Your Keg Washing System? Looking for ideas.

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I agree with others on the K.I.S.S. I do soap and water, and then rinse out with some StarSan and flush the dip tube with StarSan under light pressure. I plan to make a keg washer out of a sump pump I am replacing for other reasons for my Sanke fermenter, so I will probably end up using it for cornies too, but I try not to get overly anal about it. You have alcoholic and likely hopped beer in there to start and you are cleaning it to replace it with similar. Keep it under CO2 pressure and clean and you'll be fine.

People do tend to be overly anal retentive about cleanliness at times. Not everything has to be autoclaved!
 
People do tend to be overly anal retentive about cleanliness at times. Not everything has to be autoclaved!

In general, homebrewers are UNDER-ATTENTIVE when it comes to cleanliness and sanitation.

The alcohol and hops in beer will not prevent bacterial or wild yeast growth. Refrigerating infected beer will slow the growth, but not prevent it.

If I had a nickel for every time I've heard "it tasted fine when I kegged it a couple of weeks ago, now it's got a weird off flavor". ;)
 
In general, homebrewers are UNDER-ATTENTIVE when it comes to cleanliness and sanitation.

The alcohol and hops in beer will not prevent bacterial or wild yeast growth. Refrigerating infected beer will slow the growth, but not prevent it.

If I had a nickel for every time I've heard "it tasted fine when I kegged it a couple of weeks ago, now it's got a weird off flavor". ;)

In the real world that is probably true, but on the "what is your cleaning procedure" threads here on HBT, there is usually stuff as found in this thread. People with 10 step cleaning regiments. If you have a 10 step cleaning regiment, you have way more time on your hands than I!
 
In the real world that is probably true, but on the "what is your cleaning procedure" threads here on HBT, there is usually stuff as found in this thread. People with 10 step cleaning regiments. If you have a 10 step cleaning regiment, you have way more time on your hands than I!
While I'll agree that some folks go above and beyond what's necessary, I think it's beverage suicide to skimp. For me personally, I have no problem in taking an extra 10-15 minutes to clean something if it means there's a substantially less chance that the 4-5 hours of work, plus $40-50 worth of ingredients that goes into brewing up a 10 gallon batch goes down the drain. I mean, the point of it all is to brew the best beer possible, and taking the time to avoid infection is a key part of that.

If I had a nickel for every time I've heard "it tasted fine when I kegged it a couple of weeks ago, now it's got a weird off flavor". ;)
It just happened to me recently. Did a 10 gallon batch of IPA, everything went fine, then kegged it. Gave one keg to a friend, kept the other for myself, and while his tastes exactly where it should be, mine just tastes... wrong. Not infected, not sour, not ruined, just... wrong. And the absolute ONLY thing I can think of that happened was that my keg wasn't adequately cleaned.

Unfortunately, my rather basic cleaning setup will have to remain, however. While I look at the keg cleaning tools on here, like the one written up in BYO, or lamar's behemoth, and think that the (relative) cost is easily offset the first time or two it saves a batch from becoming a sink dumper, I just don't have the room for it, and I'm thinking a lot of brewers out there, specifically apartment brewers, have that same issue. I built a brutus, a fermentation chamber, and a milling station that are all sitting in my garage, and I literally don't have room for anything else (including building Keezer II out of the free 7cf chest freezer I scored on CL!)

Man, I never thought that homebrewing would be something where I accumulated so much stuff!
 
Im brand new to kegging, having just picked up 5 pepsi kegs yesterday. I will likely go the rout of oxyclean soak and elbow grease but was wondering how absolutely necessary it is to remove and clean the posts every time?
 
Im brand new to kegging, having just picked up 5 pepsi kegs yesterday. I will likely go the rout of oxyclean soak and elbow grease but was wondering how absolutely necessary it is to remove and clean the posts every time?

You will certainly want to remove the posts, poppets and dip tubes for the initial cleaning. It would also be a good idea to replace all of the O-rings at the same time. I remove everything every time I clean my kegs, but It's probably not necessary to do so. It doesn't take long to disassemble everything and considering how much time and effort goes into making a batch of beer, I think it's just good insurance. Cleaning and sanitizing are not corners I want to cut.
 
Im brand new to kegging, having just picked up 5 pepsi kegs yesterday. I will likely go the rout of oxyclean soak and elbow grease but was wondering how absolutely necessary it is to remove and clean the posts every time?

Well I have had plenty of times where there was some hop debris in and around the poppit after I removed the posts. No matter how hard you try to keep it out of your fermentor, some hop bits can and do get in. Unless you have something to flush out the tubes, I'd remove em and clean em. Honestly, its not hard.
 
While I look at the keg cleaning tools on here, like the one written up in BYO, or lamar's behemoth, and think that the (relative) cost is easily offset the first time or two it saves a batch from becoming a sink dumper, I just don't have the room for it, and I'm thinking a lot of brewers out there, specifically apartment brewers, have that same issue. I built a brutus...

Ha...My "behemoth" consists of a 3 gallon bucket, some fittings, pipe flange, spray nozzle, and a couple feet of loc-line.

It doesn't have to integrate with my brew rig but I get to reuse the existing RIMS heater and pump. Modularity is the goal. :)

39007_1575070019181_1308495930_31644069_3776120_n.jpg
 
Ha...My "behemoth" consists of a 3 gallon bucket, some fittings, pipe flange, spray nozzle, and a couple feet of loc-line.

It doesn't have to integrate with my brew rig but I get to reuse the existing RIMS heater and pump. Modularity is the goal. :)

39007_1575070019181_1308495930_31644069_3776120_n.jpg

It looks like a Marital Aid. Sorry I have a dirty mind, but it does. Which makes me question just how clean DOES it get your kegs?
 
Not sure what you mean. Looks more like an medieval bidet than anything. :D

I mean it looks like a WEIRD toy for your wife, or some kind of torture device. That blue and orange plastic thing looks like it will wiggle and spin or what not when the water is turned on. Like some kind of Bovine ****** or something. Like said I have a dirty mind
 
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