cleaning beer line

Hey guys.. im building a kegerator with ball lock corny kegs. Now my question is about cleaning the beer lines. Is there any kits to clean the lines with the ball lock disconnect? Also how often do i have to clean the lines?

 

I use this kit, http://www.micromatic.com/draft-keg-beer/line-cleaning-pid-CK-1100.html you still have to remove the "guts" of disconnect, which takes 10 seconds. I put the disconnect, guts and the disassembled tap into a small container. Then pump enough cleaner through to where everything is submerged. Let sit for 15 minutes, then empty pump, flush with cold water and reassemble. On cleaning times you will get 50 different answers.

If you want your beer to taste fresher longer, I recommend at the least once a month. If your beer doesn't last that long, good for you.

 

I run BLC through my taps after I empty a keg, I simply force it through using co2. I run about a gallon through the lines, I get it into the lines and let it sit for about 10 minutes, then run the rest of the gallon through. I flush another gallon or so of hot tap water through it to flush out the cleaner and finish by dismantling the faucet and cleaning that by hand. about every other keg I also use star san as a finishing step. never had an issue thus far with infections or off flavors from funk in the lines.

 

PBW is well known but you may not know it is also a line cleaner. We have professional line cleaners who have been using PBW as their primary alkali for line cleaning for 20 years, mostly in the Pacific Northwest where professional, 3rd party line cleaning is often required by code. Packing the lines at 1 oz per gallon for 10-15 mins is best. Of course, we also have a caustic LLC (Liquid Line Cleaner) and an acid "Acid Line Cleaner" (boring name) but PBW has been shown to completely clear lines blocked with beer stone, so it is sufficient. Following the PBW wash with a sanitizer or final acid rinse once every few times is a good idea. Star San is a bit too high foamy to be our 1st pick; we would recommend our low-foaming acid anionic Saniclean for that one. Sure, an Iodophor will work too but coupling the alkali with an acid rinse insures you've attacked you lines from both ends of the spectrum. Cheers!

 

I do almost the exact same thing.. fill lines with hot BLC for 15-20 min, rinse with rest of BLC, flush with hot water, then run iodophor through. Seems to work pretty well.