Filling Your Mini Keg

In short, you can fill your mini keg with any drink you like!

How long your drink will stay fresh depends on what beverage it is, and the method you used to refill.

Google "local breweries" or "batch cocktail producer" or "cold brew coffee supplier" or "local kombucha maker"and contact them. Most will be very happy to refill your keg.

The map below is beer breweries we've collaborated with, or have friendships with staff, and who've confirmed they fill iKeggers. This can change due to staff or policy over time.

We're a tiny team and can't continually update a map with over 1500 breweries, cideries and distilleries in Australia. Especially as some close, and new ones open every day!

How To Fill Your iKegger

Best Practise For All Filling Methods

Cleaning & Sanitising

Make sure your keg is clean and sanitised before filling but do not use dishwashing liquid (which will wreck the head on any beer you put in it afterwards).

See a video on sanitising your keg here

The best product to clean is sodium percarbonate which will remove any set on sediments / stickiness etc if you forget to rinse your keg out after it's empty.

The best sanitiser is a phosphoric acid based no-rinse sanitiserwhich takes 2min to kill any bacteria and doesn't leave any odour of flavour.

We also have a package that includes both of those plus spare o-rings and lubricant to maintain them here

Chill The Keg First

The fastest way to chill you keg is swirl ice water around inside it. It's always best to get the keg cold before filling, you can also put it into the fridge or freezer (with the lid off).

For any carbonated drink especially (beer, cider, kombucha, soda, G&T, rum and coke etc) it's best to chill the inside of your keg before filling. This will prevent foaming and loss of carbonation when the liquid hits warm metal.

For nitro drinks you MUST have the liquid as cold as possible, as nitrogen dissolves more easily into cold liquid and hardly at all into room temperature liquid. To aid this chill the ingredients and the keg first.

With an insulated keg it's always best to chill inside the keg before filling as otherwise you may warm your drink a bit and once it's in the keg it takes a long time in the fridge before the inside starts getting any colder again.

Gas Flushing The Keg

It's best to flush the inside of the keg with CO2 or nitrogen before filling it to avoid your drink touching oxygen (it's only really important for beer, but it's best practise for all drinks).

You can do this by injecting CO2 into the open mouth of the keg or though the gas post and pulling the gas release valve a few times. CO2 is heavier than air so imagine your keg is now filled with liquid, the heavier liquid (your drink) goes to the bottom and lifts the lighter liquid (CO2) on top of it as you fill. This prevents your drink touching oxygen while you fill.

See a video on gas flushing an open mouth keg here

See a video on flushing a mini keg with ball lock posts here

Filling Methods

Can you fill from bottles and cans?

Absolutely! There are good reasons why you might want to.

Ideally we'd also like your iKegger to reduce the use of bottles and cans, by refilling at local businesses too.

Why Fill From Cans & Bottles?
  1. Draught Beer Is Better. Most people prefer a pub quality draft beer over drinking from a can or bottle.
  2. Avoid Breakages. Glass bottles around the pool are not a great idea, especially clear glass.
  3. No Buying Ice. Our insulated kegs stay cold all day (at least 10 hours) without ice thanks to Thermos like double wall construction.
  4. Save Your Back. No need to cart around a 40kg cooler full of ice and bottles with an insulated keg either.
  5. Simple Cash Back. Buying beers somewhere with a return and earn station nearby? Pour all the beer into your keg, get cash back for the cans on the spot. No need to have them pile up at home till "it's worth driving to get rid of them"
  6. Less Space & Weight. Great for 4WD, campervans and caravans. No carting rubbish around.
  7. No Rubbish To Take Home. Don't need to bring any empties home with you (if you are going into a national park, camping, on a boat etc).
Filling From Cans & Bottles
  • Chill the keg, with lid off for an insulated keg.
  • Flush the keg with CO2
  • Tilt the keg and pour slowly and with as little splashing as possible down the inside wall of the keg.
  • Screw the lid on, attach your regulator to the gas post and put more CO2 in while pulling the release valve a couple of times to get rid of any air that did get in.
  • Pressurise to the correct pressure for your drink (about 12-14psi for beer, 15-17psi for soda / mixed spirits).
  • You can now disconnect your regulator till ready to drink.
  • This method has the most chance of oxygen contact and you should be aware that craft beer may start to go bad within 48hours if you aren't careful (bulk breweries like Tooheys, XXXX, Carlton etc heat treat their beer and it will last longer).
  • For canned and bottled sodas and RTDs (and making your own mixes) like G&T, Scotch & Dry, Rum & Coke etc a bit of oxygen contact will have no affect, just maintain the pressure in the keg and they will stay fresh and carbonated.

Can you fill from taps at pubs / breweries or on kegerators?

Of course, this was why we designed iKegger!

To take home delicious beverages from your local producers, without the rubbish, as fresh as possble, and avoiding the cut taken by middlemen.

Basic Hose Fill Method
  • Sanitise your keg
  • Chill the inside of your keg (if at a brewery ask them to put it in their fridge or swirl some ice around in it before filling.
  • Flush your keg with CO2 (many breweries will do this themselves but ask them beforehand and do it yourself with your regulator if they don't. Unless you plan on drinking the keg within the next 24-48 hours).
  • Attach a hose to the tap that reaches the bottom of the keg so you are filling within the "cushion" of CO2 and with minimal splashing.
  • Once filled (it will probably overflow with foam for a bit before it's liquid to the top) screw in your cap or even better screw in a spear and again flush the filled keg and pressurise to 13psi approx.
  • You can now keep the keg in the fridge till you want to drink it, the more careful you were to have no oxygen contact the longer the beer will last. At worst 24 hours for an unsanitised, unflushed keg up to weeks for a properly sanisited and carefully filled flushed keg.
Counter-Pressure Filling
  • Sanitise, chill and flush your keg with CO2.
  • You will need to leave your spear on the flushed keg and pressurise the keg to approximately 12psi.
  • Ideally flush the filling line with CO2 as well.
  • Disconnect your regulator and attach the iKegger Auto-Filler to the gas post.
  • Attach the liquid post or spout of the iKegger 2.0 to the filling tap via the included line.
  • Turn on the filling tap and adjust the valve on the gas post till it is allowing a slow steady flow of gas to escape as the liquid fills the keg.
  • The flow will stop automatically once the keg is full so simply turn off the tap and disconnect everything once done.

See The Auto-Stop Filler Here!

Got a kegerator at home? Brew your own beer / kombucha or coffee?

It's super easy to fill an iKegger. No need to buy cans to take out when you've got a iKegger to fill and take with you.

From A Keg or Fermenter
  • Sanitise, chill and flush your keg
  • Pressurise the empty keg to just below the source keg or fermenter pressure.
  • Connect the liquid posts together
  • Attach the iKegger Auto-Stop filler to the gas post of the empty keg.
  • Wait for the transfer to finish
From A Commercial Keg

Very similar to filling from a ball lock keg or fermenter, just that you add ball loock posts to the coupler so you can connect iKegger mini kegs easily.

See a video here

Breweries That Fill iKegger Mini Kegs