Occasional Bottles going Cloudy

[WishboneBrewery]

I've been using Starsan for a while now and I'm slowly starting to find the occasional cloudy bottle, just up to the fill level.

Anyone else found this?

Is it time for a thorough Bleach soak like I used to do every brew???

[haz66]

I use the thin bleach / vinegar solution for all my sterilising, it was something posted on here yonks ago,
I`ve never had a problem since using it, well over a year now.

Its just made up as follows
25ml thin bleach
25ml White vingar
25ltrs water

start filling vessel with water then add the 25ml Thin bleach
keep filling with water then add the vingar,
DO NOT MIX the Bleach and Vingar together on their own

This is a very good and effective no rinse steriliser, even though i do rinse.

[WishboneBrewery]

are they both acids then?
Does the Vinegar just boost the bleach's killing power?

[haz66]

are they both acids then?
Does the Vinegar just boost the bleach's killing power?

Yeah the Acid in the Vingar makes the bleach a lot more effective
It was first made by the guy who came up with Starsan.

[Dr.Evil]

Ive had the cloudy-bottle issue when sterilizing with bleach. Its because I live in a very hard water area and the bleach solution (+ associated caustic soda) is knocking limescale out of solution and onto my bottles. I now use a peracid-based sterilizer and have no problems. Adding some vinegar should help prevent this problem when using bleach.

Time for bleach chemistry 101!
Bleach is sodium hypochlorite. It comes as a caustic (alkali) solution. Its made industrially by bubbling chlorine gas through a solution of caustic soda (sodium hydroxide) to make a solution of sodium hypochlorite and sodium hydroxide. Adding some vinegar neutralises some of the hydroxide, lowers the pH and turns some of the hypochlorite into hypochlorous acid. Hypochlorous acid is a very effective sterilizing agent, much more so than hypochlorite. However, hypochlorous acid its short-lived because it reacts with excess acid to produce water and chlorine gas. Be careful not to add too much vinegar to a strong solution of bleach or you will gas yourself! The recipe given earlier in this thread should be OK.

[WishboneBrewery]

Peracid = per-acetic ?

[Dr.Evil]

There are a number of different peracids used as sterilizers, but one of the most readily available (and effective) is peracetic acid. Peracetic acid is too unstable to readily store in solution, but there are solid precursors that will react in solution to produce it. This is the kind of thing: http://tinyurl.com/ydvqnpr. Products containing a source of peracid are usually sold to sterilize medical equipment, so probably a bit OTT to use for homebrew, but hey! They are certainly effective!

[WishboneBrewery]

I think I'm going to be able to get some peracetic acid from work in the future, which could be handy