Did I Ruin My Kettle?

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

caliKOng

Member
Joined
Nov 24, 2005
Messages
13
Reaction score
0
Location
New York, New York
Rust-proof stainless steel?

Guess not!?!? :confused:

I left some stuff sanitizing (with small amount of bleech) in the kettle a day or two ago and returned today to see some rust in the kettle. And it appears where the water line reached, that the pot even corroded a little.

Note to self: kettle not for sanitizing from now on! :D

Gave it a vigorous scrub and MOST of the rust stains seem to be gone. Still looks like some of the metal was eaten away at the water line. ARGHHHH.

Do I need to throw this kettle out?
 
It's ok to sanatize smooth surfaces with bleach but you must rinse immediately. If you've got unrinseable recesses or cracks, don't get bleach anywhere near it. It will corrode stainless if left in contact.

Your kettle is not ruined unless it's got a folded seam in it.
 
Folded Seam? Please expain.

Thing is, the kettle was BRAND NEW. Only brewed my FIRST batch of homebrew in it! No scrapes, no scratches. And now...

A little bleach and the pot goes to sh%t?

Wonder how good ebrew.com's return policy is?

They gave no guarantees, but I did pay nearly 40 bucks for a 12 quart pot.

Wouldn't care if I bought it from K-Mart. But being a brewing store, they should tell you their pots don't withstand bleach - the sanitizer they themselves recommend - right?

Oh, it's fun to blame someone else when you've been stupid.

But this strikes me as a case of dumb (ebrew) and dumber (caliKOng). But alas, who is the dumbest? Ain't the customer always right?

Yes, I'm guilty of one too many Ommegang Hennepin's! (Told ya I liked them heavy beers, homebrewer_99)

Xavier
 
well, there was a nice insult from scott to me on his last post, but since he's a woman and deleted it because i bit back, i've edited my reply as well.
 
caliKOng said:
They gave no guarantees, but I did pay nearly 40 bucks for a 12 quart pot.
$40 is too high for a 12qt pot...see if you can return it. Most of the online HB stores have 20qt pots for about $40.

To answer your original question, I personally wouldn't cook with a SS pot with visible signs of corrosion. :(
 
bleach shouldn't be left over night in stainless steel. several homebrew shops even tell customers who buy used soda kegs for kegging not to let a bleach/water solution sit over night to sanitize because it will eat it up.
hate to hear the kettle got messed up.
from my HBS web page : CHLORINE BLEACH ATTACKS STAINLESS STEEL - DO NOT EXCEED AN OUNCE OF BLEACH PER GALLON OF WATER AND ESPECIALLY DO NOT LEAVE THIS SANITIZING SOLUTION IN THE KEG OVERNIGHT!!
 
This is a brew kettle correct? The temperatures of the brew kettle reach 212f which kills all of the bacteria. This is one of the reasons we boil the wort. If this were a fermenter I would be concerned that some little nook or cranny would evade a sanitizer and leave harmful bugs which could destroy a brew. For a brew pot, I would not be so concerned. For those of us who use modified kegs, do you really think that you get every thread of those welded on fittings cleaned? I don't personally think so. Even scratches in the stainless of a brew pot may be missed by sanitizers but the metal of the kettle which is in contact with the wort also reaches these sanitizing temperatures. Good soaking of a kettle or fermenter in a sanitizer will get into alot of cracks and crevices. IMO the worst condition exists in plastics where scratches are present. The maleability of the plastic can seal in 'bugs' and prevent the sanitizer from getting to them and the plastics are never heated to sanitizing temperatures.

If you have factual information on the contrary, please school us. I would hate to steer someone wrong based on my limited experiences and opinions.
caliKOng, unless you feel more comfortable getting a new kettle I would keep using this one myself. I would however, not use bleach in the future except as noted above (thorough rinsing immediately after use).
 
Chloride stress corrosion! Never use bleach with stainless. The chlorine causes very rapid etching in between the metal grains. You see it the most at the water line because the oxygen accelerates it.

If the pot isn't actually leaking you should be ok, but expect to have more trouble cleaning the pot in the future.
 
caliKOng said:
Folded Seam? Please expain.

Thing is, the kettle was BRAND NEW. Only brewed my FIRST batch of homebrew in it! No scrapes, no scratches. And now...

A little bleach and the pot goes to sh%t?

Wonder how good ebrew.com's return policy is?

They gave no guarantees, but I did pay nearly 40 bucks for a 12 quart pot.

Wouldn't care if I bought it from K-Mart. But being a brewing store, they should tell you their pots don't withstand bleach - the sanitizer they themselves recommend - right?

Oh, it's fun to blame someone else when you've been stupid.

But this strikes me as a case of dumb (ebrew) and dumber (caliKOng). But alas, who is the dumbest? Ain't the customer always right?

