Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

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Wozboy
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Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Wozboy » Thu Mar 04, 2021 8:57 pm

I am just about finished with my keezer build and need some beer line cleaner and I need to know what everyone does out there. Primarily which cleaner do I need? I hear various bits on here, the purple stuff?

Is it cheap enough and do you fill a keg with it and flush it through your lines and can I store it long term in a keg or just use it chuck it them make some more up each time you need to clean your lines?

I'm presuming flush a fair bit half a keg through each line and then maybe fill the keg with Starsan and flush it through with this ready for the beer connecting up?

Any help gratefully received!

Cheers.

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Jocky » Thu Mar 04, 2021 9:15 pm

Personally I use a normal sodium percarbonate based cleaner (e.g. PBW, Chemclean). When a keg is empty I rinse it out with hot water, then add some cleaner with more hot water.

Leave it to soak and shake it about a bit, and then run some out through the line and tap. Give it a minute and run a bit more through.

Once that’s done you can do the same with a bit of Starsan, and then push most of that out with gas.
Ingredients: Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast, Seaweed, Blood, Sweat, The swim bladder of a sturgeon, My enemies tears, Scenes of mild peril, An otter's handbag and Riboflavin.

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Wozboy » Fri Mar 05, 2021 3:29 pm

Many thanks, much appreciated.

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Jocky » Fri Mar 05, 2021 5:44 pm

I should say that it really helps to have good quality beer line. The Valpar stuff from the Malt Miller might not be cheap, but in a year of usage I’ve not had to replace any lines due to spoilage or beer taint, with just light occasional cleaning as per above.
Ingredients: Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast, Seaweed, Blood, Sweat, The swim bladder of a sturgeon, My enemies tears, Scenes of mild peril, An otter's handbag and Riboflavin.

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by orlando » Mon Mar 08, 2021 8:54 am

I use the purple stuff, lasts for ever. I adapted a garden sprayer with a JG fitting and attach a 3 way JG fitting to allow 3 lines to be cleaned in one go. Anyone know of a 4 way?
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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Jocky » Mon Mar 08, 2021 1:52 pm

Stick a 2 way onto one of the 3 way outputs?
Ingredients: Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast, Seaweed, Blood, Sweat, The swim bladder of a sturgeon, My enemies tears, Scenes of mild peril, An otter's handbag and Riboflavin.

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by orlando » Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:23 pm

Jocky wrote:
Mon Mar 08, 2021 1:52 pm
Stick a 2 way onto one of the 3 way outputs?
Your surname Heath or Robinson? :lol: Good idea, thanks.
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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Wozboy » Wed Mar 10, 2021 12:58 am

orlando wrote:
Mon Mar 08, 2021 8:54 am
I use the purple stuff, lasts for ever. I adapted a garden sprayer with a JG fitting and attach a 3 way JG fitting to allow 3 lines to be cleaned in one go. Anyone know of a 4 way?
I'd really like to see how that works if you could post a photo up that'd be great, I'm presuming clean all lines between brews every time? Do you ever dismantle and strip down your taps or is it all CIP flush through and jobs a good one?

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by orlando » Wed Mar 10, 2021 7:54 am

Sure. I will take one and post up. It really is as simple as it sounds. I thoroughly recommend a complete strip down at least a couple of times a year. I recently bought some Nuka Taps to help cope with the many places bacteria and its like can take hold, they are designed with cleanliness in mind. My previous taps were terrible. Even after PBLC being used, the only way you can keep it at bay would be to run it every week. A commercial premise of course has to, we should but don't. QED.
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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Jocky » Wed Mar 10, 2021 9:44 am

orlando wrote:
Wed Mar 10, 2021 7:54 am
Sure. I will take one and post up. It really is as simple as it sounds. I thoroughly recommend a complete strip down at least a couple of times a year. I recently bought some Nuka Taps to help cope with the many places bacteria and its like can take hold, they are designed with cleanliness in mind. My previous taps were terrible. Even after PBLC being used, the only way you can keep it at bay would be to run it every week. A commercial premise of course has to, we should but don't. QED.
Good news is that you should see a massive difference. I recently removed the NukaTaps from my keezer for the first time after 9 months of usage, and they were clean as a whistle.

