I'm an experienced mead maker with a couple of Micro-Matic Sanke D kegs I bought online over the pandemic. I finally got around to using one, and I'm stuck on the last part of the teardown: removing the CO2 valve from the down tube. I've watched a few YouTube videos and they don't really go into huge detail on this part. I even broke down and called Micro-Matic who basically said that this stuff wasn't designed to be regularly disassembled but instead pressure-cleaned with an expensive keg washer. I'm hoping someone out there has a clever tool or approach they use to handle this situation, even if it's something silly like "I hold it down over this widget with a bump which pushes up the ball and then I spray cleaner down the tube and follow it up with rinse water and I'm not dead yet".
Help?
I just realized that if I had a coupler with the gas check valve removed and a hose attached to the gas fitting, I could use that as a blow-off tube and ferment directly in the kegs. Would that work or am I missing something?
Technically yes but not super practical. Normally you want to ferment in a larger vessel with a larger starting volume to end up with your desired final volume. For example, 22 liters into a 25 liter fermentor (think 20% extra headspace for primary). The extra head space allows space for kraussen. Then you can rack off the yeast and end up closer to something like a desired 20 liters into a keg. Also since you are making mead fruit is often used that would be difficult in a keg.
I would recommend ferment in fermentor then rack into keg for conditioning etc. no one wants a pour of your fermentations yeast cake.