Bottle filling recommendations

[Ben Bosco]

Hey all,

I typically bottle half of what I brew to give away, but I know most people just use a beer gun or similar counter pressure fillers when they want to bottle a few here and there for competitions, gifts, growlers, whatever.

What is your tool of choice for force carbing single bottles, looking for cost effective methods (or expensive but worthwhile investments) of just bottling a few bottles from the keg or tap faucet… I found online something called “Tapcooler” which connects straight to forward sealing tap faucets (which I’d need to buy) and heard mixed reviews of beer guns, but don’t know what else is out there.

-Ben

[Tom Mendick]

I’ve used most of the tools other than the actual BeerGun and have found that my favorite way of bottling from a keg is the BMBF filler which is just a bottle filling wand with the spring part removed that is shoved into the end of a picnic tap and a stopper. It’s cheap, easy to clean and I’ve rarely ever heard of poor carbonation on scoresheets.

[Joshua Andrus]

Ben,

I have the Tapcooler and it worked alright for a little while but overall wasn’t impressed with it. So I recently bought the Blichmann Beergun and I love it. It’s not a counter pressure filler but I just fill the bottle with CO2 first for a little bit then fill away.

If you ever do get an intertap-like faucet and want to give it a try, let me know and I can bring it to a meeting.  I believe there’s an accessory that’ll let you connect straight to the keg (which I don’t have) if you’re not planning on getting one of those faucets. 

On Sat, Apr 26, 2025 at 10:03 Tom Mendick <tjme...@gmail.com> wrote:

I’ve used most of the tools other than the actual BeerGun and have found that my favorite way of bottling from a keg is the BMBF filler which is just a bottle filling wand with the spring part removed that is shoved into the end of a picnic tap and a stopper. It’s cheap, easy to clean and I’ve rarely ever heard of poor carbonation on scoresheets.

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> On Apr 26, 2025, at 9:20 AM, 'Ben Bosco' via Local 402 Brewers Union <local40...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>
> Hey all,

>
> I typically bottle half of what I brew to give away, but I know most people just use a beer gun or similar counter pressure fillers when they want to bottle a few here and there for competitions, gifts, growlers, whatever.
>
> What is your tool of choice for force carbing single bottles, looking for cost effective methods (or expensive but worthwhile investments) of just bottling a few bottles from the keg or tap faucet… I found online something called “Tapcooler” which connects straight to forward sealing tap faucets (which I’d need to buy) and heard mixed reviews of beer guns, but don’t know what else is out there.
>
> -Ben
>

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[Mitchel Jensen]

Good evening, Ben.

Not today to play devils advocate here but, my opinion is about the opposite of Josh's. I did not care for how finicky my Blichmann beer gun is. When I bought my tap cooler I thought it was breeze to use. That being said it probably all depends on the operator. If you are interested in trying a Blichmann beer gun you borrow mine and/or I can sell to you for cheaper then buying a new one.

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[Joshua Andrus]

Ben,

So resurrecting this email a little bit. I saw this article in the May/June Zymergy about a cheap counter pressure filler. It’s pretty similar to Tom’s and probably a good idea to try out before thinking of shelling out the money for either the blichmann, Tapcooler, or similar. 

Josh

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[Tom Mendick]

yes, this is the same basic setup that I use, but I found that the additional tubing to connect to the picnic tap is unnecessary. I also like the hollow stopper that fits over the bottle top so I can squeeze the stopper top to briefly remove the counter pressure as needed to allow flow without overfoaming.

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[Ben Bosco]

Tom,

re: the additional tubing, are you basically hooking the picnic tap directly into the holed stopper then?

-Ben

On May 19, 2025, at 9:00 AM, Tom Mendick <tjme...@gmail.com> wrote:



yes, this is the same basic setup that I use, but I found that the additional tubing to connect to the picnic tap is unnecessary. I also like the hollow stopper that fits over the bottle top so I can squeeze the stopper top to briefly remove the counter pressure as needed to allow flow without overfoaming.

On Sun, May 18, 2025 at 11:43 AM Joshua Andrus <jcan...@gmail.com> wrote:

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Ben,

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[Tom Mendick]

Correct sir, the bottling wand fits tightly inside of the picnic tap and the stopper goes around the wand

On May 19, 2025, at 6:20 PM, 'Ben Bosco' via Local 402 Brewers Union <local40...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Tom,

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[Tom Mendick]

Resurrecting this chain to go with the question @Chad Rozniecki had about bottle filling. Mostly so I can continue to be lazy and not retype my preference of bottle filler.