Deep clean of heavily used plate chiller

[Vale71]

I've had great success keeping my plate chiller spot clean using enzymatic detergents. They're quite effective while being totally non-agressive against metals. The downside is they're quite expensive but on the other hand you only need a spoonful of it so the cost per-batch is actually quite low. I don't know if you can get your hands on them in the States without buying ten pounds at a time but I think it might be worth looking into it.

 

[augiedoggy]

Again, I am not going to “chuck it, trash it, or take it to the dump” The chiller doesn’t come apart. After days of cleaning it 95-99.9% of the crap that was in is cleaned out. I could run 10 gallons through it and nothing but clean water comes out. It’s only after I bake it or soak it in pbw overnight or scrub wort channel with brush that anything comes out. I don’t know if I didn’t describe enough in the original post the current condition of the plate chiller after days of cleaning but again clear water with the rare occasional small black chunk when back flushing. I will chalk it up to misunderstand or me not being descriptive enough but just saying if you guys toss your brewing equipment when it’s this condition I would gladly take it. Picture below is water collected midstream from wort out port.

so what your saying is it actually is fine to use now but you want your cake and to eat it too? Just use it and be done worrying about it.. if you saw the pics of some of the pro plate chillers when they break them open for inspection... you might feel better.. maybe do a google search.
anyway the hops are inert matter now and as long as you sanitize with boiling wort before each use you will be fine.

btw I know some have great sucess with those large inline filters but ive had very mixed sucess myself .. most times they just plug up requiring wasted beer and removal to finish transferring. for my hop spiders or bags work best.

 

[piojo]

Does that hot lye treatment risk copper brazing?

In addition to the problem someone else listed, when unlike metals are bonded together and soaked in an electrolyte, an electrolytic cell is formed. One metal will be protected from rust (hydrogen is evolved on the surface), and the other will slowly start to oxidize (as oxygen is formed). The process is very slow, and may not be harmful depending on what metals are touching. But if I have a choice, I don't leave dissimilar metals in acid/base/salt for longer than necessary. By all means, circulate it with alkaline for as long as it needs! But don't drop it in a bucket of lye and leave for vacation.

 

[VVbrewery]

IMHO you're good to go. With everything you've done that sucker's probably cleaner than a new one. Run hot wort through it to sanitize before chilling and RDWHAH. After all that work you deserve one.

 

[ae4853t]

If you are not getting debris during normal use, then all you need to do is ensure you sterilize it before use. Hook it up to your pump 15 min before the end of boil and recirc it without the cooling water on back into the kettle. You will need to throttle the pump back with the exit valve to prevent the wort from gasping and killing your prime, and you will need to increase the energy input to maintain boil, but it will very effectively sterilize your counter flow, hoses, pump, etc no matter what is in there, given what you say is correct. I've been doing this for years and make great beer. In fact I recirc after flame out to drive the entire kettle down to pitch temp at one time.