Sanitizing a racking cane?

Hello all,

Quick sanitization question, If you are using sanstar cleaner can you use it on a racking cane? The directions say to let the sensate dry and don't rinse it but the inside takes a very long time to dry and kinda defeats the purpose of sanitizing. Is there a better way? Will the little bit of sanitizer left in the can and hose damage my beer? Any input would be awesome.

Thanks

MC

With any sanitizer, if it's dry then it may not be sanitary anymore. If it's wet, it's sanitized. This is especially true with starsan - wet is the ONLY way.

As the saying goes:

Don't fear the foam!

I sanitize my racking cane and all my hoses in an igloo cooler.
That little bit of sanitizer won't hurt.

The Starsan solution left in the racking cane will not cause any damage, as long as the solution was mixed properly.
Starsan is a wet sanitizer. It is effective when it is wet, for the purpose of transferring beer. Storage of your racking cane would only need a good rinse after use, not sanitizing. Don't store the pieces assembled. Take the tubing off the cane, and if you have an auto siphon, don't leave the cane inside the outside tube body. Leaving an auto siphon assembled will distort the rubber washer.

My process when I bottle.. sink full of water and starsans for the bottles, I throw the racking cane and tubing in the water. Then I pump star sans/water through the whole thing. Let sit while I get everything ready. Drain the racking cane and proceed with bottling. When I am done, pump starsans/water through it again and throw the racking cane in the sink's starsans/water. Then when ready to put it away I drain the water from the cane and store.

I assume you are talking about Star San. If that is the case, it is a sanitizer, not a cleaner. It is fine to leave Star San in wet form on your equipment. The way I sanitize my racking cane is simple. I have a 5 gallong jug of Star San that I have mixed up. I just stuff my autosiphon in there and start it up and run the sanitizer through it to whatever vessel I need to sanitize. Then I run it back to the 5 gallon jug once that has been sanitized.

the contact should be more than enough in that time.

I put the tubing on, place it in a bucket of starsan, pump it until there's a flow, stop the flow and try the coat the racking cane and the insides of the outer tube in starsan. I've never had a problem with sanitation

Fill bucket with star san solution, insert racking cane, pump pump pump.... sanitized

And equally important is to CLEAN IT AS SOON AS YOU FINISH RACKING. Don't let anything dry in your tubing or you'll never get it clean.

C-Rider said:

And equally important is to CLEAN IT AS SOON AS YOU FINISH RACKING. Don't let anything dry in your tubing or you'll never get it clean.

Click to expand...

True dat!

Rinse the outer tube with hot water immediately after use, do the same with the tubing. Then run some Starsan thru the racking cane. I also run Starsan thru again just prior to use.