All I ever do is squirt some starsan into the spout after pouring and then stick one of those little brush plugs into the tap, and a very occasional line clean as per above.
Ingredients: Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast, Seaweed, Blood, Sweat, The swim bladder of a sturgeon, My enemies tears, Scenes of mild peril, An otter's handbag and Riboflavin.

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by orlando » Wed Mar 10, 2021 12:47 pm

That is good news. I use a butt, er tap brush plug as well. I only noticed latterly that the previous taps had a tiny hole on the underneath. This was the source for a lot of bacteria getting hold.
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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by orlando » Wed Mar 10, 2021 5:11 pm

As requested. It really is a simple method. Just pump it up, until you can feel it.

Image
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Drinking: Southwold Again,

Up Next: John Barleycorn (Barley Wine)
Planning: Winter drinking Beer

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by guypettigrew » Wed Mar 10, 2021 5:45 pm

orlando wrote:
Wed Mar 10, 2021 5:11 pm
As requested. It really is a simple method. Just pump it up, until you can feel it.

And. as you use it, do you say to yourself, I hope my aim is true?

Guy

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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by Cobnut » Wed Mar 10, 2021 6:05 pm

Interesting reading the comments here about disassembling taps to clean them.

I bought these taps in a job lot off flea-bay a couple of years ago. They're different to most of the taps on the "new" market and the only similar ones I can find are "Roto taps".
pump.jpg
I've been using them for the better parts of 2 years (can't recall exactly when I installed them) and the only cleaning I've done is to pump PBW or similar through at then end of a keg and then with clean water and finally starsan.

I don't have any (butt) plugs - I'm pretty sure that the ones for the regular Perlick type taps wouldn't fit as the nozzles are quite narrow (c. 6mm).

I did have an issue with a collection of mould in the nozzle of one of the taps which was left between sessions for a while, but I gave it as good a scrub out as I could with a small brush and some PBW followed by Starsan.

I'm not dead yet!

Interested if anyone can identify them and/or can offer some insights.

I find once I've got the beer carbonated, I get a pretty good pour with the beer at fridge temperature (I've yet to configure another Inkbird for the kegerator) and the regulator set around 10psi. More for the "continental" beers, of course!
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Re: Keezer nearly finished what beer line cleaner should I get?

Post by McCoy » Thu Mar 11, 2021 6:17 pm

Cobnut wrote:Interesting reading the comments here about disassembling taps to clean them.

I bought these taps in a job lot off flea-bay a couple of years ago. They're different to most of the taps on the "new" market and the only similar ones I can find are "Roto taps".
pump.jpg
I've been using them for the better parts of 2 years (can't recall exactly when I installed them) and the only cleaning I've done is to pump PBW or similar through at then end of a keg and then with clean water and finally starsan.

I don't have any (butt) plugs - I'm pretty sure that the ones for the regular Perlick type taps wouldn't fit as the nozzles are quite narrow (c. 6mm).

I did have an issue with a collection of mould in the nozzle of one of the taps which was left between sessions for a while, but I gave it as good a scrub out as I could with a small brush and some PBW followed by Starsan.

I'm not dead yet!

Interested if anyone can identify them and/or can offer some insights.

I find once I've got the beer carbonated, I get a pretty good pour with the beer at fridge temperature (I've yet to configure another Inkbird for the kegerator) and the regulator set around 10psi. More for the "continental" beers, of course!
Belgian Alpha tap design. There are a few competing brands using similar design. Looked at the version from VVB at some stage. They are not wented, so works well for counter pressure filling.

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