Do Sour's Contaminate Up Your Co2 Hoses?

Hello, I know that when you brew sour's you are suppose to dedicate the equipment used, but what about your kegging equipment ? such as the hoses, balllock connectors, patty taps? Im guessing that they should be dedicated too.

And the big question for me is what about the ball lock connector for the Co2 side, the Co2 hose and the Co2 manifold, even the Co2 tank, did I just crap up all of my kegging equipment?

I have a very very sour beer/infection that I thought I got rid of, and its back, now in one of my keg's in a 3 tap tower with a 3 valve manifold.

People that know and have experience, HELP Please! Others that are just guessing please don't bother replying, Im not trying to be rude, just dont want or need the confusion.

If I need to Isolate this and throw everything plastic away just like last time, its not a problem, I will jump right on it.

But what about the Co2 side?, is it crapped up?

Help and thanks

Cheers

Anyone else experienced this dilemma ?

Cheers

I'm not sure but I dont think anything would grow or survive without oxygen? I use sulphur in my oak barrel when its not in use to prevent anything from growing. I play around with sours and do not have dedicated equipment, and have yet to cross contaminate (maybe I'm just lucky). It seems like I've been reading more and more about keg contamination on this site. I'm confused how this could happen as most beer is stored under 40 degrees which would prohibit the vast majority of bacterial growth. Are you sure its not happening somewhere else before the beer gets into your kegging system?

BradleyBrew said:

I'm not sure but I dont think anything would grow or survive without oxygen? I use sulphur in my oak barrel when its not in use to prevent anything from growing. I play around with sours and do not have dedicated equipment, and have yet to cross contaminate (maybe I'm just lucky). It seems like I've been reading more and more about keg contamination on this site. I'm confused how this could happen as most beer is stored under 40 degrees which would prohibit the vast majority of bacterial growth. Are you sure its not happening somewhere else before the beer gets into your kegging system?

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No offense, but that's terrible advice. Microorganisms survive just fine in CO2. How else do you think we bottle condition our beers? On top of this these microorganisms can be frozen for years and still be viable when roused.

Yes, you run the risk of contaminating other beers with Brett, lactobacillus, etc if you use the same CO2 hose.

BradleyBrew said:

I'm not sure but I dont think anything would grow or survive without oxygen? I use sulphur in my oak barrel when its not in use to prevent anything from growing. I play around with sours and do not have dedicated equipment, and have yet to cross contaminate (maybe I'm just lucky). It seems like I've been reading more and more about keg contamination on this site. I'm confused how this could happen as most beer is stored under 40 degrees which would prohibit the vast majority of bacterial growth. Are you sure its not happening somewhere else before the beer gets into your kegging system?

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Hello, Yes its starting in the fermenter, its not starting in the keg, I transferred to keg after primary fermentation and then put it on Co2 to carb it, without testing it before doing so, My fault.

Now Im concerned about craping up my other brews if I use the same Co2 hose and connector ?

Cheers

Yeah, you also have a nice pocket of o2 in every bottle unless you fill the bottle up to the brim.

PhelanKA7 said:

No offense, but that's terrible advice. Microorganisms survive just fine in CO2. How else do you think we bottle condition our beers? On top of this these microorganisms can be frozen for years and still be viable when roused.

Yes, you run the risk of contaminating other beers with Brett, lactobacillus, etc if you use the same CO2 hose.

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Thank You PhelanKA7, I had a heck of a time with this when I screwed up cleaning/sanitizing creating this bug the first time around, bleach bombs didn't even faze it, I thew away everything plastic, fermenters, hoses, air locks, etc, to finally get rid of it.

I made the mistake of keeping a new (contaminated) colander, bleach bombed of corse, guess to many places for bugs to hide, and used it for making cheese, in the pot I use for ice bathing my wort, crapping up my equipment once again, but this time I have kegging equipment involved.

I guess its time to start ordering everything new thats plastic.

Thanks and Cheers

BradleyBrew said:

I'm not sure but I dont think anything would grow or survive without oxygen? I use sulphur in my oak barrel when its not in use to prevent anything from growing. I play around with sours and do not have dedicated equipment, and have yet to cross contaminate (maybe I'm just lucky). It seems like I've been reading more and more about keg contamination on this site. I'm confused how this could happen as most beer is stored under 40 degrees which would prohibit the vast majority of bacterial growth. Are you sure its not happening somewhere else before the beer gets into your kegging system?

