Hard water with iodophor and starsan

Hello to everybody from Mexico!


Well i have been disconected from the forum (too much work)

I have noticed when i use hard water with these sanitizers my Ph its very high 7-8 so the solution itsnt acid.

I have had many infections (overcarbonated,bug around the bottle neck, and sour or acid taste),so im almost sure the reason of these infection are due to my hard water(because alkaline solution doesnt kill bacteria) so because i wanted to keep those infected beer i had to go to pasteurize them so i have stopped the overcarbonation by re-open the caps to vent co2 and re-capped once again (i just open slightly the cap) and then pasteurize the bottles. Also When the beer has white bugs around the neck by using pasterurization the infection stops.

But what do you think, does pasteurization helps to reduce the sour-acid taste? or a long aging?

I tried cold crash for improve clarity and works very well but the sour-acid taste still remains.



How can i improve those sour-acid batches?



Tomorrow i will brew with soft water and pbw (from BK to FT to Bottling) so i could see diferences.


All the best !!!

Oh i forgot it, when racked the beer from carboy to the plastic bucket to bottle the beer i always taste it and take readings about brix. And the beers werent sour but after 5 days carbonating it was sour. 4 beers that i brewed in a row were fine before bottling (nice and cool taste with hints of noble hops) but after 5 days carbonating they were sour-acid (i used iodophor with hard water to sanitize everything before fermentation and starsan with soft water to sanitize everything to bottle the beer the Ph with starsan was 3-3.5(also i made a night soak with bleach for bottle,new tubing,hoses,siphon,bucket,caps etc))

If the beer was fine before bottling and after bottling got sour taste what do you think? also my brewing room its always closed during bottling also i used covermouth to prevent airbone bacterias, i crush the grain in another room far away from the brewing room too.

Do you think that sour taste maybe made by lactobacilus or pedioccocus get its acid level thanks to the oxygen that remains in the bottle neck during bottling?

Thank you to all of you!

With an acid-based sanitizer like StarSan, the pH of the solution needs to be under 3 if I recall correctly. Any higher than that, the sanitizing effect is greatly diminished. When using Iodophor sanitizer, pH is much less an issue.

I have found that StarSan will become cloudy rapidly if the water is hard. The calcium apparently causes the problem. If water from a salt-based water softener is available, it is well suited for making sanitizing solution with StarSan and it will not become cloudy.

Regarding PBW, it is a cleaner and not a sanitizer. Use PBW to get the big stuff off your equipment and then you have to use a sanitizer like StarSan or Iodophor solution to get the equipment sanitary.

Try to make your sanitizer solutions using distilled water, it will allow them to work at their intended pH. I believe star san and Iodophor both have pH limits that need to be maintained in order for effectiveness.

yes i have bought carboy water because its softer than my regular water line, and the pbw i want to use it to remove organic stuff to enhance the sanitizers work, i never think about minerals in my water (just for brewing) but not for sanitizers i guess the producer needs to writte down the information on the package (my iodophor bottle doesnt say that, my starsan its a refilled bottle so i wasnt able to see the original instructions) last sunday i could brew but tomorrow i will and i have to see no infection on the next batch.

Also i will pasterurize some beers to see if the sour-acid taste can be diminish or reduce i dont know but i will try hehehe

And maybe i will have to buy a iodophor tester to see the ppm


Thank you !