Chinese Keg Washer Issues

[Tom Block]

Does anyone have experience with one of these keg washers. It came as a package with our Chinese brewing system. It is not draining the kegs properly back to the caustic reservoir or to the drain. Air pressures are within manufacturers recommendations and I can actuate all solenoids manually.

Basically, after the cleaning cycle is complete, the keg is more than half full of liquid (caustic).

Any help would be appreciated.

Cheers,

Tom Block
Brewer, Grand River Brewery

[TonyT]

We got a 2 head washer with our Chinese "turnkey" system too, same style of coupling as that. Didn't work worth a damn. We ended up dismantling the heads, and attaching a normal keg coupler (check valves removed...cleaning coupler) to machine. I can email you some detailed photos tomorrow if you want. Works like a champ now.

[Tom Block]

We got a 2 head washer with our Chinese "turnkey" system too, same style of coupling as that. Didn't work worth a damn. We ended up dismantling the heads, and attaching a normal keg coupler (check valves removed...cleaning coupler) to machine. I can email you some detailed photos tomorrow if you want. Works like a champ now.

I'd love to see pics Tony. Send her or I can send you my personal e-mail.

Cheers,

Tom

[gtrsnax]

Our Chinese system allows us to manually change the time frames for each piece of the cleaning process. There was about a weeks worth of tweaking to get it all right, and we have 2 different timing "cheat sheets" for sixtels and half barrels. If you're able to edit the times, maybe you just need a longer CO2 blast to empty the keg before the cycle moves to the next step.

[mendodistilling]

Just for reference, which manufacturer did you receive this from? I'm about to work with MEC Brew and was curious, looking for feedback. Thanks.

[TheBrewersAsst]

I am also curious to hear if anyone has had experience with MEC Brew.

[dfalken]

Just for reference, which manufacturer did you receive this from? I'm about to work with MEC Brew and was curious, looking for feedback. Thanks.

I bought my brewery and my keg washer and filler from Wang at MEC Brew. The keg washer and filler are great pieces of equipment especially for their price. It takes some tweaking initially and we actually had to make some hardware modification as well to get it how we wanted it but once you become familiar with it you'll see it is a fairly simple straightforward piece of equipment that can be tweaked to meet your needs. The main issue we had was that the model that was sold to us is made to sanitize with steam. We don't have clean steam (and I doubt most craft brewers do) so we couldn't use it as it was built. We figured out how to modify it so we could use peracetic acid to sanitize and now it works great. If you can get a model built to sanitize with a liquid sanitizer instead of steam you'll be ahead from the get go.

[dfarion]

Keg washer photos

We got a 2 head washer with our Chinese "turnkey" system too, same style of coupling as that. Didn't work worth a damn. We ended up dismantling the heads, and attaching a normal keg coupler (check valves removed...cleaning coupler) to machine. I can email you some detailed photos tomorrow if you want. Works like a champ now.

Hi Tony,

I know this is an old posting but we are thinking of doing the same and I was hoping you still had the photos and were still willing to share.

don@bomberbrewing.com


Cheers
Don Farion
Bomber Brewing
Vancouver BC

[TonyT]

Connect the feed side of the machine's manifold to the "beer" side of a cleaning coupler, and connect the drain side of the manifold to the "gas" side of the cleaning coupler. We notched out the table so the keg fits inverted with the coupler attached. We had to sawsall the manifold and weld in stainless hose barb fittings.

[mgohring]

Resurrecting an old thread...

I just picked one of these up that looks exactly like the one in Tom's original post. We haven't used it yet as we're still in our build out phase.

I noticed the operating manual states the keg scope for this machine at 30L - 50L. Has anyone had any luck using 1/6 and/or 1/2 bbl kegs on one of these? Wondering if it's mainly a height clearance issue or something else entirely.

I would rather use 1/6 and 1/2 bbl-sized kegs as opposed to 30L or 50L.

Cheers,

Matt

[Todd Hicks]

Your timing is off in the programming.

Once the times are set correctly, it will run like a champ.

And then it will break down.

[PIB Beer]

interested in photos

We got a 2 head washer with our Chinese "turnkey" system too, same style of coupling as that. Didn't work worth a damn. We ended up dismantling the heads, and attaching a normal keg coupler (check valves removed...cleaning coupler) to machine. I can email you some detailed photos tomorrow if you want. Works like a champ now.

I know this thread is old but i would appreciate detailed photos. I am having the same problem with my Chinese washer. Thanks

Will Fox
Pacific Islander Beer Co

[kpbowman04]

Reply to an Old Thread

Hey guys,

We are having similar issues with our Chinese washer as well. Our set up seems a little different so I wanted to see if anyone would be able or willing to walk me through how you engineered the washer to accommodate.

Thanks,