Sanke sanitation.

[sawbossFogg]

I've perused the threads and there are some fancy rigs out there that I'm far from building. I remove my spears and use sanke kegs. I sanitize by filling with hot PBW and push through one of my tap lines, open the keg again, rinse very well, fill with clean water and again push volumes through the tap line. This cleans my kegs and taps, but is labor intensive and uses bottled gas. Is there another way to confidently ghetto clean the sanke spear? I'm not worried about the keg, PBW takes care of that, but the spear is my concern. Any help would be appreciated thanks.

 

[itsme6582]

First of all. PBW is not a sanitizer. It is a cleaning agent. It will not effectively sanitize your equipment.

Difficulties with cleaning sankes is a big reason why so many people use corny kegs for homebrew. I don't know how you could effectively clean the inside of the keg without removing the spear and that is probably the most difficult part. Once you get the spear out you could use something like the carboy cleaner to scrub the keg. You could easily clean the spear with a bottle brush. I would probably just remove the spear and soak the keg overnight with Oxyclean. With the spear out, you could just dump it, rinse it, and let it dry upside down. Sanitize with a proper sanitizer and put the spear back in. No CO2 used but plenty of work.

You can also clean your beer lines by adapting something like this
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/diy-beer-line-cleaner-226497/

 

[sawbossFogg]

OK, thanks for the reply, but... As I wrote I remove my spears easily with a nice tool from Sabco. Correct, excuse me, PBW is a detergent like the ever-popular OxyClean. What I need people to share with me are methods for cleaning the spear. The spring and ball are the harborer of funk. Thanks for the link, I'll check it out...right, that is a great tap line cleaning method.

 

[JuanMoore]

I do the same as you, and every few uses I also take the spear apart and get all the nooks and crannies clean. I made a tool out of a scrap of ABS pipe for getting the spring on/off of the spear, but recently saw a thread where someone was using a caulking gun. I'd be interested in an easier method as well.

 

[sawbossFogg]

I do the same as you, and every few uses I also take the spear apart and get all the nooks and crannies clean. I made a tool out of a scrap of ABS pipe for getting the spring on/off of the spear, but recently saw a thread where someone was using a caulking gun. I'd be interested in an easier method as well.

Huh, I must have missed this post earlier, thanks. That's one thing haven't done and is my primary concern, cleaning the spear.