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've used a crescent wrench to wedge under the lip and then push down on the ball to release pressure (do this outside and with the keg on it's side unless you like getting sprayed in the face with nasty old stale beer). To remove the spear there is a retaining clip you can try to pry out with a flat screwdriver and a needle nose pliers.