Soda Smell?

I can’t seem to get the soda smell out of my kegs completely used oxyclean and a carboy brush to clean the inside but I still have a little soda like smell. Also the o-ring smells of soda as well. Will the soda smell alter the taste of my beer?

Break your keg down, and clean everything. Replace your o-rings, and the lid gasket for sure. Also, the tube inside will need to be scrubbed as well. Either google the process or perhaps another G.O.B. can spell it out for you. Either way, after all that, the soda ghost should be exorcised.
Brew On!

You'll never get the smell out of the o-rings. Replace those. As far as the kegs go, let em soak for a 1/2 hour in oxy clean or PBW. Then put a bucket on top of it and flip it over so the top soaks too.

Make sure to take the WHOLE thing apart and soak everything.

rdwj said:

You'll never get the smell out of the o-rings. Replace those. As far as the kegs go, let em soak for a 1/2 hour in oxy clean or PBW. Then put a bucket on top of it and flip it over so the top soaks too.

Make sure to take the WHOLE thing apart and soak everything.

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what he said, root beer is the worst.

Hiijack warning!!!

As an aspiring keg apprentice, should I just buy reconditioned kegs from a homebrew site? How much savings are we talking, for quite a bit of work from the sounds of things?

chillHayze said:

Hiijack warning!!!

As an aspiring keg apprentice, should I just buy reconditioned kegs from a homebrew site? How much savings are we talking, for quite a bit of work from the sounds of things?

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Go for it. I got 4 for $100 shipped off ebay. They're a little dented in a few places (especially the rims), but they were worth it!

chillHayze said:

Hiijack warning!!!

As an aspiring keg apprentice, should I just buy reconditioned kegs from a homebrew site? How much savings are we talking, for quite a bit of work from the sounds of things?

Click to expand...

It's not that much work. It takes 5 minutes to take a keg apart and it's a good thing to know how they're assembled anyway. The soaking time is just set it and forget it.

Personally, I wouldn't trust anyone to clean a keg as well as I'd want it cleaned.

As everyone has said, replace all the o rings. It is a good idea anyway.
For the keg itself, the book I got with my system recommends filling the keg with water and adding 1 cup of baking soda. Let the keg soak overnight then rinse well. I did this with an old root beer keg and it worked quite well. You only have to do this one time (unless you keg a root beer in it some time)

I filled the ones I cleaned up with water and added a cup or so of Borax. I let it sit a couple days and then flipped it over for a couple more. Rinsed them out and there was no hint of soda smell

I think when detergents adds say "contains color safe bleach" that means it has some borax in the mix.