Cooling Beer Using an Air Duster

In the quest to cool beverage cans this project investigates the effectiveness of using an air duster can.

The contents in an air canister has been compressed to liquid form. When it leaves the air canister, it rapidly expands, hence why it's used to blow dust. It also absorbs heat as it expands.

The Air Duster was able to cool a beer can from 24c to 2c over 9 minutes. The Air Duster canister was inverted and squirted against the can enclosed in in a lockable plastic container. After squirts of about 5 - 10 seconds the case and can were shaken and moved around for about 2 minutes to mix the coolness into the can's liquid. The Air Duster was completely used to cool one can down to 2c. It would be more economic if an Air Duster could be used to cool multiple cans.

Goto step 4 to see how the effectiveness can be improved upon by spinning the can with a mini can spinner. Achieving an ice-cold beer in 5 minutes.

Air duster canister

Plastic container with a clipped locks on lid

Tools:

Drill

Drill bit

To make the Air Duster Beer can cooling system:

1. A hole was drilled in a container with a drill bit the same size as the air dusters dispensing tube.
2. A series of small holes were drilled into the dispensing tube. The end was blocked off with the tip of a bamboo skewer, so the spray would go directly onto the can.
3. The container has a lockable lid, this is required to prevent it blowing off when the air duster is used. If the container being used doesn't have a lockable lid, tape should be wrap around it to keep the lid on.

Care should be taken when using this system as the liquid is very cold and shouldn't come in contact with skin.

Between squirts of about 5 seconds from the up turned Air Duster canister, the container and can were shaken and moved rapidly around for about a minute to mix the coolness though out the beer in the can.

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In an attempt to cool two beer cans from one Air Duster Canister, a larger contained was tried, the cans were cooled to 11c.

Using this container to cool 2 cans separately, where each receive half an Air Duster canister, successfully cooled the first can to to 8c and the second to 12c.

The cans were washed in cold water after being removed from the container just to be the safe side.

It's great that an Air Duster canister can be used to cool beer. But you are unlikely to want to do this very often as an Air Duster canister costs between $10 and $17.

Even if you are successful in cooling 2 beers with one canister the cost won't be less than about $5 a can. An expensive way to cool beer.

There are a few scenarios where it might be useful:

- You are very rich.

- You really want a cold beer and have no other way of cooling beer e.g. on the later part of a multi-day hike.

- Your main source of cooling beer only takes it down to say 8c and you really like your beer at 4c (e.g. lager) then it could be used to boost the coolness, and a canister will then likely be able to do this over a few cans. E.g. an air canister cooled a soda can from 12c to 3c in six minutes, using 139g of a 220g can.

Cooling a beer using a compressed air canister can be improved upon by having the can spun while being cooled by spray from the can. This was achieved by using a mini beer can spinner . Having the can spun increases the effectiveness. A beer can was able to be cooled to 2.5c by spinning the can in a plastic box for 5 minutes and giving 5-10 second bursts of the liquid air every minute.