RedDraw

Recipes 

Been brewing for about 6 months now and have a question about cleaning my bucket fermentors. They haven't gotten nasty crud on them with the brews I have been making. I've been able to wipe out everything with a sponge and everything looks clean. Should I still be cleaning them with a cleaner such as PBW or am I okay with the fact that they look clean?

Grantman1

Recipes 

You definitely want to sanitize them after scrubbing them down. Even though they look clean, there will be bacteria there and it'll only be a matter of time before it ruins a batch of beer.

aiptasia

Recipes 

I don't use harsh abrasives on any of my fermenter buckets for only one reason, a scratch on the plastic can be an infection zone for bacteria to hide in. Nothing harsher than a paper towel goes into any of my fermentation buckets and I just use idophor and elbow grease to clean them out. A strong kitchen sink sprayer and hot water is usually sufficient to clean out any trub or adjuncts (garbage disposal eats the rest). Then, everything gets a thorough breakdown and inspection, especially the gasket rings around the airlock and the lid. I remove them, then wipe everything down with idophor water and let it soak for 2-3 minutes, then just pour it out. I don't bother rinsing the idophor off. I just let it air dry.

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Paranormal Brewing
Beer so good, it's frightening.
2013: Wamphyri Belgian Dark Strong, Trinidad Scorpion IPA, Shadowman Stout, Bermuda Triangle Barleywine, Bloody Mary RyePA, Pruno.

JonM

Recipes 

A 24-hour soak with warm Oxyclean Free clears up most, if not all, of that gunk for me.

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Sincerity is everything. If you can fake that, you've got it made.

masskrug

Recipes 

Starsan and a paper towel rub down before and after contact.

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Primary: One Buck Bombers II
Bottle Conditioning: One Buck Bombers I
Now Serving: Lil' Sumpin' Sumpin'
Drunk: Celebration Ale, Fat Tire, Two Hearted Ale, Speedway Stout, SNPA, SNPA w/Simcoe, Moose Drool, Dale's Pale Ale
On Deck: One Buck Bombers III

pabloj13

Recipes 

+1. Super cheap at Target too. Up and Up brand.

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Kegged Two Hearted, Dragonmead Final Absolution
Bottled Robust porter, Founder's Breakfast Stout, Ommegawd Hellepin, Ed Wort's Apfelwein
RIP Snake Dog IPA, Biermuncher's OktoberFAST, Falconer's Flight IPA, Two-Hearted clone (Culturing Bell's Yeast), Noberon wheat, Skeeter Pee using dry yeast, Smooth Oatmeal Stout

Simple and easy wort aeration - Harvest yeast from your blowoff - Homebrew Spicy Mustard

Bamsdealer

Recipes 

I'm shy about using oxy now. It tends to leave a bunch of residue on my bottles that's hard to get off. Hot water and a sponge does well for me. Even a simple hot rinse before anything sets on my bottles , tubing, siphon, etc and air dry has worked for me. Star San gets used before I use my equipment... Not in the cleaning process

boscobeans

Recipes 

As soon as you get the beer out of the fermenter dump the trub, spray it out really well and use a soft sponge or cloth for a good rub down then re spray it out to rinse. Before the next brew fill it with OXY and let it soak (a couple of hours) dump the oxy, rinse well and spray it with StarSan.

bosco

Yesfan

Recipes 

I clean my buckets out right after I bottle. I used Oxy, but been using Palmolive Clear and Free with good results. When I get ready to use it for the next batch, I just sanitize it with Star-san.

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On Deck: Strawberry Blonde
Primary1: Joe's Ancient Orange Mead (2G)
Primary2: Caribou Slobber
Primary3: The Innkeeper
Primary4: Caribbean Stout
Bottled: Edwort's Apfelwein (1G)
Bottled: cranberry/raspberry "wein" (1G)
Kegged:

GoldMiner

Recipes 

I clean mine in the dishwasher after a good spraying.

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I Secondary.