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Fermentation is simply metabolism under anaerobic conditions. If that statement was true, we'd all be drinking under-attenuated beer with hardly any alcohol content.

PhelanKA7 said:

No offense, but that's terrible advice. Microorganisms survive just fine in CO2. How else do you think we bottle condition our beers? On top of this these microorganisms can be frozen for years and still be viable when roused.

Yes, you run the risk of contaminating other beers with Brett, lactobacillus, etc if you use the same CO2 hose.

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Question? Can this bug travel back up the Co2 hose into the 3 Way CO2 Distributor and even past that into the regulator, then the tank?

And if so ? then back out to the other two Co2 hoses/kegs ?

If this is the case, Did I just loose a new/complete 3 keg setup including the 20lb tank?

Cheers

pure co2 environment... not with oxygen, and sugar for yeast to consume. the next time I fill up my co2 tank I will be sure to clean it with starsan first.

Based on my own experience, and that of a few of the guys in my homebrew club, I don't think the gas lines are a true concern.

I had a sour on tap from roughly last March or April through the beginning of this January. I also have three other tap lines, with various beers throughout that timeframe. During that timespan, the bug from the sour never travelled back up the CO2 hose, through my 4 way distributor, and back down to any of the other kegs. Also, since the sour kicked, I very thoroughly cleaned the beer lines and the faucet and I've been serving a non-sour beer on that tap ever since, with absolutely no sign of passing the bug from the previous sour beer onto the current beer.

I've got several guys in my club who are sour afficionados (admittedly, this was my first, and probably only one) who do this all the time. While yes, the bugs could survive in the absense of oxygen, so long as you're not goofing up and backing up beer into your gas line, there's no actual food source there for the bugs - they're not going to go where there's no food source. They'll stay in the beer where they're happy and fed. Clean and sanitize your beer line, disconnect, and faucet and you'll be fine.

stratslinger said:

Based on my own experience, and that of a few of the guys in my homebrew club, I don't think the gas lines are a true concern.

I had a sour on tap from roughly last March or April through the beginning of this January. I also have three other tap lines, with various beers throughout that timeframe. During that timespan, the bug from the sour never travelled back up the CO2 hose, through my 4 way distributor, and back down to any of the other kegs. Also, since the sour kicked, I very thoroughly cleaned the beer lines and the faucet and I've been serving a non-sour beer on that tap ever since, with absolutely no sign of passing the bug from the previous sour beer onto the current beer.

I've got several guys in my club who are sour afficionados (admittedly, this was my first, and probably only one) who do this all the time. While yes, the bugs could survive in the absense of oxygen, so long as you're not goofing up and backing up beer into your gas line, there's no actual food source there for the bugs - they're not going to go where there's no food source. They'll stay in the beer where they're happy and fed. Clean and sanitize your beer line, disconnect, and faucet and you'll be fine.

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Thank You stratslinger, Im also thinking/guessing that the bug I have is a contact to transfer type of bug and isn't airborne, since I have other fermenters that were in the same room and don't seem to be affected.

So, that would lead me to believe that like you said the Co2 lines should be ok as long as I didn't back up any beer out of that keg, on that note, I will be replacing the one Co2 hose and keg coupler just to be safe.

As far as cleaning and sanitizing the beer hose on that tap, I really don't it will work on this bug, as even a severe 1 hour bleach bombing with an extreme amount of bleach then a 1/2hr StarSan soaking did nothing to this bug when I tried to drive it out of my plastics the last time.

Thanks and Cheers

BradleyBrew said:

pure co2 environment... not with oxygen, and sugar for yeast to consume. the next time I fill up my co2 tank I will be sure to clean it with starsan first.

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Hello BradleyBrew, just an FYI, the StarSan did nothing to the bug (on Plastics) when I was trying to get rid of it the last time I encountered it, even a severe 1 hour bleach bombing with an extreme amount of bleach then a 1/2 hr StarSan soaking didn't even slow it down in the plastics, however the bleach bomb/StarSan combo did kill it off of any metal and glass brewing equipment.

