Cleaning a Beer Barrel

[Greendan]

(Newbie alert)

Whats the best way of cleaning and sanitising a 5 Gallon standard beer barrel?

My guess is to put a couple of litres of sanitizing soultion in it and shake it about a bit? I'm concerned about getting the top of the inside done (around inside the Neck where you can't stick your hand). Some sort of brushing probably wouldn't go amiss I'm guessing?

[petehastwofeet]

I use a bit of bleach/sterilising solution, but they will need a bit of a scrub aswell. On the old Boots style barrels with a 4" gap at the top, I can fit my bandy arms in and sort it with a sponge. But on the 2" Young's super budget value crap barrels, I use a 3ft Barrel Brush for the bottom, and a curved demijohn brush for getting in under the top part.

[Aleman]

A couple of litres of cleaner, followed by a microfibre cloth, lid on . . .

shake it round and round . . .

Invert it shake it round and round. . . .

Invert it . . .

Remove cap, tip solution out remove cloth . . .

Sorted.

[EoinMag]

I fill the barrel with water and vwp and depending on how much cleaning is needed then either leave it soak for a long time or a short time if not much crud needs shifting and then rinse using the barrel brush and a bendy brush. VWP shifts most crap if put in with hot water and left a few hours.

[hail_to_the_ale]

Try using Milton & cold water, top up to the brim & watch the grime dissolve. Best left over night to soak, it even gets the stains out of the inside of the tap.

Works a treat & you can even transfer the solution to a second barrel if you need to clean more than one at a time

Gord.

[Parabolic]

after reading up on keg cleaning on another forum I got my self some of that Lidl's W5 multi stain remover oxi action powder. 3 scoops into the keg, hot water and sit for 30mins. fantastic! I then poured it out of the keg and into my fermenting bin as I'd just racked a beer from it. it desolved the krausen ring in no time.

[gregorach]

I've made a kind of poor-man's sprayball from an small plastic bottle, a spare barrel cap, and some silicone tubing. Using an old fishtank pump connected to the barrel tap I can just leave it recirculating Brupaks Bruclean, aka Murphy & Sons Cleaner / Sterliser for half and hour or so. Does a grand job. Haven't figured out how to get it to rotate yet, but the spray pattern's good enough.

[JeremyDuncombe]

I am new to Jim's Beer Kit, have only just seen this post. I put a small amount of warm water and VWP in the barrel ( say 1/2 gallon in a 5 gallon barrel ) with a handful of plastic beads, then cover the top and shake it about vigorously. A few shakes followed by a rest then a few more shakes will get off pretty well any stuck on crap. You can buy plastic beads for a pound or two from angling shops ( they are used for making up sea fishing rigs ). Just make sure you catch the beads in something when you empty the barrel. You can use anything else small and hard e.g. a handful of dried kidney beans - but you can only use them once. Hope this helps.

[john_drummer]

how many rinses does it take to remove all the VWP from a barrel?

I've got a Rotokeg that I can never get a decent brew from. The longer I leave the beer in the keg, the worse it tastes. sort of sour, but not vinegar. I've got 8l of Coopers IPA in it at the moment, the rest went in bottles so as not to waste it all. it's been in a week. When it went in it was as good as any beer coming straight out of the FV does, but now it's got a hint of something nasty about it. The bottled stuff is fine.

Or is there an alternative cleaner to VWP?

[soupdragon]

I always do a final rinse with a solution of sodium metabisulphite after using any bleach based cleaner. The sod met will kill chlorine dead. I lost a brew through not rinsing fully. Tasted like sucking on a plaster ( sort of tcp taste ).
Not had a problem since

Cheers Tom

[john_drummer]

cheers, I might give that a try if I ever dare use the thing again