Party Pig Beer Dispenser

So I attempted to make my first batch of beer using the Mr. Beer kit I had gotten for Christmas.

Everything was super easy and the two weeks of fermentation seemed liked they were never going to get here. But last Friday came and I figured it was a good time to move the beer into the Party Pig I had gotten from Mr. Steve's in Lancaster, PA. I sanitized it and then moved the beer into the pig which took about five minutes or so. Then I put in the pouch and sealed her all up. Everything looked pretty good and I inserted my tubing and then tried to activate the pouch using my air compressor. This did not work very well. I couldn't get it to activate the first time and the restrictor became dislodged. I disassembled it to put the restrictor in and tried the compressor again. This time the restrictor became dislodged again but the pouch activated. So I figured I would be good except for the beer coming out at a greater rate. Well about 12 hours later I went to the basement where I had the beer conditioning and found all the beer from the pig on the floor. The beer smell great but would not be able to be drunk. So I decided to email Party Pig. They responded pretty quickly and after getting some information they told me it was hard to say what went wrong. But the most common thing would be that the screws weren't tightened evenly allowing for a leak when the pressure built up. They also said that it was better to use the hand pump they sell instead of a compressor because it dislodges the restrictor. I figured I'll give it another try with the other kit I have sometime soon and see if it works out better this time. Hopefully my next blog entry about the Party Pig has a happier ending than this one.