Mark II keg washer

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Arbe0

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Just bought a Mark II keg and carboy washer. It was a suggestion by a friend who loves his. Most info I see shows cleaning with PBW which is something I always do. But with the keg cleaner and using PBW it doesn't show rinsing. I have always thought that you need to rinse the PBW off kegs etc. after you clean them. So do I just empty the washer and rinse it so I can put clean water into it for rinsing a keg or just take it to the faucet and rinse it?
 
Sorry dude but that thing looks like its more trouble than its worth. A simple rinse in the tub or hose will do the same thing. That being said I just rinse with water. Lots of folks will say thats no sterile. I've never had an issue. There is more chlorine in tap water than I care to think about. Plus as far as the keg goes it already has alcohol in it by that time...killer of everything....dont sweat it
 
Rinse with clean water. Water isn't sterile, but you are cleaning, not sterilizing as JR said.
If I had one and was cleaning multiples, I'd run pbw (ho-made) and hose rinse each as it came off. Cap/seal or fill immediately within reason. Personally, I'd do a quick starsan shake&swirl and dump into the next vessel and repeat, but thats just me.
 
I wouldn't rinse using the keg cleaner as the pbw your rinsing out of the keg/carboy will just be getting recirculated back into the keg. Ideally use it to clean then rinse with clean water in the sink. Then do a starsan purge and your good to go. Cheers
 
I normally boil some water with PBw and put it in the keg and seal it, shake it, push on the "out" popit to clean out the diptube. then I take everything apart and clean that, then rinse several times. A little star san in the clean keg, and seal it until I need it.
But a Friend says this thing is so much easier, he swears by it. I am going to try it out. Probably just rinse it out after the PBW.
 
I normally boil some water with PBw and put it in the keg and seal it, shake it, push on the "out" popit to clean out the diptube. then I take everything apart and clean that, then rinse several times. A little star san in the clean keg, and seal it until I need it.
But a Friend says this thing is so much easier, he swears by it. I am going to try it out. Probably just rinse it out after the PBW.
Definitely a must have. I made one outta a few 5 gallon buckets. I like it uses so little water. I also use it to clean my tap lines. Cheers
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I bought one used from someone getting out. If it broke tomorrow, I’d pay full price for a new one or try to make one very similar. Literally set it and forget keg cleaning. Tablespoon of PBW, bout a gallon of hot water and let it run for 20-30 mins.

I rinse mine with a hose afterwards, seal the lid and blast a bit of CO2 in there.

When I go to use the keg after, I do a quick hose rinse and star San in it prior to filling. Couldn’t be easier.
One thing I have started doing is quick rising the pump of the PBW water, not a long rinse but a good flush thru it in the sink before I put the whole thing away.
 
Yes, rinse it out. You can spray it out or dump a pint of water in it, swish around, dump, repeat a couple times.

No need to reset the keg washer for that purpose. This is how I do it:

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I love my Mark II keg and carboy washer I line everything up and just swap them as I go about my brew day it's awesome and saves you money in the long run on cleaning supplies
 
I have a Mark II, it works quite well on kegs, hot PBW cuts resinous hop deposits better than scrubbing.
But it sucks eggs on carboys.
I rinse kegs in the sink as it's easier than using the Mark II...

Cheers!
 
I have a Mark II, it works quite well on kegs, hot PBW cuts resinous hop deposits better than scrubbing.
But it sucks eggs on carboys.
I rinse kegs in the sink as it's easier than using the Mark II...

Cheers!

I made one with a stronger pump and a CIP ball for a little cheaper than the MKII and it works great on my carboys.
 
Just tried it today. Rinsed the keg before I used the keg washer, it was nice to just let it do its work and gives me time to mess with other things.
I used hot water in the keg washer, after it cleaned, I did it again with fresh water because the first rinse was kind of dirty water. I think I am going to be happy with it.
Thanks everyone for the feedback. Have a great day.
 
As far as sanitizing I plan to just put a little starsan in the keg (as I always do) seal it, put co2 on it and leave it until I need it. Shake it up to get all the starsan on the inside of the keg and drain when I need to use it.
 
As far as sanitizing I plan to just put a little starsan in the keg (as I always do) seal it, put co2 on it and leave it until I need it. Shake it up to get all the starsan on the inside of the keg and drain when I need to use it.
Have you considered doing a starsan purge and a closed transfer? It can increase your shelf life considerably. Cheers
 
Just tried it today. Rinsed the keg before I used the keg washer, it was nice to just let it do its work and gives me time to mess with other things.
I used hot water in the keg washer, after it cleaned, I did it again with fresh water because the first rinse was kind of dirty water. I think I am going to be happy with it.
Thanks everyone for the feedback. Have a great day.

This is a good practice to do a quick hose out rinse so you aren't recycling brown water.

Depending on how dirty the keg is dictates whether I do a hard hose pre-spray. Either way a heaping tablespoon of PBW and hot water gets them clean while I'm doing other things.

