From Ice Box to Jockey Box

Crafting beer is more than just a hobby, it is a life style. For some, it is a profession, for others a dream for something bigger, a dream to take their passion to the next level. Nonetheless, we all share the same love and desire to create a beer that people, including ourselves, fall in love with. A beer that pours our story and displays our adventurous character; in hopes that the long path of dedication and hard work shows its true color in the first pour, the first sniff, and finally the first sip. You look into the face of judgment. They look up from their pint with a euphoric smirk on their face as they pronounce, “Wow, that is a damn good beer!”

If you are reading this, you love beer and love brewing it. And if you brew beer you know and feel that beer is a passion. Beer is an endless road of creativity. Beer is a science. As brewers, we take extreme measures to push the boundaries with our ingredients and style but also have to exercise caution with precision, timing, temperature, mash schedules, water chemistry, yeast stability, fermentation conditions, sanitation, and so on. How do we sleep? We often don’t. We are up every hour checking the fermenter after a previous brew day looking for any sign of active yeast, answering countless questions in our head: Did I pitch a large enough starter? Have I oxygenated the wort enough? Checking off your mental list over and over. We install a camera and baby monitor in the fermentation room to check on it when we are not home.

Or maybe all of this is just me.

After all the sleepless nights from recipe formulation to finally transferring it to the keg, with your face gleaming with pride, are you happy going to a homebrew festival and serving your beer out of a plastic cooler?

For me, I think not. When life calls on you to bring your creations out of your home to places your kegerator cannot go, whether to a friend’s wedding, family barbeque, a tasting event, or even a competition, it’s time to ditch the plastic cooler and build a portable custom jockey box using mainly the same mechanics. Here is my design, but be creative and put your own spin on it. You’ve mastered your beer, you’ve mastered your pour, now master your presentation.

Parts and Tools

• Old icebox fridge (no need for arefrigeration unit)
• 12-volt battery
• AC/DC inverter
• Weatherproof battery box
• Zip ties
• 3⁄8-inch wire loom
• 3⁄16-inch ID beer lines (20 feet/6 m)
• 2 ball lock beer connectors
• 2 ball lock gas connectors
• 3-way gas line manifold
• 1⁄2-inch airline hose with quick disconnects (10 feet/3 m)
• 1⁄2-inch thread to 1⁄2-inch barb fitting
• (3) 11⁄2-inch black iron floor flanges
• (2) 11⁄2-inch close nipples
• 11⁄2-inch street 90-degree elbow
• (2) 11⁄2-inch unions
• (2) 11⁄2-inch to 3⁄4 inch reducers
• (3) 1⁄4-inch self-tapping screws
• (2) 75-foot (23 m) draft coils
• 20-foot (6 m) lamp cord
• 2 Perlick faucets
• 1 lamp holder
• 1 lamp cage
• 1 lightbulb
• Stainless steel box with drain (size dependent on application)
• 1⁄2-inch vinyl tubing (6 feet/1.8 m)
• (2) 24-inch (61-cm) spring tension rods
• 2 Tap handles