What's the best cleaner and sterilizer

[IanRMartin]

Hi guys,
What's the best chemicals to use for cleaning and sterilizing these days?
There are so many different things in this forum my head is spinning
Cheers
Ian

[crafty john]

Hi guys,
What's the best chemicals to use for cleaning and sterilizing these days?
There are so many different things in this forum my head is spinning
Cheers
Ian

I use cheap supermarket thin bleach at a rate of 5ml per litre of cold water to sanitise, make sure you rinse in cold water 3 times. For cleaning I use soda crystals at a rate of 1tbs per litre of warm water. I have never had any infections to date.

[Jolum]

Same as crafty john for plastic kit, you can't beat a good bleach solution.
For my SS gear I clean with washing up liquid and a green squidgy pad and then rinse really well. Then I just sanitise the lot with Star San solution. Never had an infection either

[boingy]

There is no single answer to this one because there are lots of options.
I clean with soda crystals and sanitise with Videne. Works for me.

[Wolfy]

Hi guys,
What's the best chemicals to use for cleaning and sterilizing these days?

I don't think you can 'sterilize' with a chemical, however you can 'sanitize' which is more than sufficient for home-brewing.

Personally I use Sodium Percarbonate (and a drop of dishwashing liquid) for cleaning, acidified bleach for disinfecting and StarSan as a no-rinse sanitizer.
(Sodium Percarbonate is the active ingredient in many laundry/nappy wash products, and is often marketed as 'eco' or 'oxygen' cleaner).

[Jolum]

If you want to hear an interested podcast about Sanitation try this. Jon Herskovits of Five Star Chemicals is really funny and adamant that Star San is the cure to all ills

I'd have to agree with Wolfy in that you're really talking about applying heat or some form of radiation in order to sterilise. But (and I'm putting words in his mouth here) I'm sure Ian just meant sanitise. Interestingly, if you listen to the podcast see how many times Jon Herskovits corrects Jamil for mixing those very terms

[IanRMartin]

Cheers guys!

So cleaning wise we have washing up liquid, soda crystals or oxyclean type stuff

My appolgies i do mean sanitise

Then bleach, videne (Never heard of this what is it?) or this star san which i have seen mentioned a few times now as a no rinse santisier is this like idopher?

Ian

[RajBoab]

I clean with soda crystals and a microfibre cloth. Does a great job for peanuts.

I got fed up with bleached splash patches all over my clothes from sanitising with acified bleach so switched to Iodine at no rinse concentrations.

The Brewers Contact (March 2010) had an interesting article on contaminants in tap water which makes me think twice about rinsing with tap water after sanitising.

I'm starting to doubt Iodine's ability to fully sanitise so am going to switch to StarSan.

Stuart

[IanRMartin]

This Star San certainly seems to be the sanitiser of choice at the moment.

[sladeywadey]

The Brewers Contact (March 2010) had an interesting article on contaminants in tap water which makes me think twice about rinsing with tap water after sanitising.

Stuart

just how bad is tap water then?? Should we all be concerned about this?

[steve_flack]

Bugs in tap water or bugs in the tap?

When I worked for a water company the maximum permissible coliforms in tap water was zero. Any more was a fail. On the other hand the taps were run for a while before a sample was taken so that flushed out the tap and the pipes.

In the end it depends what the bugs are. Many bugs are killed by low pH, a lack of oxygen and the presence of alcohol and/or hops. The ones that aren't are the ones you need to worry about.

Any hose you use probably has more bugs in it that the tap water.

FWIW I use antiformin to clean and either starsan or peracetic acid to sanitise.