cleaning beer lines

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lagerlad

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hi all,reached the end of a keg yesterday and want to clean the beer line and tap before putting on the next keg i am thinking i may just replace the beer line and clean the tap with starsan or vwp or would i be better running vwp then water through the system if the latter i presume you have to fill a keg with cleaner then carb it up to force through,is this right..... cheers lagerlad
 
I use oxy as well then run starsan through everything.
I just fill the keg with 3 liters of hot water and mix in the oxy. I let the keg soak for 30 minutes then attach my lines. I don't use co2 since that's such a waste. I went to one of those DIY centers and got a pump spray bottle used for spraying pesticides on trees and such. I cut the end of the hose and attached a gas ball lock. Now I can pump up the keg and force out the cleaner. You have to rinse off the oxy well so it takes a few fills to rinse everything and empty the lines.
 
I use a carbonation cap like this one.
https://www.brewuk.co.uk/carbonation-cap.html
You can get them a lot cheaper on AliExpress but the link to them on there was huge
Just put your favourite cleaning solution, let's say Oxiclean, in a pet bottle, screw on the carbonation cap and clip your beer line corny connector on to it ( it should in fact fit both gas and liquids corny connects) and then open the beer tap on the beer line and just squeeze the pet bottle to get the cleaning solution into to the beer line
It's a easy way to clean a beer line if it's still in use and you feel it need a freshen up
You can also use the cap a a counter pressure filler to fill pet bottles from cornry kegs to use to take beer away to party's ect, just look on YouTube to see how
 
thanks for the input everyone not got time to do this till tomorrow evening so will think it through not sure if the carbonation cap would work for me as it is crusader kegs i have cheers
 
hi all,reached the end of a keg yesterday and want to clean the beer line and tap before putting on the next keg i am thinking i may just replace the beer line and clean the tap with starsan or vwp or would i be better running vwp then water through the system if the latter i presume you have to fill a keg with cleaner then carb it up to force through,is this right..... cheers lagerlad

When a keg kicks, my routine to get it ready for the next fill is;

  1. Thoroughly rinse out the trub/yeast/hops from the keg with a hose
  2. Add about 5 litres of clean water and half a scoop of Oxy-clean
  3. Re-attach lid and seal keg with a bit of CO2
  4. Shake vigorously for 30 seconds or so, then run the solution through the beer line until keg empty
  5. Thoroughly rinse keg with cold water
  6. Add another 5 litres of clean water, seal keg with a bit of CO2, then run through the beer line until keg empty
  7. If you have a new beer to fill the keg right away, perfect. If not, I'll run StarSan through the line, leaving some in the line and the keg until next use.

For the taps, and the keg dip tubes/posts, every other brew I'll completely dismantle and soak in Oxyclean. An old toothbrush is good for getting in all the nooks and crannies!
 
Cheers henteaser ended up removing the tap and fully stripping it down cleaned everything in vwp and reassembled so all should be good might try and sort out a system for future cleaning without dismantling,thanks again for the tips everyone lagerlad
 
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