Keggle Cleaning - Exterior

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Dunkelbrau

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Ive googled and googled and googled on this all of last night and all of today between household jobs.. and i couldnt find a bloody thing that helped me in Australia.

Ive just acquired my first (legal) keg to convert to a keggle, slowly getting bits together to go AG and looking to start BIAB with a 50L Keg on a gas burner we have here already, and eventually move to a 3v setup.

Now, the inside is pretty damn clean, and i will obviously clean it out well before using it. Its still a while off.

I have a few rust marks on the outside (surface rust only, nothing bad) and some very dirty looking sections. I like clean things, not super polished second coming of Jesus shiny, but just something clean and tidy looking.

The only things i can find on google to clean the exterior with is Bar Keepers Friend, which obviously we dont have here.. The question - what is a good substitute? I went at it with some "metal magic" i had laying around the garage from cleaning some chromed drum lugs, worked shit on those, so i didnt have any hopes for it, but gave it a crack anyway! I heard any oxalic acid cleaner will work, but down at bunnings and the local coles, nothing actually has ingredients listed.

Cheers!
 
Boat shop sells hull cleaner that is phosphoric acid. I have been using it to do the same only it's on a really old keg and trying to.clean the inside up. It has cleaned nearly all of it off. Will need some more goes. Not sure on price tho.
 
Your CLR type products should contain oxalic acid. I have tried to get rid of rust on SS and it is hard without the good stuff. I tried neat starsan (~50% phos) on some keg fittings with a little rust and got no significant results out of it.

You might be able to find nitric acid in the concrete section of the hardware store. Obviously use extreme caution and PPE with anything like that.
 
I know that bore pump clarifying agents are also generally dry oxalic acid.
 
'marine clean' is like 85% phosphoric acid
i work on prawn boats and we get the stuff in 20l cubes for cleaning up rust
dont get it on anything galved/brass/copper, it works absolutely magic on 316 stainless though

should probably be said though that its pretty serious stuff that i wouldnt want in my shed/house and ive been using the stuff for years
although i doubt 'average joe' can get that stuff, i dont think marine chandlery places even stock it (or atleast they probably shouldnt)

the other stuff you probably can get is 'septone gelcoat restorer' ive used it a few times when we ran out of marine clean, its a lot weaker so i used it straight or 50/50 diluted depending how bad the rust was
http://www.cleaningshop.com.au/contents/en-us/p797.html
 
I just buy 85% phosphoric acid from grain and grape.
http://www.grainandgrape.com.au/product_in...roducts_id=7493

I'm pretty happy with it in my brewery but I tend not to drink it. It's mainly for adjusting water/mash pH but I also use it to clean rust off various items, both brewing and non brewing related.

Grab a sponge and some nitrile gloves and either wear safety equipment or just don't be an idiot and splash it in your eyes/nose/arsehole/sister's mouth.
Works best for me when I allow items to soak in water and phos. acid so may not be viable for your purposes.
 
There is a supplier of bar keepers friend in Australia. Will try and find the email they sent me when I enquired.
 
Cheers guys, I'll probably head to bunnings tomorrow at some point and have a look in different sections than cleaning, I can probably get some phosphoric acid from the old man, they use it at his work.

I was wondering what the go is with scrubbing and passivating as well, I've seen some guys hit it hard and basically take a layer off, then passivate it with oxalic as mentioned on palmers website, does phosphoric do the same?
 
Cheers man!

Ordered some just then, see how it goes. Every single website i visited looking for what to use raved about this stuff, lets see if its all its made out to be.

If all else fails, i'll just grab some phosphoric and try that, if that doesnt work, i'll live with it haha.

Cheers guys!


if you have no luck take it to your local stainless fabricator and get them to use their tig brush on it they use a solution of hydrofluric/nitric acid with a carbon fibre brush that has an electrical current going through it and will clean it up in seconds works just like electropolishing if they dont have a tig brush they will have pickling paste its a gel with the same acids in it and will work just as good but will take a few minutes to happen both of these will leave an new oxide layer on the stainless as they pasivate aswell
 
I think the deck cleaning products use oxalic acid. Think it's 10-15%
 
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