cleaning a therminator

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joe22

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I just flush it a few times a week for a month letting water set in it then drain it and when i is time to use i run boiling water threw it for 15min. I can keep flushing it and i still get hops out of it. what do other people do and how dose it work for you.
 
What kind of thermometer is it? Never seen one that would be that clogged with hops. Can u post a pic of it?
 
Duh. My bad. Didn't even see that. Im not sure what what that is. plate chiller??? What does it do?
 
Yeah I see it now. Basically a wort chiller. Thanks. I guess that was too stupid of a question for PBHbeer. My bad.
 
Here's what I do (not sure if it's the best option but it's never failed for me.)

After all the wort has been chilled and and the carboys have been tucked away, I take all my fittings and parts and let them soak in warm water with powdered brewery cleaner. I let my plate chiller soak with my fittings as well. After an overnight soak I hook my hose up to the plate chiller with a jumper hose into the wort in side and turn the nozzle full blast. I let it run for about 5 minutes or more but it may be overkill. The bulk of the residue gets flushed out quick.

If you flush it right away you probably don't need to let it soak in anything, just don't let the hop residue dry out and crust up on the inside, that's when it gets ridiculous to clean.

Anyway, this is how I do it, I don't know if it's the "proper" method but it works very well for me.
 
No worries brother there is always something to learn I have a 40 plate chiller ordered and still no clue how I plan on using it
 
After every brew, I put a few gallons of hot water in my mlt, dose it with some PBw and circulate through my chiller and herms coil. I then drain and circulate some clean hot water. No problems yet.
 
passedpawn said:
I used to circulate oxyclean through it, then let it sit for a few days. Now, i just put my hose nozzle against it and give a good blow. That's it. I've run 50 batches of beer through mine.

Just water pressure? I used to blow mine out with compressed air until I moved my compressor. It did get a lot of gunk out.
 
Just water pressure? I used to blow mine out with compressed air until I moved my compressor. It did get a lot of gunk out.

Yea, but I do use a hanging hop basket, so I don't get a lot of hop residue.

I almost didn't buy my Therminator a couple of years ago because I read about folks baking them in their oven. Seems funny now.
 
passedpawn said:
Yea, but I do use a hanging hop basket, so I don't get a lot of hop residue.

I almost didn't buy my Therminator a couple of years ago because I read about folks baking them in their oven. Seems funny now.

Hop bag here too. I certainly would never bake it. That seems like it would make things worse! A good flush with hot water shortly after use seems to do the trick.
 
I've used my 40 plate duda once now and just back flushed with cold santized water. Is that not enough? Should I back and do it with hot oxy water too followed by hot clean water?
 
Everybody will have their own way, here is my way. I brew 10 gallon batches so I have 2 6.5 gallon glass carboys I also need to clean/sanitize.
1. After every brew day, run hose water through the in and out after chilling wort to my fermentation temperature during clean up. (I put this as step 1, b/c that's where it starts from on new brew day.
2. Beginning of new brew day I fill 1 6.5 gallon carboy with PBW and warm/hot water and let it soak for an hour (this accomplishes cleaning carboy and chiller)
3. I siphon/drain carboy full of cleaning solution through the WORT IN on chiller into carboy #2.
4. Carboy #1 is empty, i lift carboy #2 to sink level and put it through WORT OUT on chiller to the sink
5. I do a rinse cycle the same way
6. I do a Starsan cycle the same way

That way everything is cleaned and sanitized and I never see any gunk coming out of the chiller after cleaning.

Thats how I do it.
 
ya, i have not had any problems. it just that no mater how many times i flush it hops still comes out .
 
some times i do and some times i use the hop blocker from blichmann and i can clog it both ways if i use a lot of hops but no matter what i do it still holds hops no matter how much i flush it
 

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