how best to clean a dirty blow off tube

ethangray19 · 07-17-2008, 06:10 AM

I have a blow off tube, that also doubles as my racking tube. The last beer i fermented "blew off" pretty strongly and there is some kraussen residue in it and I did not replace it with a three piece airlock untill today(over a week).

Any ideas on how best to clean it and then sanitize it so that i can use it to rack my beer with and as a blow off tube next brew???

Thanks

AlesNeverFail · 07-17-2008, 06:27 AM

i've found that soaking it in bleach works well. but yeah that gunk is hard to remove after a while.

Sasquatchula · 07-17-2008, 07:15 AM

I dropped my hose into just boiled water and let it sit for 1/2 hour. Then, with the tubing still soft, I rolled it between my fingers to loosen any gunk still in there. Next I stuck a funnel on one end of the hose and poured the still hot water through it to rinse. Finally, an overnight soak in bleach/water solution. Looks and smells, well, like a vinyl tube.

EvilTOJ · 07-17-2008, 07:15 AM

First, go out and buy a 1" OD section of plastic tubing 3' long from Home Depot. Use that as a blowoff tube. Trust me. What I do to clean mine out is make sure it doesn't dry out, and run hot water through it. If that doesn't work, then a soak in oxyclean helps out.

ethangray19 · 07-17-2008, 02:57 PM

thanks for the responses. Those are good ideas. I might just buy a new one, but will also try those ideas

Nerro · 07-17-2008, 03:22 PM

Doesn't soaking it in hot water for a few days to a week do the trick? Otherwise soaking it in diluted hydrochloric acid might work.

DuffmanAK · 07-17-2008, 04:41 PM

Go out and buy a thing of Oxyclean Free (note the free, no scents, etc).

I had krausen/gunk all sticky and caked on the inside of my carboy, I put some oxyclean in it, let it sit for about 2 hours and it dissolved ALL the gunk. I didn't even need a brush. I suspect the same could be done for a blowoff tube.

Also, Oxyclean Free is a WONDER for taking bottle labels off. Just soak the bottles in warm water + oxyclean for like 15 minutes and the labels basically fall off. It's great.

ethangray19 · 07-17-2008, 04:52 PM

awesome info.

Do you think that soaking the tube in water for an extended amount of time will cause any ill effects to the tube?? (my tube is synflex PVC tubing)

DuffmanAK · 07-17-2008, 04:57 PM

Hmm.. that I'm not sure on, long as it's not boiling I wouldn't think it's be a problem, but I'll defer to someone else here that's more familiar with that type of tube. I'm not even sure what kind of tubes I'm using (picked up most of my gear second hand). Seems like it's vinyl or something similar.

barroomhero1234 · 07-17-2008, 10:42 PM

Soak it in sanitizer. Then use Q-tips to take out the krausen. That works for me. I had the same thing as you. Then i splurged and spent 2 dollars on more pipe.