[mugwort]

After having just gotten over an issue with dirty gas lines, it's better to be safe then sorry.

how did they get dirty on the inside?  from beer getting sucked into the line?

Likely getting pushed from a pressurized keg into a non or lower pressurized line.  I have check valves on my keg lines to prevent this from happening, to a point I guess. I try to remember to reduce the pressure in my kegs when I'm connecting to them to keep beer/foam out of gas lines all together.

Yeah this one's important to remember.  I never agitate-force carb, but when I take a keg that has been high pressure carbed at room temp and connect it to my in-fridge lines, I ensure that the in-fridge line has greater pressure than the keg when they make contact.

Don't even want beer atmosphere entering a portion of the line, let alone any liquid. Nobody needs bad gas.

[klickitat jim]

I just purged my system with starsan. I suppose some day I should strip it down and actually clean it.

[mugwort]

I envy some of the shorter rinse/switch out practices mentioned here.  Most of my beers leave too obvious deposits in my lines for me to do anything less.  None of my brews are cold crashed or filtered and all but the longer-aged, clarified ones need the PBW/LLC one two punch.  I haven't tried a sole LLC cleaning for keg and lines.

So plenty of people just use PBW/oxy and the lines go completely clean?  Even with very hot PBW flushed and held for 20-30 mins there are still some beer lines with holdout globule deposits.  Line age and quality is not the issue; even on first use there were stubborn deposits remaining just past the QD.

[dbarber]

I use picnic taps as well.  After a keg kicks they get a rinse with hot water and the QDs are taken apart and rinsed.  When i am ready to use them again the tap and QDs go into a bucket of starsan.  I do take apart the picnic tap and soak every once in a while.  I've had one of my picnic taps for 10 years, never had a problem.

[beersk]

After having just gotten over an issue with dirty gas lines, it's better to be safe then sorry.

how did they get dirty on the inside?  from beer getting sucked into the line?

Likely getting pushed from a pressurized keg into a non or lower pressurized line.  I have check valves on my keg lines to prevent this from happening, to a point I guess. I try to remember to reduce the pressure in my kegs when I'm connecting to them to keep beer/foam out of gas lines all together. 

Yep. I think it happened from accidentally hooking up a keg that was sealed with 30 PSI to the gas line that was pressurized with 10 or 12 PSI. I don't think I knew it happened. But I took apart my system and found white stuff in the lines and green mold in one of the disconnects. Cleaned 'em up, no issues since. Still get pretty paranoid here and there if my palate is off. I'll start imagining stuff. I got pretty traumatized; lots of ruined beer.

[Pinski]

After having just gotten over an issue with dirty gas lines, it's better to be safe then sorry.

how did they get dirty on the inside?  from beer getting sucked into the line?

Likely getting pushed from a pressurized keg into a non or lower pressurized line.  I have check valves on my keg lines to prevent this from happening, to a point I guess. I try to remember to reduce the pressure in my kegs when I'm connecting to them to keep beer/foam out of gas lines all together. 

Yep. I think it happened from accidentally hooking up a keg that was sealed with 30 PSI to the gas line that was pressurized with 10 or 12 PSI. I don't think I knew it happened. But I took apart my system and found white stuff in the lines and green mold in one of the disconnects. Cleaned 'em up, no issues since. Still get pretty paranoid here and there if my palate is off. I'll start imagining stuff. I got pretty traumatized; lots of ruined beer.

That's a good reminder to clean out my QDs.  I started a multi-evening cleaning last night as my kegerator is light and easy to manage at the moment.  Hot water rinsed all the lines last night and defrosted and cleaned the inside of the kegerator. I was surprised at how clean the kegerator was. Tonight i'll soak the lines in PBW and flush with water. Final rinse with star san.  Maybe tomorrow I'll clean all the QDs and Thursday evening my rig will be deep cleaned top to bottom and ready for the new beer year!