This is the value in the product, set it and forget it !!
 
I have stored my Star San in a keg with Co2. when I need it I can just hook it up and push the star san into the new clean keg ,shake it up, then dump the star san and fill again with Co2 and the new beer hoping to not oxygenate the beer. But that takes a keg that wont have beer in it.
 
I'm happy with my SS BrewTech Keg washer that I just picked up, PBW, Rinse, and StarSan Buckets for 10 mins each. I think it does a good job
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Does the Mark II keg washer work well with kegs that you ferment in? I have a lot of crud on the top of my kegs from where the fermentation line is. I wasn't sure if this keg washer does a good job of spraying that part, or if it's more towards the bottom of the keg (which is where non-fermenting kegs may get more dirty).
 
Does the Mark II keg washer work well with kegs that you ferment in? I have a lot of crud on the top of my kegs from where the fermentation line is. I wasn't sure if this keg washer does a good job of spraying that part, or if it's more towards the bottom of the keg (which is where non-fermenting kegs may get more dirty).

It squirts up to the bottom of the inverted keg and then the cleaning fluid flows down the inside sides. It isn't like a CIP ball that is spraying everything. I think if you had kegs you'd fermented in you would want something like a CIP ball to work on it.

The pump that came with mine has a 1/2" NPT female connection on the top, so, assuming a new one was the same (likely is), you could not only clean kegs that had just held beer, but you could also have a CIP ball in place of the normal plastic pipe so you could work on kegs used for fermentation.

There's a bunch of those on this page https://www.amazon.com/s?k=cip+ball&ref=nb_sb_noss_1 so all you'd need is a short NPT 1/2" nipple to connect to the pump.

FWIW, when I clean my conical after fermentation, I usually spray down the krausen ring in the conical. I see no reason not to try to quickly dislodge that stuff before putting it through the CIP regime.
 
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Thanks, that's helpful. I ferment and serve out of the same keg, so the krausen ring has usually been there for at least a month by the time I wash the keg. These keg washers get good reviews, so I'll likely get one.

I had a keg kick yesterday. I sprayed the krausen ring in the kitchen sink to dislodge what I can, and then I filled it halfway with warm water and a little oxiclean, put on the lid, then let it sit for a few hours. The Mark II seems to be quicker (although a little more time consuming to set it up, compared to just filling a keg and letting it sit), and it could also be used for cleaning draft lines.
 
I like the concept of this keg washer, mostly because it makes it possible to effectively clean kegs without having to fill them.

One thing I can't help but wonder, though: if the system uses some kind of submersible fountain-type pump, doesn't that pump get all clogged up from the gunk in the keg as that small volume of cleaner circulates? Or do you have to "pre-clean" the kegs to blast off all the biggest bits of crud before using this keg washer contraption?
 
My Mark II is key tool in my brewery. If I was buying today I'd consider the SS Brewtech unit but really Mark's works fine. I have added the liquid and gas connectors similar to the SS using tubing for when I don't feel like doing a full keg disassembly. It needs about a gallon of cleaning solution and I clean 3-6 kegs at a time with it. If I were cleaning all those kegs by doing full volume fills and soaks I would need to use up to 15-30 times the PBW that I use for keg cleaning (5x per keg to achieve same concentration, and doing the fill and soak the PBW is spent when you move on to keg 2).

I've recently added a bucket heater controlled by an inkbird to maintain temps while cleaning. I'm finding PBW works great to clean kegs when it is nice and hot but not as well as it cools down (one of those days I am cleaning 6 kegs for example).

I also find the pump useful for other brewery applications. Id did a decent job CIP my conical until I got the CIP ball and it is great for cleaning beer lines in my kegerator.

OPs other question...yes I just rinse the kegs in the sink with hot tap water after cleaning and then let them dry upside down. When time to sanitize I do a full star-san push keg to keg.
 
Does the Mark II keg washer work well with kegs that you ferment in? I have a lot of crud on the top of my kegs from where the fermentation line is. I wasn't sure if this keg washer does a good job of spraying that part, or if it's more towards the bottom of the keg (which is where non-fermenting kegs may get more dirty).
I don't have the commercial Mark II washer, but I built my own with a sump pump, 5-gallon bucket and fittings. I ferment and serve from the same keg, and it does a great job knocking off all the krausen ring, hop crud, and yeast cake. The key is powerful flow rate and HOT PBW.
 
Does the Mark II keg washer work well with kegs that you ferment in? I have a lot of crud on the top of my kegs from where the fermentation line is. I wasn't sure if this keg washer does a good job of spraying that part, or if it's more towards the bottom of the keg (which is where non-fermenting kegs may get more dirty).

Yes. I use mine this way on my ferm-n-serve keg, and it cleans the hoppy krausen line just fine in about 20min runtime, then rinse 2-3 times w clean water from hose or sink, pushing last clear water rinse out through dip tube.
 
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