One of my old Taprite CO2 regulators is showing signs of decline. Looking for opinions on what regulator is currently the best out there, reliability-wise. Price is (almost) no object. TIA.
You could try to rebuild the reg, if you have all day all night and are inspired to invent new curse words. It's a chore man, I mean you put the damn thing together exactly. And it might work. So we just stopped trying. So. McDantim is offering regulators that are supposed to be super precise. McDantim makes all of the gas blenders (all of them, other companies resell their blenders). I have not used one but based on the specs and their reputation for quality I am sure they are superior. Most regs are not very accurate in the low digits, and most draft systems never need to be at 1 or 2 psi. Homebrewers could use that though. These McDantim regulators are apparently good in micro incrementations. I'd be interested to see the pressure gauge as that is usually the weak ling. Those things are often $4 POS part. Of course MM Pro series are excellent. Expensive. Not really needed. You can view the anatomy of their regs on the website. We have some new regulators from Ireland, sold through a distributor. I'll check later to see the specific brand. These are really good too. I'm not certain of the brand so I'll get back to you. But they are pretty and work very well. Not enough time in the field to see about reliability yet. And, Taprite. They really do work well. Most of the time. Cheers
So... I looked for McDantim but couldn't find anything that was a single bottle to single regulator device. And I couldn't find anything labeled pro series at Micromatic. My google-fu must be fading. I did find this, Harris model 201, which is intriguing due to a 7 year warranty, so I pulled the trigger. I notice there is no teflon tape (or anything) on the threads. Can't remember if I've ever seen that on any regulators before. Should I be concerned?
The MM reg is called Premium Plus, sorry for that. Harris makes regs for welding equipment and all sorts of weird industrial gases we would not usually encounter. Some of those are jumbo. My take, The bonnet is metal, which is the very good, as most CO2 regs are plastic. Nitro would be metal because the tank pressure is much higher. Metal is better than plastic of course. The gauges are most likely the same $4 gauges on every other regulator. Maybe. You can swap those out for real fancy glycol filled gauges on the lo pressure side, even get a 2.5" or 3" dial if it will fit. Just because. @PortLargo has used these i believe, to withstand salt water. The handle is big, so you can make small adjustments easily. Don't need teflon, excuse me, PTFE tape. Use the washer though. Looks nice. Let us know. How much? Cheers
$89 shipped. Pricey compared to most homebrew regulators, but I think I've only had one that lasted at least 7 years, which is why I was intrigued.
That's not terrible, really. Regulators seem to be a mixed bag. Some of them fail day one, brand new out of the box. Then others just stop working for no random reason after a few years of honest service.. 7 years sounds like a solid product no doubt. Worth an extra $30cor so. Absolutely. Good luck.
Haven't had a chance to test it yet, but the knob moves so smoothly it's almost scary. It reminds me of I don't know how many decades ago, after fighting with many IBM clone type computer cases, I was asked to work on one (wish I could remember the maker) to change a conflicting IRQ jumper or something, and that case just *rolled* open via gravity (slight built in incline I suppose) as soon as a couple of screws were removed.
Checking back in. The Harris 201 is still working flawlessly. At this point. I think it's the best regulator I have owned.
That's weird. I had also said that reliability (long term) remains to be seen. I must have done something brilliant to accidentally delete that before posting.
