Fermenting in 50L kegs and Bucket blasters

[Alex.Tas]

I’m often fermenting ~45 litres in a 50L keg with the centre spear removed, using either a bung and airlock, or the Kegland commercial keg to ball lock adaptor.
Works great, only problem is cleaning the krausen ring off afterwards.

the Kegland bucket blaster looks great, anyone able to chime in with personal experience using the bucket blaster for cleaning sanke kegs after fermenting in them?

As you can’t get a good look at the insides of the keg after running it through the bucket blaster I’m sceptical on how much of the crud will come off without some physical scrubbing.

kegland suggests that the nozzle that comes with the bucket blaster tends to do a better job than most stainless CIP balls, which might be true for tall fermenters, like the ferm zillas or their larger all rounders- but for a short, fat fermenter with lots of crud caked on near the neck of the keg, I would think a rotating CIP would be the better option.

cheers

 

[MHB]

Got talked over recently in this thread.
(1) Sanke Kegs | Aussie Home Brewer
Might be worth a read through
Mark

 

[kadmium]

I’m often fermenting ~45 litres in a 50L keg with the centre spear removed, using either a bung and airlock, or the Kegland commercial keg to ball lock adaptor.
Works great, only problem is cleaning the krausen ring off afterwards.

the Kegland bucket blaster looks great, anyone able to chime in with personal experience using the bucket blaster for cleaning sanke kegs after fermenting in them?

As you can’t get a good look at the insides of the keg after running it through the bucket blaster I’m sceptical on how much of the crud will come off without some physical scrubbing.

kegland suggests that the nozzle that comes with the bucket blaster tends to do a better job than most stainless CIP balls, which might be true for tall fermenters, like the ferm zillas or their larger all rounders- but for a short, fat fermenter with lots of crud caked on near the neck of the keg, I would think a rotating CIP would be the better option.

cheers

I can't say for Sanke kegs, but I can confirm looking at the way the water flows in a clear fermenter thats stubby (snub nose) and flasks it cascades very well.

I would suggest buying a USB Fibre Optic cable from somewhere like FleaBay or similar as a cheap investment to inspect kegs.

 

[kadmium]

 

[philrob]

Off topic, and probably not helpful, but that Micro Inspection Probe might be useful to check the efficacy of your enemas.

Other than that, looks to be a really good price for what you get.

 

[kadmium]

Off topic, and probably not helpful, but that Micro Inspection Probe might be useful to check the efficacy of your enemas.

Other than that, looks to be a really good price for what you get.

I would need an XL then...

 

[MHB]

I just don't want to go there, I mean I really don't!

 

[razz]

View attachment 119592

I immediately thought "Kadmium WTF do you find stuff like that and why? I guess maybe you were a med student in a former life?
Good price though.

 

[Alex.Tas]

Got talked over recently in this thread.
(1) Sanke Kegs | Aussie Home Brewer
Might be worth a read through
Mark

Thanks mark, I found that one via google- I’m hoping to find someone who has used the BB for cleaning 50L kegs following a primary, who can provide some info on how it all went.
Cheers

 

[kadmium]

I immediately thought "Kadmium WTF do you find stuff like that and why? I guess maybe you were a med student in a former life?
Good price though.

Looked at using them to check behind the couches, under work benches in garage, work on the car etc. Once you get one you find a million uses for it.

Can also peep on the missus in the shower...

 

[MHB]

Free tip
If the keg isn't spotless it will pong.
Just fit a coupler (assuming you haven't got the top removable) open the keg and have a good sniff. If you left anything behind after a week or so its really noticeable.
Mark

 

[Grmblz]

Can also peep on the missus in the shower...

You're obviously quite young! Or punching well above your weight!

 

[DarrenTheDrunk]

I would not use the camera for an enema...in case I enjoyed it...just passing on this info for a friend !!!

 

[user 37368]

dirty water pump, some irrigation fittings, spray ball of aliexpress, hot water with perc.