Cheers

I don't know what I was thinking. Odds of the bacteria going backwards into your kegs are slim but you are likely inoculating your pours which obviously doesn't matter.

BradleyBrew said:

I play around with sours and do not have dedicated equipment, and have yet to cross contaminate (maybe I'm just lucky).

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i have had the same experience with sour / clean beer, i brew both and have them on tap side by side all the time. none of my equipment is dedicated to sour only brewing, it's all used for whatever i'm doing at the time. on the homebrew level it should be pretty easy to clean and sanitize to avoid cross contamination.

I brew several times a week, about half sacc only, half mixed culture. All shared equipment including hoses. i soak in Oxyclean and then star San and no problems. There is no way for a yeast or bacteria to move on its own, much less against the pressure of the co2.

TNGabe said:

I brew several times a week, about half sacc only, half mixed culture. All shared equipment including hoses. i soak in Oxyclean and then star San and no problems. There is no way for a yeast or bacteria to move on its own, much less against the pressure of the co2.

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The pressure of co2 means nothing. Otherwise, I agree that a good oxyclean + starsan regime is enough to contain most bugs. I share most equipment between wilds and clean beers without issue.

I would suggest to the OP to look elsewhere in the process for potential sources of contamination. I'm particularly interested to know what you (OP) mean by "ice bath" that you're using a colander for.

dwarven_stout said:

The pressure of co2 means nothing.

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Doesn't that make the gas line a 'one-way street'?

Won't the cooler temps for serving beer inhibit the growth of the bugs? Also if it did contaminate each glass as poured they don't stay around long enough to notice.

If it really is an issue, you could always bottle bug-beers instead of keg 'em.

TNGabe said:

Doesn't that make the gas line a 'one-way street'?

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Once the pressure equalizes, a few seconds after you connect the line and adjust the pressure, there's no relative pressure in the line.

Chipman said:

Won't the cooler temps for serving beer inhibit the growth of the bugs?

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Depends on the bug, really. Some, the cooler temps (depending on exactly what temp) will inhibit. Some, the cooler temps will slow, but not stop altogether. Some, likely not even that.

Just think about how often you need to pull everything out of your kegerator/keezer/beer fridge and hose it all down to clean up the mold and other nastiness that builds up over time. Sure, it's not the same bugs that are growing inside the beer, but it's the same basic idea - the cold isn't stopping those from growing, so why would it to stop everything in your beer from growing?

eastoak said:

i have had the same experience with sour / clean beer, i brew both and have them on tap side by side all the time. none of my equipment is dedicated to sour only brewing, it's all used for whatever i'm doing at the time. on the homebrew level it should be pretty easy to clean and sanitize to avoid cross contamination.

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Every beer that has come in contact with any plastic that has been in contact with this bug gets infected.

Like I said nothing (and I mean nothing) gets this bug out of your plastics once it touches it.

I can send you a bottle of this bug, if you would like to try adding it to your equipment, then try to get rid of it.

Cheers

dwarven_stout said:

The pressure of co2 means nothing. Otherwise, I agree that a good oxyclean + starsan regime is enough to contain most bugs. I share most equipment between wilds and clean beers without issue.

I would suggest to the OP to look elsewhere in the process for potential sources of contamination. I'm particularly interested to know what you (OP) mean by "ice bath" that you're using a colander for.

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I never said that I was using a colander for a ice bath, I said I used the colander for making cheese (straining whey out) in the same pot that I cooled the wort down in, after washing and sanitizing the pot.

To answer the first part of your question, an Ice bath to me is when you put a pot full of hot wort into a sink or tub filled with ice and water, a colander is not used at this time.
This link will explain the process in detail, some times I add ice to the proses described in the article below. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/entries/cooling-wort-fast-without-chiller.html

Cheers

I just helped a guy with this same problem. It doesn't take sour beer to funk up the whole works. It just takes beer to get into your CO2 lines. Bugs can survive any very harsh conditions. Once beer gets sucked up into your lines, get them clean.

They can't travel, per se, but can be blown through the lines via pressure going to the keg, of back flushed when you release the pressure from a keg that is higher than your regulator setting.

I'm sure all of us take our systems apart every so often to clean them, but most people neglect to take the CO2 lines apart as well. You'd be shocked at how much buildup you get after even a year.

