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What's the best cleaner to soak a carboy in?

  • PBW

  • Bleach solution

  • Hot water

  • StarSan

  • Something caustic

  • Something else

  • Squeeze Ralph Nader through the carboy's neck w/ a toothbrush


Results are only viewable after voting.

Monk

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What's the best cleaner to help break down that nasty krausen ring on the inside of the carboy? Help me spend money on a new cleaner, por favor.

Monk
 
Warm soapy water has always done the trick for me. Rinse out what I can easily after racking out of the carboy, then just put a squirt of soap in and fill it up with warm water.

The stuff comes right off the next morning with a quick scrub from a carboy brush.

-walker
 
TSP - trisodium phosphate. It's pretty nasty stuff - I mix it at about 1/4 cup to 5 gallons, and it dissolves all of the goop. I rinse REALLY well and follow up with Star San.
 
I'm shooting for taking off that krausen ring, mainly. And getting rid of any organic funk left over from the primary fermentation, so that I'll have to use the carboy brush as little as possible. Ideally, I'd like to soak, brush off any remaining gunk, decant the soaking solution, rinse, and sanitize with Iodophor.
 
I like PBW, but that's all I've ever tried. It's simple and effective, so I think I'll continue
 
Fill with hot water and a scoop of Oxyclean, walk away, come back an hour later, drain, rinse, top off with starsan, store until you next brew
 
Well...while many of you have endorsed oxyclean or pbw, Ralph Nader still leading in the polls (something he could only do on HBT, I suppose).
 
When we're talking about Oxiclean, it's the 3.5 lb bucket of powder, correct? The one you can get at Target, or wherever? Oxiclean has a ton of different versions of their product.

monk
 
Monk said:
When we're talking about Oxiclean, it's the 3.5 lb bucket of powder, correct? The one you can get at Target, or wherever? Oxiclean has a ton of different versions of their product.

monk

Whatever SWMBO bought. Tub of powder.

I don't even think she knows I've been using it......


Haha, that's in her budget.


Now, if I can get ther to buy yeast...
 
olllllo said:
Whatever SWMBO bought. Tub of powder.

I don't even think she knows I've been using it......


Haha, that's in her budget.


Now, if I can get ther to buy yeast...


LOL nice!!! :mug:
 
I've never soaked. Hot water and the occasional detergent with a little elbow grease on the carboy brush--- all done immediately after emptying the carboy. Takes just a couple minutes.
 
Bleach (yea I said that word). 2oz and fill with water. completely clean in 24-48 hours. Hot rinse afterwards. Cheapest stuff out there. But I do have oxyclean too so I could start using that; but I like bleach bottles for my ferm chiller...
 
I've been using oxyclean and a few hours soak. Two little scoops and fill up the carboy with water. Use the bottle brush to knock the loose grunge ring off (takes no effort after soaking in oxyclean), dump, then rinse a couple of times.
 
i'll do whatever is on sale. They all work. I'll use bleach is nothing is on sale - but mostly use oxyclean b/c it can be picked up pretty cheap at target or at costco. PBW & straight A, etc. are all way overpriced IMO.

That said, bleach still does the job properly - just rinse twice.
 
desertBrew said:
Bleach (yea I said that word). 2oz and fill with water. completely clean in 24-48 hours. Hot rinse afterwards. Cheapest stuff out there. But I do have oxyclean too so I could start using that; but I like bleach bottles for my ferm chiller...
Bleach, bleach, and bleach. It will completely break down any hardened residue (with little or no scrubbing with a brush) and remove stains as well.

Beyond being cheap (which is a good thing), you don't have to worry about getting back to it in an hour or two like Oxyclean. And 20-30 seconds over a bottle washer with hot water remove all traces of it (no soapy residue to worry about). After a couple days, it pretty much degrades, making it much easier on the environment than detergents - a feature Ralph Nader would appreciate without having to squeeze through that neck himself.

K.I.S.S. - an acronym to live by. :D
 
I use water and a carboy brush immediately after emptying like Kornkob does. 5 minutes and it's clean. No need to fill the carboy, just get it wet inside and scrub away. Rinse every once in a while to see how well it's going.

Works fine.
 
DrewsBrews said:
Beyond being cheap (which is a good thing), you don't have to worry about getting back to it in an hour or two like Oxyclean.

Why do you have to get back to Oxyclean in an hour or two? I don't. I've let bottles sit in water with Oxyclean for a couple of days, and in a carboy overnight. It may be that it becomes ineffective after a few hours, but that doesn't mean you have get back to it right away. It's already done the job, regardless.
 
gruntingfrog said:
I use water and a carboy brush immediately after emptying like Kornkob does. 5 minutes and it's clean. No need to fill the carboy, just get it wet inside and scrub away. Rinse every once in a while to see how well it's going.

Works fine.

After two weeks in primary, there is a hard crust of dried kraeusen above the level of the beer in the carboy that I am unable to remove with a carboy brush, even after soaking in water. After soaking in Oxyclean and water for an hour, however, no scrubbing is required. Just wave the brush around the inside of the carboy and all the stuck stuff comes right off. Less work than scrubbing as you describe.
 
I've never encountered that. *shrug* And I think you are overstating the 'scrubbing' that I do. It's not that a much effort. Frankly, it takes me less time to clean my carboys than it takes me to fill one.

On the other hand, my beers rarely spend 2 weeks in the primary, so that might be part of it too. Initial fermentation is complete sometimes as soon as 3 days after brew and I've moved on to a secondary long before 14 days.
 
beer4breakfast said:
Why do you have to get back to Oxyclean in an hour or two? I don't. I've let bottles sit in water with Oxyclean for a couple of days, and in a carboy overnight.
That statement was based on an earlier comment:
olllllo said:
Oxyclean with a several hour soak. Make sure you rise and don't let it soak too long or you'll get residue.
Never used the stuff myself.


beer4breakfast said:
After two weeks in primary, there is a hard crust of dried kraeusen above the level of the beer in the carboy that I am unable to remove with a carboy brush, even after soaking in water. After soaking in Oxyclean and water for an hour, however, no scrubbing is required. Just wave the brush around the inside of the carboy and all the stuck stuff comes right off. Less work than scrubbing as you describe.
I get the same effect with the high strength bleach solution. I ususally put off cleaning the carboy for a day or two and that ring gets pretty hard to scrub off. Last brew I did, the carboy sat for a week. I added bleach water and two days later the ring had disolved.
 
I've always used bleach, and I've never even owned a carboy brush.

I just fill the bottle up to the top, with a couple ounces of bleach in, and let it set for a day or 2. Dump it out, put in a couple cups of clean water, and shake it up. Clean as a hound's tooth!

Now, I've been hearing, at the LHBS, (which is also a part-time job) that bleach will etch (or corrode) glass. Anyone else hear this?

steve
 
skou said:
Now, I've been hearing, at the LHBS, (which is also a part-time job) that bleach will etch (or corrode) glass. Anyone else hear this?steve
Sounds like someone's trying to get you to buy something else. Now, an acid maybe...
 
DrewsBrews said:
Sounds like someone's trying to get you to buy something else. Now, an acid maybe...

No joke. Man, bleach won't etch glass. It will, however, make your vinyl tubing cloudy if you leave it in for a few days, but it doesn't hurt the performance in any way. I leave my glass carboys filled with bleach solution for weeks at a time. They were BS'n ya...:drunk:
 
I have some muriatic acid that I used to etch my concrete floor prior to applying nonskid coating. I wonder what muriatic would do to glass...mwa haw haw! Some of you science geeks might be able to tell me.
 
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