aluminium friendly cleaner

[oliverm]

Hi all

I need to clean and sterilise some aluminium easy kegs.

I have chempro oxi, bruclean, barrel cleaner and anti-something-I've-forgotten.

I've been told by separate people that all of them are unsuitable for aluminium.

Can anyone recommend a cleaner that will be OK?

Olly

[Bart]

http://www.wikihow.com/Clean-a-Beer-Keg

[DEMPSEY]

Are you sure your keg is not stainless steel. I don't think aluminium kegs have being around for decades now. Last ones I remember were in the 1980's
Oh and welcome to the club.

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

He is talking about 5l easy kegs which have become very popular but they are a pain to clean

[johnrm]

They should be called un-easy kegs then. 

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

I am not too sure how you would clean them and feel safe about the beer on the inside

[Bazza]

I've a few of them but haven't used them in ages.

For cleaning, I just filled them up with vwp solution and rinsed after 10 or less minutes. Problem with them is, you can never get ALL of the liquid out of them, due to them being flat at the top. Store them any length of time with the bung on and they start to go a bit stagnant on the inside and no amount of washing and rinsing gets rid of that smell, and it affects any beer that goes in there.
Another thing I noticed was that after only a couple of uses they'd start to rust around the rim.

Good in theory and maybe a couple of design improvements such as making the top of them slightly conical as opposed to flat would have made me use them more.

-Barry

[Ed]

I've a few of them but haven't used them in ages.

For cleaning, I just filled them up with vwp solution and rinsed after 10 or less minutes. Problem with them is, you can never get ALL of the liquid out of them, due to them being flat at the top. Store them any length of time with the bung on and they start to go a bit stagnant on the inside and no amount of washing and rinsing gets rid of that smell, and it affects any beer that goes in there.
Another thing I noticed was that after only a couple of uses they'd start to rust around the rim.

Good in theory and maybe a couple of design improvements such as making the top of them slightly conical as opposed to flat would have made me use them more.

-Barry

+1

i rinse and drain as best I can then invert with a bung of kitchen roll and shake and then leave for a while - not the best way, but it's worked well enough so far.

edit - also, mine aren't aluminium? they get the light rust too.

[Will_D]

A few things here:

1. Aluminium is atackted by strong alkaline solutions. They are are very resistant to oxidising acids. So use Starsan as a sanitiser.

2. To clean gunk out of aluminium use any thing you want BUT only for say 5 or 10 minutes. Use a length of chain as a physical scourer inside. Rinse then add 1 campden tablet and 500 ml of water for rinsing/storage.

HOWEVER: Peeps who report RUST are not using aluminium! These mini kegs are just plastic coated mild steel. Use a magnet to check. Clean as above but store dry!