Crazy days, Free Beer, a Rusty Bottom and Pin lock kegs

[LouieMacGoo]

(Sorry, slightly long post. Just a lot going on.)

Holy cow, the last few months have been insanely busy. My youngest daughter just graduated from high school and there has been a lot of pomp and circumstance associated with her final days of her high school career. Also we've (as in me) been working on the house (paint up, clean up, fix up) trying to get it ready for the grad party/open house that will take place next weekend. On top of all that we sold my mother-in-law's house which is about 3 hrs away and had to get it all cleaned out for the closing which took multiple trips.

With all that going on I was actually able to squeeze in brewing a couple of batches of beer. One being my Citra-Nilla IPA and also a Summer Wheat beer and I plan to have both ready for the grad party. When I stopped into my LHBS/Party Story I found out that my go to guy Carl had moved to Savannah Georgia and was long gone. The owner said that Carl had batch of beer in the back that he had brewed and left behind and offered it up to me to use for the grad party. Umm Free Beer? Yes please! I got a hold of Carl on Facebook and found out it was a stout that he brewed trying to use up left over grains that he didn't want to take with him and has an ABV of about 4.6%.

Today I racked the 9 gallon batch into 2 corny kegs and the small sample tasted really good. While getting the kegs ready for the stout and also for my other 2 brews I noticed that one of the kegs has a rust spot at the very bottom so I'm a little concerned if keg can be used safely. The rust seems to be right in the dimple at the very bottom. I'm wondering if I could stick a Brillo pad or SOS pad down there and clean it or if I should replace the keg?

Also someone from my homebrew club gave me 2 pinlock kegs. I've seen that several HBS have Pinlock to Ball lock conversion kits for about $10 and I was wondering if anyone has changed any pinlock kegs over to ball lock and if it worked out well?

Thanks guys!

[John Sand]

You should be able to clean the rust and use the keg. Even if some rust remained (don't), it isn't dangerous, but might spoil the flavor. I've never converted a keg, but I'm sure it's not hard or risky. The pinlocks have slightly different dimensions than ball locks. I believe they are shorter and wider.
Congrats on the graduation, sale, and free beer.

[BlackDuck]

I'm guessing the inside of kegs is stainless steel??? I'm not sure as I've never given it a thought. If they are, you could try some Barkeepers Friend on it. Add a little bit of warm water, dump some Barkeepers into it, get a stick with the brillo pad on it and scrub it. That stuff works wonders and is made for this type of cleaning.

Conrats on all the good news!!

[Beer-lord]

I did a quick google on it and it seems you can use "Acid #5" from 5 Star and a Scotch Brite pad to get the rust out. Assuming, of course, it's not really bad. Passivate it for a bit afterward and see it that gets it back to normal.

[FedoraDave]

I've converted pin lock to ball lock. When I was on the road to kegging, I bought a keg online, not realizing until after the order was in transit that it was a pin lock. I found a conversion kit online and did it myself in pretty short order. Not really anything to it, and if I can manage it, pretty much anyone can.

[LouieMacGoo]

Thanks guys, the info is greatly appreciated. I plan to head over to the lhbs tomorrow or Thursday to get the conversion kit and some other supplies I need.

To add to my chaos our air conditioning went out the other day when it was 97 degrees out. The new AC unit will be put in tomorrow

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