How far do you go disassembling your ball valves?

If you have never taken your ball valves apart you may be in for a shock.

I took off the handle and unbolted one side and soaked one overnight in a hot PBW solution, valve partially open. Next day, it still looked dirty. So I unbolted the "handle shaft" (dunno what it is called), pulled it up a little to release the ball and then pushed the shaft down and out. Nasty brown gunge everywhere.

(Seems I may have broken the white washer/seal on the handle shaft. Can you get replacements anywhere?)

morebeer.com says to unbolt the handle and boil the valve for 5 mins or so. Am I going too far?

Cheers!

Yep, the first time I did that I was really surprised too. I had a batch where I opened up the valve to drain sparge water into the HLT, and for the first second or two, the water was murky brown. It smelled just like burning marshmallows or burning sugar, so I figured there was sugar somewhere in there.

I took it apart, and found that the ball and some of the inner parts were completely encrusted with black carbonized sugar. Took many soaks in Oxyclean free to get it all off. Now I disassemble and clean maybe every other brewday.

I do it every few brews now. I didn't even realize it was a problem till I was running mash water one day and a big black chunk came out. I couldn't figure anywhere else it would have come from so I took the valve apart. It was covered with brown and black crap. I now have all 3 piece valves and take them apart every few brews. I am getting ready for my first all electric brew this weekend. I have a feeling going from propane to electric is going to make a huge difference in cleaning the valves. I suspect that the heat from the burner is what burns all the sugars in the valve. I'm interested to see what happens after a few electric brews.

Thanks for the replies!

A bit of a warning:

I'm not sure now whether or not it is a good idea to take these things apart.

For one thing, there are 5 gaskets/O-rings in there. Some of mine were a bit deformed and one at least was breaking up. Another plea- does anyone know where you could get replacement gaskets - I've googled but couldn't find anything.
Second, it took a bit more torque putting them back together than I would have imagined, and they are of a whacko size - not metric or SAE, so ya gotta use a couple of adjustable wrenches. No big deal, but please check for leaks before putting back into service.

Cheers!

Well now I feel like a right ******* - one of the valves is leaking. I guess the moral of the story is if it ain't broke don't fix it. Kinda annoying as I was trying to do the right thing. From now on I'll turn the valves on-off-on-off while doing the cleaning-in-place regimen.