Have you tried a pressure washer? Lye?
If none of those work, bail on that keg and get a new one. Once you have a good clean keg, clean it immediately after each use and it will be very easy to clean.
I use a 2' TC cap drilled and tapped to accept a compression coupler for the racking cane and a NPT to accept a T which has a Gas-in post and an adjustable PRV.
Works great, and I would not change a thing.
FWIW, I added thermo wells and wish I hadn't. Taping the sensor to the outside with a bit of insulation is way less cyclic.
Need some help please -
Can an infection be spread by the PRV?
Any help would be appreciated
thanks Kevin
Your cleaning regiment sounds good so I am puzzled. The quick answer to this question is: if, you can't clean out the PRV well and humidity from fermentation is able to possibly go back into the fermentor... then yes. This was a concern of mine early on and so I use a water filter housing for my spunding setup. Then, all I have is tubing leaving the fermentor to worry about cleaning and it is impossible for anything to get back into the fermentor. Beer out-gassing is incredibly sticky so I have tried to minimize that in my spunding valve or PRV as much as is possible, yet it still gets sticky. That is all I can think of to help you out. Some use a whole other keg as I do the water filter housing.
I take mine apart and clean it. I haven't bought the one like you have yet. I recommended it because it works better to release pressure, but I didn't know you couldn't take it apart. I need to buy another one because both of mine have corroded where the steel meets the brass. I may make one in machine shop out of stainless and be done with it.Interesting point -
How do you clean the valve?
Do you still use a water barrier to separate the spunding valve from the keg?
I see a lot of folks who have the valve screwed right onto the TC hardware that seems like you would have to clean that all every time.
so I have all my parts on order and they should arrive today. one question though what gauge psi should I get 0-30, 0-60 0-100 and should this be liquid filled or dry? I'd think dry would be fine. I am getting the gauge for free from a vendor for the price of a 12oz homebrewed beer.
-=Jason=-
I take mine apart and clean it. I haven't bought the one like you have yet. I recommended it because it works better to release pressure, but I didn't know you couldn't take it apart. I need to buy another one because both of mine have corroded where the steel meets the brass. I may make one in machine shop out of stainless and be done with it.
The water barrier helped keep everything but the sticky gas out of the valve, but didn't 100% fix the problem of the valve getting sticky.
I started out with the valve right on the TC, I had to clean it every time.
At some point the pressure release stopped right? At that point liquid could come back out of the valve.
Kevin, I can't see that your setup would do what I mentioned unless you picked up your spunding setup allowing anything to go back in the fermentor. I just find it hard to believe that that many kegs would taint the brews you have done. This makes me think either: 1) something is happening during your fermentation (ie pressure ramp too high too fast making the yeast through off flavors, which I don't see from your procedures posted) or 2) you are tainted prior to entering the fermentor either with transfer tubing, chiller, or airborne during your chill. I really don't know! You may have to wait until you try your carboy beer to really tell.Not trying to argue ... trying to understand so stay with me please.
Here is my new setup -
I dont see how any liquid could go back through all this hose and fittings, gas maybe? You said liquid though, just trying to make sure we are on the same page.
thoughts?
thanks Kevin
So it's been a while since I read the first page. I'll reread it but are most people going straight from pitching yeast to using the prv? Or using a blow off tube and then putting the prv on?
Based on a comment from WortMonger, for my first batch, I went straight to PRV after pitching and fermented to 10 psi for the majority prior to ramping up for carbonation. I've read from others that they ferment at a lower psi ~3-5. Not sure of any attenuation differences of the selected value but my first batch went fabulous!
Great! How much are you fermenting and in what size container? Curious if you had any krausen foam problems? Also, what hardware are you using (regular tap connector or something else)? Any buffer from keg to PRV or are you right on top with it?
Kevin, I can't see that your setup would do what I mentioned unless you picked up your spunding setup allowing anything to go back in the fermentor. I just find it hard to believe that that many kegs would taint the brews you have done. This makes me think either: 1) something is happening during your fermentation (ie pressure ramp too high too fast making the yeast through off flavors, which I don't see from your procedures posted) or 2) you are tainted prior to entering the fermentor either with transfer tubing, chiller, or airborne during your chill. I really don't know! You may have to wait until you try your carboy beer to really tell.
Based on a comment from WortMonger, for my first batch, I went straight to PRV after pitching and fermented to 10 psi for the majority prior to ramping up for carbonation. I've read from others that they ferment at a lower psi ~3-5. Not sure of any attenuation differences of the selected value but my first batch went fabulous!
haeffnkr - Do you force carb after kegging, or do you naturally carb by cranking up the spunding and transfer to serving under counter-pressure?
haeffnkr - how about trying to brew a cheap batch with a drilled stopper and air lock in lieu of the spunding valve. I'm guessing it's the source of your infection.
This is what I do, dump wort into fermenter at around 80-90 (hard to get it lower in san diego without a prechiller), the fermenter sits inside the stand up fridge so when it gets to around 75 I pitch the yeast, turn the prv to around where I know it will get to 10 psi and let it ferment. Now, on my last batch I took my stout to 20 psi on the last few points of gravity so it could naturally carb but then when I had to drop in some vanilla beans, so I started letting the gas vent, I must have done it too quickly because when I opened the lid, foam came out like crazy!
How do you guys do this when you have to put hops in or any other stuff?
How do you guys do this when you have to put hops in or any other stuff?
Pickles mentioned doing secondary additions in the serving keg. I just did this with some hops and it was great. Put the additions in prior to pressurizing so you don't expose to oxygen.
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Hmm, maybe I'm not following, but why did you open the keg after transferring onto vanilla beans? Did you use the spunding valve to counter pressure fill the keg from the conical? If you did it sounds like you just need to slow things down a bit.
It will come out great then. Did you check gravity when you got back? Might be done and ready for carbonation already.
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I've read that this technique will suppress ester production this allowing fermentation at higher temps. Anyone have experience fermenting in the higher temperature range?
Yesterday afternoon I pitched a starter into 60F wort, set spunding valve to 7psi and closed up the ferm chamber set at 63F. I then left town to go to a wedding. When I returned 24 hrs later I found the GFCI tripped and temp was at 73F and 7psi. I'm assuming in that time that not a whole lot of off flavors were generated but it got me curious about how high people have pushed things.