jockey box question

[oneandonlychaz]

How well does a jockey box handle a keg that has just been brought home? The problem I'm facing (fraternity parties) is that we play a lot of parties kinda last min and we go get 2 or 3 kegs and want to tap them immediately and obviously we get foam. The kegs will be cold from the walk in cooler we get them from so im less worried about the jockey box's ability to cool them down from 80 degrees.

I am more wondering if the built in restriction from the coils plays a major role in calming the foam down. Also what length coils do you guys recommend? Obviously 120' would be the best but money is an option here.

Again the kegs would be cold from the walk in cooler we just drove them from (and it actually is a pretty cold cooler unlike some of the other stores that we could get kegs from which are no where near 38 degrees). I am more hoping that this can lead to a nice cold beer with little foam as soon as i bring a keg or 5 home

[Hophead]

I've done it (tapped a keg right from the store last minute) and it worked out just fine. I use a 120 foot coil so I don't know if I'd have the same result with a shorter coil. I had the CO2 pressure at about 30 PSI.

If I remember correctly, we did get a little extra foam at first but it seemed to settle pretty quickly. No one cared because we were in the middle of a party and ran out of beer. Just about anthing other than pure foam would have worked for us at that point!