TNGabe said:

I brew several times a week, about half sacc only, half mixed culture. All shared equipment including hoses. i soak in Oxyclean and then star San and no problems. There is no way for a yeast or bacteria to move on its own, much less against the pressure of the co2.

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I think maybe you are confusing equalized pressure with flow, once a system is under pressure it equalizes and becomes stable, its much harder to travel up stream against flow than it is to travel under equalized pressure.

Thats why you can walk around in a pressurized cabin of an jet airplane, the pressure isn't holding you down, now if you open the nose and the tail and let the air flow threw, your not going to be able to get up and walk against that flow of air.

I have 3 kegs all connected to a 3 way manifold, the manifold is then connected to a regulator set at a specific pressure, all kegs and the manifold are at the same equalized pressure.

Cheers

KeystoneHomebrew said:

I just helped a guy with this same problem. It doesn't take sour beer to funk up the whole works. It just takes beer to get into your CO2 lines. Bugs can survive any very harsh conditions. Once beer gets sucked up into your lines, get them clean.

They can't travel, per se, but can be blown through the lines via pressure going to the keg, of back flushed when you release the pressure from a keg that is higher than your regulator setting.

I'm sure all of us take our systems apart every so often to clean them, but most people neglect to take the CO2 lines apart as well. You'd be shocked at how much buildup you get after even a year.

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Thank You KeystoneHomebrew, Im also thinking that my other Co2 hoses and manifold are ok as long as no infected beer has come in contact with them (at-least Im hoping)

I have only had all of my kegging equipment for 3 months now, I don't think any beer infected or not has been sucked back up into the Co2 or manifold as I have been very careful not to introduce a over pressurized keg into the system.

Even when I lowered the pressure to the kegs, I close all 3 valves to the kegs, purge keg pressure, reduce regulator pressure and purge, let regulator and manifold re-pressurize, then open manifold valves going to the kegs.

My concern is that when I take a draw off a un-infected keg, will the pressure differential let the bug go up into the Co2 lines?

Im guessing/pretty sure that this bug is a contact only bug and not airborne, on those lines, any plastic and rubber that has come in contact with the infection (such as ball lock connectors, keg O-rings) will be infected.

I all-ready know for sure that Bleach/Oxiclean/StarSan in any quantity/duration do not kill this bug out of plastic or rubber.

I was just hoping that it didn't crap up the Co2 tank, regulator, manifold, hoses, and the ball lock connectors that have not come in direct contact with it.

And Congrats on 20 years of brewing!

Cheers

WileECoyote said:

My concern is that when I take a draw off a un-infected keg, will the pressure differential let the bug go up into the Co2 lines?

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It certainly can. The problem zone is when a keg is full enough to reach the gas dip tube. Beer can easily get sucked up just like the liquid tube. But even if you filled it 3/4 of the way, just moving it around splashed some beer onto/into that gas dip tube. To combat this, I tell people to always unhook the gas connection to the keg whenever turning pressure down. Obviously turning it up isn't an issue, just down. If I'm making pressure adjustments to get the serving right, I'll drain the keg of CO2 completely, hook it up at 1-2 psi, then keep dialing it up till I'm happy.

WileECoyote said:

Every beer that has come in contact with any plastic that has been in contact with this bug gets infected.

Like I said nothing (and I mean nothing) gets this bug out of your plastics once it touches it.

I can send you a bottle of this bug, if you would like to try adding it to your equipment, then try to get rid of it.

Cheers

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i'll take you up on that, part of the reason i brew everything with the same gear is to see if there really is a superbug out there that can't be defeated by a cleaner and star san. if you have that bug i want it for sure.

eastoak said:

i'll take you up on that, part of the reason i brew everything with the same gear is to see if there really is a superbug out there that can't be defeated by a cleaner and star san. if you have that bug i want it for sure.

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eastoak, PM me with your address and next week Ill check into how much it cost to send you a bottle or 2, if the shipping isn't to bad Ill send.

Oh and don't forget to chill and taste, I promise you'll remember it for a very very long time. lol

Hmmm, I wonder if their is a market for a super sour beer?

Cheers

WileECoyote said:

I never said that I was using a colander for a ice bath, I said I used the colander for making cheese (straining whey out) in the same pot that I cooled the wort down in, after washing and sanitizing the pot.

