Endless Liquid Refreshment

rabtech writes "I'm very lazy. As part of that continuing effort, I've come up with a guide for installing a soda fountain in the house. I've detailed how to get the equipment, hoses, and supplies, as well as how to install and calibrate the system. Now you won't ever need to move for lack of liquid refreshment! My next project: Food Replicator."

interesting

[zephc]

without reading the story, how does he handle the soda NOT corroding any piping? Is it all plastic? Can plastic survive soda corrosion?

Nice

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a big fan of club soda. I don't drink pop becuase its too unhealthy.. that much sugar is bad news.

Any one ever try coffee and club soda? I've never seen anyone else drink it, but try it, its great. Hrmm... I think I'll go put some coffee on right now.

Have a nice evening.

Well

[Anonymous Coward]

At least you can see the thick, cludgy syrup that makes up these carbonated sugar drinks.

Perhaps the eye-opening nutritional odyssey will offset the convenience of the dispenser?

For me, nothing beats good ol' H20...

Re:Carbonation

[cybermace5]

Not so sure about that, but carbonation does upset the carbon-oxygen cycle of metabolism. The result is that more toxic acidic byproducts of metabolism stay in the blood.

Re:So

[siliconwafer]

I keep seeing comments like this.

1. Some Idea
2. ???
3. Profit!!

Where did this come from? They're all "+5 funny". I am certainly missing something... anyone care to explain?

there's already been a compost story

[Calaf]

Hardcore Waste Recycling [slashdot.org]

Can't wait to see the sheep story.

Re:Even more impressive

[Pharmboy]

Besides which, there is evidence that diet soda drinks are mildly carcinogenic and may slow down the metabolism enough to negate the fact that they are less caloric.

Aspertame (Nutrisweet) is the one that may slow down metabolism. I wouldn't say its proven yet, but compelling enough I don't use it. I do use acesulfame potasium (like Sunnett) and sucrolose (Splenda) which haven't shown to do that, and don't affect blood sugar. The only carcinogenic I can think of is saccarin, which was found to not be cancer causing in reasonable amounts anyway. I use it, too. Oh, and I don't eat sugar. Or white flour. Ever. There is a good reason [atkinscenter.com].

But on another note, we keep talking about price, but its all in the volume. You can't get commercial rates for an in house soda fountain.

Re:Even more impressive

[azav]

You are so correct. Recent articles on newscientist and eurekalert mention what I've found out personally. Sugar and processed flour is BAD for you. Sugar leads to inflammation and promotes the body's inflammation cycle which is destructive to tissues. the inflammation cycle promotes itself and is large fault in our system. REaD: Arthritis, Crohn's disease. Also, processed flour is partially digested and very quickly converts to sugars. Sugars in addition to promoting inflammation, cause an insulin rise in the body and over a long lifetime intake, may set you up for diabetes. If your body is still tolerant of high sugar/flour intake, the bacteria in your skin might like it also and sigar is just food for them. If you eat foods with lots of sugar or flour in it, check in 1/2 an hour and see if your skin breaks out or is itchy. The bacteria in your skin is eating all that digested sugar and you're having an inflammation response or are breaking out with pimples. No fun.

Glad you brought this up Pharmboy, hopefully, since this is related, it's not too off topic. I'm recovering from spinal osteoarthritis after working to reduce the inflammation cycle. It will probalby affect us all. Better to find out BEFORE you are told that they want to fuse your spine like they did to me.

Not fused yet.

Go splenda. Ditch the carbs.

Enjoy,

Co2 and Related Health Problems

[Cyno01]

The carbonation in soda is pretty bad for you. It will react and strip calcium off of pretty much anything in you, teeth, bones etc, this is why sports coaches tell their players not to drink soda, it can weaken your bones. All this will also leave you with lots of Calcium-Carbonate(scale, like in hard water), this can also lead to problems. Drink a lot of soda in a short period of time, and you might notice your piss is slightly cloudy, the extreme of this happened a friend of mine, kidney stones. Ouch.

Coca-Cola Breakmate Machine

[shadowj]

Sometime in the 80's Coca-Cola decided that they'd try to promote Coke as an office beverage, directly competing with coffee. Towards that end they developed the Breakmate, a little self-contained soda fountain about the size of a large microwave oven.

The basic machine attaches to a water line and draws 110V from a wall outlet, and that's all that you have to hook up (you can even buy an accessory water tank, eliminating the water line). Inside the machine is a little refrigerator, a small CO2 cylinder, and space for three 1-litre syrup boxes.

