Sanitized cornie filled w/CO2?

[Glibbidy]

There was a sanitation question flying around here recently concerning how long something stays sanitized.
This got me thinking...If my cornie is clean, and I sanitize it with iodophor, empty the keg, and then push enough CO2 into the keg to pressureize it, would my cornie remain Sanitized?

 

[stevecaaster]

I have thought about doing this, and personally i would not trust this method.

I think that maybe a day or two max would be ok, but I think if the environment inside the keg is not 100.00000% sterile, bacteria/whatever else will thrive without the benefit of the alcohol or antiseptic nature of hops in beer. leaving a keg empty is giving something in the keg you dont know about a chance to grow, without impedance of yeast or hop acids or alcohol.

I fear that then you go to use the keg after it has been sitting around, and there is a colony of something that has already got the chance to take off in there, and its too established to be knocked out by the beer and will then infect the batch.

maybe if you hit it with 60-100 psi or something there is a certain pressure that bacteria will not survive, but this I dont know...

 

[ScoutMan]

I have been using this method for since I started kegging, I have yet to have any problems. Clean the keg with oxy-clean, rinse well, sanitize with iodophore and hit it with 20 psi of co2. I have left them for a couple of months like that without incident. Perhaps I've just been lucky.

 

[BierMuncher]

To pressurize an empty keg to 20 pounds wastes a lot of CO2.

I simply clean and sanitize and store the kegs upside down with the lid off. Same as I do my bottles. I'll grab a keg that has been sitting like that for 4-5 weeks and after 70+ batches that way...nary an issue.

If I'm felling particularly anal, I'll give the corny a quick upside down blast of hot tap water to rinse it real quick just before filling.

These things are made of stainless steel folks, not cheese.

 

[jrm16311]

I work in the biotech industry and have some experience with CIP and SIP system validation of various equipments. I can say 3 things are certain...

1. Unless you sterilize the system to begin with, keeping the system under positive pressure alone, will not ensure sterility or even sanitization.

2. Once sanitization, or even sterility is achived, there is a finite time it can be maintained. Your system will not maintain this status infinitely.

3. There are bacteria that will thrive in a CO2 environment (as oppossed to air) and even in high pressure environments (although you can bring the pressure of a system up, maintain it like that for a few days while the bateria equalize, then bring it down to atmospheric pressure rapidly. Their cell walls should explode)

Best advice I can give you is to clean your system thoroughly after each use (sanitation is not needed post use) and store it in a dry environment. When ready, sanitize before each use.

 

[Glibbidy]

Best advice I can give you is to clean your system thoroughly after each use (sanitation is not needed post use) and store it in a dry environment. When ready, sanitize before each use.

This is presently what I'm doing. Guess I'll just continue along this path. I figured I could maybe save a little water by sanitizing all my gear at once.
Thanks for all the insight.