Cleaning corny w/Stainless steel brush

[checker]

In the early days, I found that after a keg kicked, there was significant hard water build up on the interior of the keg. Call it calcium carbonate, call it beer stone, don't know except it required a lot of painful, in-keg scrubbing to remove it. Back in the day, I was also in the habit of doing my primary in a corny, which left a lot of braun hefe trub caked in the keg.

So I built a wand out of PVC, stainless steel rope (I think it's 302 from home deposit) and an arbor. Toss some warm water and dish soap into the keg, insert the described reamer, don some rubber gloves and whirl away (gfi, insulated, use at your own risk). Works great.

Question I have is, would this be considered an appropriate method of cleaning the keg? Am I perhaps removing the very stable chromium oxide coating and forcing my beer to recreate it w/potential poor effects? I am chasing a slightly metallic taste in my beers but believe it to be related to brass nipples on my faucets.

Opinions appreciated.

 

[tasq]

Why not just do a pbw soak?

 

[checker]

Why not just do a pbw soak?

I like the mechanical action of the brush over the chemical action of PBW. Plus it takes less time, less water and is cheaper than PBW. That said, I should probably run a line of batches that uses only kegs that have been PBW'd.

 

[audger]

the same reason you dont see people recomending brillo pads- you are taking off the oxide layer that is passivating the steel.

when you have metal on metal contact, you are going to be wearing away at the softer metal. when both are stainless steel, you will wear away at both of them (the brush and the keg).

 

[JetSmooth]

I like the mechanical action of the brush over the chemical action of PBW. Plus it takes less time, less water and is cheaper than PBW. That said, I should probably run a line of batches that uses only kegs that have been PBW'd.

Can't get much cheaper than the generic "Oxyclean" at the Dollar Store. Plus, it actually seems to be more "pure" Oxyclean without the perfumes and detergents and stuff