kombat
Well-Known Member
Hey guys. I submitted this content as an article, but it was a little too short to warrant a full article. So I decided to share it here, in case it's still helpful to anyone else. I apologize for not being able to embed the images inline with the post, they're all gathered at the bottom.
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Cleaning your kegerator and keezer lines is important for ensuring the best possible taste from your beer. Dirty taps and lines can impart nasty off-flavors to your beer. When it came time to give my lines their first cleaning, I was presented with the problem of figuring out the best way to do it. I hit up Google to see how other people were doing it. Most approaches involved manually pumping cleaning solution through the lines with a modified hand-pumped sprayer, like the one shown below.
The other most-suggested approach was to push cleaning solution through the lines and taps from a pressurized keg. I was unsatisfied with either of these solutions. While I did indeed build a pump sprayer (for my picnic tap lines), I find it leaks considerably, and requires quite a bit of pumping to be effective. The "PBW-in-a-keg" approach worked fine, but I didn't like wasting CO2 pushing anything other than beer through my lines and taps. I wanted a way that would let me recirculate cleaning solution, rinse water, and Star San through my lines indefinitely, without requiring me to manually continuously pump, or waste valuable CO2.
The solution I came up with was to use my grant and one of my pumps, combined with a new, custom-built length of high-temperature silicone tubing with a liquid-out post on the end, to recirculate cleaning solution through my lines and taps. I constructed the tubing from a simple length of high-temperature silicone tubing, with a barb, hose clamp, threaded nipple, post adapter, and liquid out post on one end. See the photos below.
My "grant" is a simple 2 gallon plastic bucket, with a ball valve and hose barb fitted to the bottom. I usually use it when recirculating my mash, as it gives me a convenient place to check the wort's temperature, gravity, colour, clarity, and pH while recirculating the wort before collecting my first runnings. There's a photo of my grant in action below.
For cleaning, I prepare a gallon or so of PBW solution in my grant and place it beneath the taps. I connect the outlet port from my grant to the inlet of my pump with a length of regular high-temperature silicone tubing. I connect my custom tubing with the liquid out post on the end to the pump's output.
Finally, I connect the tap's liquid quick-disconnect to the liquid out post on the tubing. I open up all the valves and the tap to prime the lines, then plug in the pump.
Voila! Cleaning solution recirculates through the line and tap for as long as I want. I usually let this run for 5 minutes or so. The photos below show the pump and hose attachment in action.
After I'm satisfied that the lines and tap are clean, I unplug the pump, dump the PBW solution, refill the grant with plain water, and run it again to rinse the line. I often do this twice, just to make sure. Then, I'm ready to hook up another keg, or flush the lines with Star San to keep them sanitized until the next keg is ready.
I hope this post has shown you an easy way to tackle the oft-dreaded "line cleaning day" without wearing out your shoulder with a bunch of pumping, or wasting a bunch of CO2.
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Cleaning your kegerator and keezer lines is important for ensuring the best possible taste from your beer. Dirty taps and lines can impart nasty off-flavors to your beer. When it came time to give my lines their first cleaning, I was presented with the problem of figuring out the best way to do it. I hit up Google to see how other people were doing it. Most approaches involved manually pumping cleaning solution through the lines with a modified hand-pumped sprayer, like the one shown below.
The other most-suggested approach was to push cleaning solution through the lines and taps from a pressurized keg. I was unsatisfied with either of these solutions. While I did indeed build a pump sprayer (for my picnic tap lines), I find it leaks considerably, and requires quite a bit of pumping to be effective. The "PBW-in-a-keg" approach worked fine, but I didn't like wasting CO2 pushing anything other than beer through my lines and taps. I wanted a way that would let me recirculate cleaning solution, rinse water, and Star San through my lines indefinitely, without requiring me to manually continuously pump, or waste valuable CO2.
The solution I came up with was to use my grant and one of my pumps, combined with a new, custom-built length of high-temperature silicone tubing with a liquid-out post on the end, to recirculate cleaning solution through my lines and taps. I constructed the tubing from a simple length of high-temperature silicone tubing, with a barb, hose clamp, threaded nipple, post adapter, and liquid out post on one end. See the photos below.
My "grant" is a simple 2 gallon plastic bucket, with a ball valve and hose barb fitted to the bottom. I usually use it when recirculating my mash, as it gives me a convenient place to check the wort's temperature, gravity, colour, clarity, and pH while recirculating the wort before collecting my first runnings. There's a photo of my grant in action below.
For cleaning, I prepare a gallon or so of PBW solution in my grant and place it beneath the taps. I connect the outlet port from my grant to the inlet of my pump with a length of regular high-temperature silicone tubing. I connect my custom tubing with the liquid out post on the end to the pump's output.
Finally, I connect the tap's liquid quick-disconnect to the liquid out post on the tubing. I open up all the valves and the tap to prime the lines, then plug in the pump.
Voila! Cleaning solution recirculates through the line and tap for as long as I want. I usually let this run for 5 minutes or so. The photos below show the pump and hose attachment in action.
After I'm satisfied that the lines and tap are clean, I unplug the pump, dump the PBW solution, refill the grant with plain water, and run it again to rinse the line. I often do this twice, just to make sure. Then, I'm ready to hook up another keg, or flush the lines with Star San to keep them sanitized until the next keg is ready.
I hope this post has shown you an easy way to tackle the oft-dreaded "line cleaning day" without wearing out your shoulder with a bunch of pumping, or wasting a bunch of CO2.