The thing actually mixes pretty decent soda, but apparently there were reliability and maintenance problems. In any case, the whole program flopped,and Coca-Cola no longer manufactures the Breakmate. They still make supplies, though, and you can buy a used Breakmate for $200-$300 on Ebay or through vendors like this one [mrbreakmate.com].

Drawbacks? Well, you're restricted to a short list of Coca-Cola beverages... Pepsi and others are out of the question. The syrup packs are relatively expensive... each pack makes about 30 glasses of soda and costs $8-$10, so you'll pay about $0.25-$0.35 per glass. More bad news: the little CO2 cylinder doesn't go very far (many Breakmates have been modified to use larger cylinders); fortunately, they're refillable, and CO2 is cheap. Despite the drawbacks it might be worthwhile; the machine does work, it's a lot cheaper and simpler to install and use, and it's sorta cool besides.

Re:Compounding a problem...alternatives?

[WheelDweller]

I agree that drinking sodas is a bad way to go. Yet, I still consume about 3L a day of some cheap-but-amazingly-good pseudo-Mountain Dew. (It's called Mountain Holler; see Save-A-Lot: 58 cents!)

I'm already working hard to stop smoking- that's the top of the list. If I can kill that demon, the next two are increased exercise and moving towards drinking water-only.

As to exercise: what's a good choice for people like us? It seems pointless to run in place for 20 minutes. Biking has gotten downright dangerous. Is there anything *you* do that you find interesting/useful?

I'm serious; I want something that doesn't amount to standing in the rain....ya know? Painballs? Swimming? (can't, BTW) Karate?

Re:Actually, it would be cooler to keep it simple

[joew]

Its sad how few people will get the joke

the one vendor i know for Old Fashioned Soda Fountain supplys [ceisites.com]
one of these days after I buy a house I will set one of these up. The question that is do i need a 20 foot long counter to go with it :)

Re:One important thing to note...

[stygar]

CO2 is provided free o' charge

That only happens if you're a big enough account that Coke or Pepsi gives you freebies. I spent a couple of summers helping deliver pop for Pepsi, and while the chain restaurants and the bigger independant accounts got free CO2, small accounts had to pay for it. It doesn't get in the bottle by itself, you know:)

Re:Turbo Tea

[Stonent1]

I find you can make a perfectly decent cup of tea by putting 2 bags of tea inside your espresso maker and adding 1 cup of water. I found this out while I was sick and didn't want to sit around waiting for tea. Then I made my own concoction. Tea + orange juice. It helps loosen the phlegm in the throat and gives you a boost. I suppose I could take the tea out of the bags and be able to cram another bag-full in there.

Re:hmmm....

[ewen]

"One thing that is underrated is getting a dedicated water jug and putting it in the FRIDGE to keep it really cold."

I completely agree with this, having done the same thing (bought a water filteration jug) a couple of years back. Tap water with the not-so-nice tasting things filtered out, and chilled, is very nice. (Unchilled and it's no where near as nice.) It's also easy to maintain: take out of the fridge, pour glass of water, top up water in filter jug, put back in fridge. And change the filter every three months.

When I first bought it I figured at worst it didn't cost too much (NZ$50 (about US$25) plus about NZ$15 (US$8 ish) for the filters every few months), but having used it for a couple of years I wonder why I waited so long.

Still the article was very cool in a geeky "why not?" kind of way.

Ewen

Taco Bell

[Zakabog]

I work at a Taco Bell and in the back they have a soda machine for the really lazy. You just put the cup down and it automatically fills to the top, waits a few seconds till the foam goes down and then gives a last little squirt. It doesn't matter what size cup you use or how much soda is already in it, it will always fill to the top and there's never any mess (the cups are titled and any excess foam goes over the top of the cup into a drain and not down the side of the cup). I've wanted one ever since I started working there, I'd get the CO2 and the syrup from my grandmother (she owns a bar so she's getting syrup and CO2 all the time)

Re:Aspartame FUD

[Kombat]

Show me any Internet rumor or fiction about aspartame and I'll show you research from a reputable organization with no vested interest (MSF, ADA, French and Canadian equivalents of the American FDA, Mayo Clinic, etc.) that says the opposite.

Excessive consumption of Aspartame causes permanent loss of peripheral vision. I know, it happened to a roommate of my sister-in-law's. The real irony? She's a nutrition major at the University of Toronto.

Granted, she drinks (yes, present tense, as in she hasn't learned her lesson) about a dozen cans of Diet Coke every day, but she is a very real example of what aspartame can do to you. She lost her driver's license because of it, and will never get back the peripheral vision she's lost.