The claim the kl stuff works better than a cip ball is hilarious, I suspect a cip ball just wants more flow rate than their little pump.

 

[Grmblz]

The limitation with submersibles is temperature, I've got a similar setup using a big pond/aquarium pump, works great but I don't go over 30c, which is pretty much the max rated temp for PET anyway so nothing lost there.
I'm in the process of building a cleaning/sanitising station for my stainless stuff and I'm aiming for 65c so an external pump is necessary.

 

[kadmium]

The limitation with submersibles is temperature, I've got a similar setup using a big pond/aquarium pump, works great but I don't go over 30c, which is pretty much the max rated temp for PET anyway so nothing lost there.
I'm in the process of building a cleaning/sanitising station for my stainless stuff and I'm aiming for 65c so an external pump is necessary.

I just drown my pump in hot water and let it rip for kegs. Once it cools to the 40s I let it do the fermenters.

Yeah I found it odd that they think a CIP ball is no good but KK sell an almost identical kit with a CIP ball and it works fine.

I have the KL bucket blaster it works pretty well.

 

[Grmblz]

Yeh, as dibbz says a spray ball requires higher flow/pressure, by using a fixed spray head KL have been able to save a couple of dollars on the pump, no problem with that as long as it works, but just like trump, anything that's not their idea is "rubbish" and doesn't work as well as "their" solution.
What's really amazing is KL is now admitting that a spray ball should be an option, but the m*ron wants to make it from "engineering plastic" you know the same stuff that duo tights are made from, the stuff that melts/splits when exposed to chlorine compounds, the stuff that ***** itself if you get the proportions of STARSAN! wrong ffs, just so they can keep using the weaker pump?
They can't compete on price for a stainless spray ball, so they come up with some bs idea about less pressure needed for a super slippery plastic one, how about just supply a bigger pump, Ahh but that puts the price up, and they're all about rock bottom prices, which is fine if the product is comparable, but they're not comparable, and the pain of poor quality lasts long after the pleasure of a cheap price has been forgotten.
$25 gets you a stainless CIP spray ball (not some melty plastic thing)
$35 gets you a 50Lpm submersible pump (more than enough to spin the spray ball, and blast the crud off))
^ This is what I'm using currently.
I'm not knocking KL, most people will buy on price alone and that's KL's business model, in fairness they have certainly lowered the cost of getting into kegging, and as such increased the numbers of folk getting into that side of the hobby, just wish their QA was a bit (lot) better.

 

[Ballaratguy]

dirty water pump, some irrigation fittings, spray ball of aliexpress, hot water with perc.



The claim the kl stuff works better than a cip ball is hilarious, I suspect a cip ball just wants more flow rate than their little pump.

I use a similar set up that I made up with a CIP ball that I got of evil bay. I also use ABC cleaner from KegKing. Which I often use cold to wash out kegs and fermenters (supposed to use warm)

I’ve found that this works really well about 20 mins cold gets caked on trub from the fermenters

 

[fdsaasdf]

I got the bucket blaster the day it went on sale and have had a spray ball since a few weeks after. It works fine for kegs and up to 30L bucket fermenters - absolutely worth the effort/cost for the cleaning efficiency IMO.

For the 30L conical I had, I just sent the spout up the bottom port it worked quite well but still a little manual effort was needed around the top of the vessel e.g. krausen ring and into the lower recesses like the sample port (and obviously a bunch of TC parts weren't cleaned in place). With my larger spike unitank now it's a similar story - bucketblaster + spray ball does a reasonable job but it's not CIP.

 

[Skiddy au]

I had an Ozito pump and setup like dibbz, and it works well for most of my fermenters. I use the top of a clothes horse to rest them on, but I have now encountered a problem, in that my glass 54lt demijohns (I use them for long term storage of wine/cider) won't sit on this, they're too heavy. Any ideas of what I could use or how I might be able to get them to sit safely upside down?