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Ok. That wasn't clear at all from your original post, so thanks for clearing that up.

I think it's highly unlikely that storing a plastic colander in your pot caused any issues. Since you boil in the pot, you would have killed anything that transferred over.

A few other things to think about as you try to chase down this infection:

1) Make sure you're diluting your cleaners/sanitizers at the proper ratios. Starsan in particular can lose its effectiveness quickly in hard water- if you aren't using distilled water to mix up your starsan, consider switching. Bleach is best used in acidic solution- I don't know if you were adding vinegar to it or not, but there's some helpful topics about that on this forum. Oxyclean seems to work better when you add a little dish soap to the water.

2) try brewing at a friend's house if you can. Fill the carboy there and then bring it home (or leave it there if he's cool with it). Do everything else just how you normally do. What this does is isolate the possibility of an airborne infection in your house.

2a) have your buddy watch you throughout the process and see if he can identify something that you do without thinking about it that could introduce infection into your beer.

3) make sure you've considered all possible sources of infection. You're obviously trying to do this by asking about the kegging lines, so tear those suckers apart and make sure you don't have beer crud up in there. Partially cover your wort during chilling- enough to let steam out, but minimize dust and whatnot landing in it. Don't touch the wort with a wooden paddle or spoon after the boil ends. If you haven't swapped out your airlock stoppers, consider it. Same thing for whatever you use to get hydro samples. How about seals in the kegs?

UPDATE, My wife did some research and came up with, hydrogen peroxided will kill lactobacillus, (always good to have a second set of eyes looking)

The recommended mix was, 50/50 hydrogen peroxide and water, soak items in that mix for 36 hours.

We tried it and it worked great even on hoses and rubber bungs.

Just thought I should share this info.

Cheers

WileECoyote said:

UPDATE, My wife did some research and came up with, hydrogen peroxided will kill lactobacillus, (always good to have a second set of eyes looking)

The recommended mix was, 50/50 hydrogen peroxide and water, soak items in that mix for 36 hours.

We tried it and it worked great even on hoses and rubber bungs.

Just thought I should share this info.

Cheers

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Makes sense. Most things kill lacto, and peroxide kills most things.

dwarven_stout said:

Makes sense. Most things kill lacto, and peroxide kills most things.

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Hello dwarven_stout, Im Not trying to contradict you or start an argument, but from my personal experience and research most things don't kill lacto.

in-fact we tried all kinds of things to kill this lacto infection, even a bleach bombing at a 50/50 ratio, it didn't work, nothing we tried worked.

Hydrogen peroxide works great at killing this infection, and is the only thing that killed this bug.

Cheers

WileECoyote said:

Hello dwarven_stout, Im Not trying to contradict you or start an argument, but from my personal experience and research most things don't kill lacto.

in-fact we tried all kinds of things to kill this lacto infection, even a bleach bombing at a 50/50 ratio, it didn't work, nothing we tried worked.

Hydrogen peroxide works great at killing this infection, and is the only thing that killed this bug.

Cheers

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i'm surprised that you were not able to kill off a lactobacillius with bleach, it's not known to be immune to bleach or star san for that matter.
interestingly, some lactobacilli have a very high tolerance for hydrogen peroxide.

eastoak said:

i'm surprised that you were not able to kill off a lactobacillius with bleach, it's not known to be immune to bleach or star san for that matter.
interestingly, some lactobacilli have a very high tolerance for hydrogen peroxide.

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This was a wild infection, I didn't have lab tested, so there is a possibility it could be something other than lacto.

I guess the "some lactobacilli" having a very high tolerance is why you have to soak items in the hydrogen peroxide for 36 hours to 48 hours to kill it off.

All I know is that hydrogen peroxided at a 50/50 mix (or stronger) worked for me, and nothing else worked.

and StarSan didn't even faze this bug, not in the least.

I was also able to reuse my plastics using this method, instead of throw them away, 6+ batches done now with these plastics and all is good.

I am sharing this information, to help others with an infection that seems to be immune to the common methods of dealing with infections.

Cheers

Update, I am around 25 batches down the road from this infection now and am still using some of the items that we soaked in Hydrogen Peroxide, still no problems, knock on wood.

My hope here is that this information will help give brewers suffering with a persistent infection another means to battle it.

Cheers