Designing an easy to clean brewing system

[jmccraney]

After puttering along on my 5 gal cooler and keggle system, I'm looking to upgrade to a shiny new single-tier half-barrel direct-fire RIMS brewhouse. One of my biggest complaints with the old system is that it has been a major PITA to clean. All the nooks and crannies of the patchwork keggle, plus each tube in the cooler's manifold collect grime no matter how much I scrub. I've seen a lot of nice builds on here and was curious if that experience has taught you anything about making an easy to clean system.

My current thought is that I want to be able to pump hot PBW or other cleaner through all the tubing and add a spray ball to basically CIP the mash tun, kettle, chiller, and all the pumps and tubing. Does this sound feasible? It probably would mean I should avoid threaded fittings where I can, so tri-clamp fittings on the kettles, but I'm probably still stuck with threaded fittings on the pumps. Is this a major concern? Anything about pump selection I need to be aware of? Being able to drain them a certain way?

Thanks in advance for the cleaning advice, and any other advice as well while I start this new build.

 

[jmccraney]

Oh, forgot to mention I'm looking at using butterfly valves on the kettles. A) because if they're running to pumps they'll always be open and B) because it seems like I could clean them with a good cleaner recirc vs ball valves which you're supposed to disassemble.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Weezy]

You can always run boiling water through it all to sterilize the nooks and crannies.

 

[jmccraney]

True, that works for sterilization of the chiller, but I think my bigger concern design-wise is how to first get everything clean.

 

[Weezy]

Same as the pros. Scrub what you can reach, pump/recirc cleaner then sanitizer though the rest. That's what has to be done on hard plumbed systems.

 

[jmccraney]

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Any design recommendations? Just trying to avoid having that one crevice or joint that never gets cleaned right. I know the pros use caustic, but is pbw sufficient? I've never used it in this context