Cleaning and sterilising

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m_rawdin
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Cleaning and sterilising

Post by m_rawdin » Wed Dec 09, 2015 8:54 am

I think this question may have already been answered on here but what is the best thing to use to clean and sterilise your brewing equipment? I've just ordered my ingredients so I can start my first batch in my new kit.

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Jocky
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Re: Cleaning and sterilising

Post by Jocky » Wed Dec 09, 2015 10:43 am

There are all kinds of products, and what you end up using depends upon your personal circumstance.

Cleaning, sterilisation and sanitisation are three separate things.

Sterilisation requires a pressure cooker or autoclave, and it means that you kill everything you apply this to. You don't need to sterilise until you start doing things like plating yeast.

What you want is sanitisation - removal of contaminants down to a low level, generally right before whatever you're sanitising touches your beer/wort. Popular for this is starsan, as it's effective in 30 seconds and doesn't need rinsing. The downside is that it doesn't work as well with hard water.

Alternatives for harder water are dilute thin bleach, or iodophor. These can be no rinse at the right strengths.

I have hard water and so personally I soak everything in an iodophor solution, and take items out a few minutes before use to drip off, and then to be extra careful they get a quick spray with starsan made up with bottled water right before they touch anything. Total overkill, but it helps with my paranoia.

Cleaning is a different game. Everything should be spotlessly clean, as any dirt provides lovely hiding places for nasties, which you will not be able to sanitise away.

VWP, Oxyclean, bleach solutions, or PBW are all options here. I use PBW as it's very good and leaves no residue if you leave things to stand, but it's expensive if you don't buy a lot of it. The other three I've all used and they all work well, you just need to rinse things as soon as you're done cleaning, and you need to be careful when leaving things to soak.
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m_rawdin
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Re: Cleaning and sterilising

Post by m_rawdin » Wed Dec 09, 2015 1:44 pm

Someone did mention peracetic acid, it's sounds good but pretty nasty stuff.

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Jocky
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Re: Cleaning and sterilising

Post by Jocky » Wed Dec 09, 2015 1:53 pm

m_rawdin wrote:Someone did mention peracetic acid, it's sounds good but pretty nasty stuff.
Yeah, it is. See here: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=39491

You won't find home brew suppliers selling it for that reason, especially when there are great alternatives like StarSan, or the NBS no rinse sanitizer from the malt miller.
Ingredients: Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast, Seaweed, Blood, Sweat, The swim bladder of a sturgeon, My enemies tears, Scenes of mild peril, An otter's handbag and Riboflavin.

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mbarn
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Re: Cleaning and sterilising

Post by mbarn » Wed Dec 09, 2015 9:47 pm

I use cheap bottled water with starsan, due to being in a hard water area. The fact it is no rinse is fantastic. Tip out the excess and proceed.
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