks and the craft beers are commonly stacked with a device known as a "keg
series spacer," such as the one manufactured by DeVault and featured by
many web retailers. The advantage of the keg series spacer is that it allows two
kegs of the same product to be connected to the glycol system. Getting back to our
example, I designed the walk-in cooler to have seven brands of sixtels along
one long wall -- double-stacked, four slim 1/4-barrels along the opposite wall --
double-stacked and three 1/2-barrels -- double-stacked on the end wall.
Each of the smaller barrels has a row of back-ups
in front of it, designated in red. This layout can be downloaded at the end of this article.
The capacity of this 6' x 8 ' walk-in cooler is: (21) sixtels, (12) slim
1/4-barrels and (6) 1/2-barrels. This means that a total of 14 brands can be
stored in this walk-in cooler. Of course, depending on the popularity of certain
products, that configuration could easily be changed.
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