Cleaning Kegs - general question

[bnentrup]

I am in the process of figuring out what I need to clean kegs. I am leaning towards a DIY cleaning rig, but want to know why most out there do not remove spears and clean with spear out? Is it a time related issue? I know you will need to have pressure to clean the internals of the spear, but feel that I could achieve better overall cleaning of the keg(s), and have better inspection (peace of mind), with spears out.

Thanks for your input!

[BrewinLou]

It is about time. If you have lots of it, by all means take every spear out every time. But there are keg cleaning machines that clean spears fine, others do not touch the outside of the spear. I have yet to see a "fast" machine that also cleans the outside of the spear as good as the inside. Our current machine cleans the inside great, all except the outside of the spear, There is a bit of beer stone on every one I pull.

[bnentrup]

It is about time. If you have lots of it, by all means take every spear out every time. But there are keg cleaning machines that clean spears fine, others do not touch the outside of the spear. I have yet to see a "fast" machine that also cleans the outside of the spear as good as the inside. Our current machine cleans the inside great, all except the outside of the spear, There is a bit of beer stone on every one I pull.

Thanks! Exactly what I thought-- I will likely have time in the beginning to mess with this. I can totally see in a short bit of time that this will not likely be the case. I have just read exactly what you stated and wondered how I could avoid this and achieve a simple(r) DIY keg cleaning build.

[beerguy1]

Here is the keg washer I built:


Its pretty much a manual operation in that you have to open valves and turn the pumps on but, It has a built in heater I wash with a caustic that has beer stone remover in it and have gotten good results. As others have said there is a bit of stone on the outside of the spear and perhaps that will come off eventually. But, I have not had any bad tasting beer since I started using it.

Cheers
Mike
Cheboygan Brewery

[Natrat]

Nice rig :-)

[mtnbrewer99]

I second Natrat--nice setup. Any chance we can get more pictures and details of the rig? I am going to be building my own here shortly.
Matt
Tumbledown Brewing

[NatchezBrew]

Yes more info and pics please.

[beerguy1]

Sorry for the delay wife was in hospital,OK on with more info Basicly there are 2 tanks one holds a HOT caustic solution with stone remover the other is sanitizer. The keg is attached to a hi flow sankey connector. Now, look up to the levers they are in sequence. there is a "T" valve that controls the return flow from the keg. It either goes to the drain or returns it to the caustic keg so far simple. THe keg is rinsed with domestic hot water then flushed. T valve moved to return to caustic.
The next lever opens the valve to allow caustic to flow from the pump to the keg,the timer is started for 2 min.wash it is blown back into the tank with CO2. T valve is opened a hot water flush again. Next lever opens to allow sani to flow from the pump to the keg usually about 30 seconds, it rests for 45 seconds then CO2 blasts out the sani the outflow valve is closed to allow it to pressure up to 15# then thats it

All parts came from Mcmaster and Carr except I found the pumps wholesale that saved me 50%. Its a 220 system that has contacters and as you can see fuses. The caustic heater is an immersion type. A friend works at a metal fab shop so that helped alot. One last this a 6 nozzle manifold is at the bottom all fluids and gasses run thru it. Actually a simple pump-manifold-valve system.

It works great on a keg but it all manual system. Hopefully in the future we can go to an automated one but for now we cant quite justify the cost

Cheers
Mike

[mattbk]

cleaning chemical

Related question to this thread - our brewery is planning on starting using PBW (for several reasons) for cleaning most of our brewery equipment. Is PBW acceptable for use with keg cleaning? Or is a caustic advised? I am wondering if PBW isn't harsh enough for kegs, which will tend to sit around dirty for longer than most brewery equipment. Thanks - Matt

[beerguy1]

Related question to this thread - our brewery is planning on starting using PBW (for several reasons) for cleaning most of our brewery equipment. Is PBW acceptable for use with keg cleaning? Or is a caustic advised? I am wondering if PBW isn't harsh enough for kegs, which will tend to sit around dirty for longer than most brewery equipment. Thanks - Matt

I asked the same question of 5 star at CBC. They didnt recommend it. They said use there Acid#5 its a nitric/phos low foam blend with a surfactant in it they said it removes stone and protein. I currently use a product from Broadmore out of Grand Rapids MI that is a caustic low foam with an additive to remove beer stone. I have had great results with it as the color of the water really gets dark with use and good stone removal. I will however use some of there Acid #5 at the start of next year as I think its good to switch ph solutions at time to time to remove products that others may miss. That comes from my first brewmaster and the logic has served me well thru the years

[TonyT]

I asked the same question of 5 star at CBC. They didnt recommend it. They said use there Acid#5 its a nitric/phos low foam blend with a surfactant in it they said it removes stone and protein. I currently use a product from Broadmore out of Grand Rapids MI that is a caustic low foam with an additive to remove beer stone. I have had great results with it as the color of the water really gets dark with use and good stone removal. I will however use some of there Acid #5 at the start of next year as I think its good to switch ph solutions at time to time to remove products that others may miss. That comes from my first brewmaster and the logic has served me well thru the years

We alternate each month between cleaning/sanitizing kegs with PBW&Saniclean, then Acid#6&StarXene. We pull spears and inspect every 10 kegs or so through the machine, and they've been looking great.

[Bainbridge]

PBW contains sodium metasilicate, which apart from only really being effective for about half an hour before it stops oxidizing, degrades into some silicon compounds that can form a (literally) rock hard film on things if you let it sit too long.

We've been using caustic but I'm contemplating switching to acid or alternating them quarterly.