Recommend a good Beer Line Cleaning Kit?

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StankAle

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I saw this Beer Line Cleaning Kit on Micromatic's website. I wanted to know if it a ripoff or is it worth buying?
I just built a Sanyo 4912 with a dual tower. I want to clean/sanitize the beer lines and faucets before first use.
I have read many posts about using Beer Line Cleaner (BLC) but I do not know how I would get the BLC through my beer lines without a pump of some kind.
Thanks in advance.
Dustin
 
I have heard good things about BLC on this forum myself. I don't think you really need that kit. I think you can just put some BLC solution in your keg with some pressure on it and then run it through the lines. Pull it through to the tap and then shut off the tap and let it sit for a while and clean the lines. When you're done you can just run some water through the same way to rinse it out.
 
There is a guy on brewboard that devised a way to clean his beer lines with a 20 oz. soda bottle and a carbonator cap. I use that method every time, and it works awesome.

You need a carbonator cap and the spare soda bottle, and some BLC.

Essentially what you do is you fill the soda bottle with the BLC mixture, put the carbonator cap on the bottle, hook it up to your gas line, pressurize it to about 30 psi, flip it over, and open your tap. The BLC is forced through the beer line. You can do this once or twice and then rinse.

It takes me less than 15 minutes to clean all 4 of my taps.
 
Dude said:
There is a guy on brewboard that devised a way to clean his beer lines with a 20 oz. soda bottle and a carbonator cap. I use that method every time, and it works awesome.

You need a carbonator cap and the spare soda bottle, and some BLC.

Essentially what you do is you fill the soda bottle with the BLC mixture, put the carbonator cap on the bottle, hook it up to your gas line, pressurize it to about 30 psi, flip it over, and open your tap. The BLC is forced through the beer line. You can do this once or twice and then rinse.

It takes me less than 15 minutes to clean all 4 of my taps.
That is a pretty slick idea. Thanks man!! Such small amount of waste too.
 
Every 2-3 kegs, I put about a gallon of BLC in an empty corny keg and push half a gallon through each faucet. Then flush with water followed by some starsan.

Doesn't take too long and I shake the corny when it has BLC/water/starsan in it to clean the inside of the corny at the same time. So when I'm done, I have a sanitized corny under pressure, so it's ready to have beer racked into it.
 
I bought the cleaning kit from AustinHomebrew and it works really well, takes me about 10 minutes to BLC, rinse and starsan a line (this includes complete disassembly and cleaning of the faucet).
 
I have a cleaning kit that came with my kegerator. It has a Sanke tap though so I hadn't been using it, I was just using a keg full of oxi clean and then fresh water whenever I am cleaning a keg. Using a full keg helps save CO2.

I have now converted the cleaning kit to use Cornie fittings.
 
I bought a 2 quart hand pump sprayer and took the noozle off and threaded (er, cross threaded) in it's place a beer out keg post. I just mix up some BLC, put it in the sprayer, pump it up and hook it up to the beer line disconnect.
 
I fill a keg with warm water and run that through the lines, then i fill the keg with BLC solution and run that through the lines. Lastly I fill the keg with StarSan and run that through the lines. I just use the CO2 to push everything through. My 10lb CO2 tanks last so long, i dont worry about the little bit of CO2 i am wasting.
 
Dude said:
There is a guy on brewboard that devised a way to clean his beer lines with a 20 oz. soda bottle and a carbonator cap. I use that method every time, and it works awesome.

You need a carbonator cap and the spare soda bottle, and some BLC.

Essentially what you do is you fill the soda bottle with the BLC mixture, put the carbonator cap on the bottle, hook it up to your gas line, pressurize it to about 30 psi, flip it over, and open your tap. The BLC is forced through the beer line. You can do this once or twice and then rinse.

It takes me less than 15 minutes to clean all 4 of my taps.

Hi Dude,
Can you tell me exactly how you hook it up?
I bought a carbonator from the link you provided, but now I'm not sure to connect it. I can undo the co2 hose from the keg, and just stick the hose onto the carbonator, but that's not gonna do the job. What connectors to I need,and how do I do it? Thanks!
 
paradise,
once it's pressurized unhook from gas line, connect to beer line, flip the bottle upside down, open the faucet and the solution is forced out
 
Dude said:
There is a guy on brewboard that devised a way to clean his beer lines with a 20 oz. soda bottle and a carbonator cap. I use that method every time, and it works awesome.

You need a carbonator cap and the spare soda bottle, and some BLC.

Essentially what you do is you fill the soda bottle with the BLC mixture, put the carbonator cap on the bottle, hook it up to your gas line, pressurize it to about 30 psi, flip it over, and open your tap. The BLC is forced through the beer line. You can do this once or twice and then rinse.

It takes me less than 15 minutes to clean all 4 of my taps.

It what I do, but you should change out your connections. I use Black Beer connectors with 1/4" NPT connectors. I unscrew them, disassemble them, and soak them in BLC during this process. I then screw on a gray gas ball lock connector and use it to push hot water followed by hot BLC through my lines.

While I let the lines soak, I rinse the black ball lock connectors and reassemble them. I'll run water through the lines and life is good.

Total cost to change 3 ball locks over is still less than most kits.
 
I got that kit with my kegerator and it's not that great. The pump doesn't build up much pressure and you really have to pump the s*** out of it to get the fluid flowing. Once you get over the hump in your system gravity takes over and it siphons out. I won't buy another one when this one gives out completely, but I'll use it till then.
 
There is a guy on brewboard that devised a way to clean his beer lines with a 20 oz. soda bottle and a carbonator cap. I use that method every time, and it works awesome.
You need a carbonator cap and the spare soda bottle, and some BLC.
Essentially what you do is you fill the soda bottle with the BLC mixture, put the carbonator cap on the bottle, hook it up to your gas line, pressurize it to about 30 psi, flip it over, and open your tap. The BLC is forced through the beer line. You can do this once or twice and then rinse.

This sounds like a great idea... I had a question about fittings conversion as I try to think out a real convenient setup so I won't have an excuse not to clean regularly --
Do they make a fitting that will convert from the 1/4 MFL threads of the ball lock to a male 7/8 fitting that would easily mate with my faucet line wingnut?
(Or from a ball lock with a 1/4 Barb, to the 7/8). (Even with short lengths of hose would be OK, but I couldn't find fittings to be able to screw in the faucet line easily.)
Thanks for a great suggestion!
John
 
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