Yes, I'm guilty of one too many Ommegang Hennepin's! (Told ya I liked them heavy beers, homebrewer_99)

Xavier
My car doesn't have a disclaimer on the radiator cap telling me not to pour oil into the radiator - so if I do so, is it the car company's fault that the car would break down? Of course not!

Nor is it the fault of the company you bought your kettle from that your stainless was harmed by bleach. It's pretty common knowledge what bleach does to stainless steel. Hey, even my mother knows this and she doesn't brew beer, she just uses her stainless pots to cook with.

Oh, and the customer isn't always right! Sometimes we are wrong.
 
Which is why I was being cheeky about the whole thing and admitted what I did was pretty dumb.

But do I really deserve public (he now deleted them) and private message attacks because I left bleach in the kettle overnight?

Come on guys...this is supposed to be fun place to share information. Please refrain from sending me messages calling me an idiot, etc.

For those of you who have been kind enough to answer my question and help me understand, thank you :)
 
try switching to Iodaphor or Star-San as a sanitizer rather than bleach. non-corrosive and does a better job. plus, it's nice not having to worry about rinsing off bleach.

there was a poll taken with comments on which one each of us prefers. good insight and may help you decide which one you'd like to use. under the general techniques section posted by Mindflux.
 
nope. iodaphor is iodine based. never used Star-San, so don't know much about it other than from what i've read on the forum (which is a bunch i guess?).
 
caliKOng said:
But do I really deserve public (he now deleted them) and private message attacks because I left bleach in the kettle overnight?

Come on guys...this is supposed to be fun place to share information. Please refrain from sending me messages calling me an idiot, etc.

Don't worry about it caliKOng. Some people have a hard time making their point without being condescending. Don't take it personal. It's them, not you.

-walker
 
You live and learn. Earlier this year I made a mixture of muriatic acid in my 12qt ss pot to soak some parts off my outdoor cooker to dissolve the rust. It didn't take long before I realized it was dissolving my pot.
 
You could try passivating your SS brewpot. Here is what Palmer has to say on the subject:-

"A situation that often comes up is, "Hey, my stainless steel is rusting! Why? What can I do to fix it?"

Stainless steel is stainless because of the protective chromium oxides on the surface. If those oxides are removed by scouring, or by reaction with bleach, then the iron in the steel is exposed and can be rusted. Stainless steel is also vulnerable to contamination by plain carbon steel, the kind found in tools, food cans, and steel wool. This non-stainless steel tends to rub off on the surface (due to iron-to-iron affinity), and readily rusts. Once rust has breached the chromium oxides, the iron in the stainless steel can also rust. Fixing this condition calls for re-passivation.

Passivating stainless steel is normally accomplished in industry by dipping the part in a bath of nitric acid. Nitric acid dissolves any free iron or other contaminants from the surface, which cleans the metal, and it re-oxidizes the chromium; all in about 20 minutes. But you don't need a nitric acid bath to passivate. The key is to clean the stainless steel to bare metal. Once the metal is clean (and dry), the oxygen in the atmosphere will form the protective chromium oxides. The steel will be every bit as passivated as that which was dipped in acid. The only catch is that it takes longer-- about a week or two.

To passivate stainless steel at home without using a nitric acid bath, you need to clean the surface of all dirt, oils and oxides. The best way to do this is to use an oxalic acid based cleanser like those mentioned above, and a non-metallic green scrubby pad. Don't use steel wool, or any metal pad, even stainless steel, because this will actually promote rust. Scour the surface thoroughly and then rinse and dry it with a towel. Leave it alone for a week or two and it will re-passivate itself. You should not have to do this procedure more than once, but it can be repeated as often as necessary."

J. Palmer. How to Brew. http://www.howtobrew.com/appendices/appendixB-1.html

Hope this helps.

BB
 
Walker said:
Don't worry about it caliKOng. Some people have a hard time making their point without being condescending. Don't take it personal. It's them, not you.-walker


You are absolutely correct that it was me and not him. I deleted my initial comments after realizing that I shouldn't have said what I said which was simply: "Dude, I'm sorry but if you can't comprehend the concept of a folded seam, you are not likely to comprehend the science of brewing."

He proceeds to call me an a-hole and an A-wipe. I realized that I was wrong so I deleted that part of my post. I never sent him a personal message calling him an idiot though I did send him a personal message in response to the post he changed. It was simply: "The fact that you don't "ponder" as you put it is why you now have pits in your new kettle."

So I render here my apology for being an A-hole last night.

I feel a rant coming on put I'll try and refrain.
 
ScottT said:
I feel a rant coming on put I'll try and refrain.


Yes, let's refrain. :p

It was an honest mistake about the brewpot, some unnecessary words were said, apologies (kind of) were given, and now we are all good. :D
Let's not make this board PIRATE4X4 (For those that don't know, Pirate4x4 is notorious for jumping all over n00bs and/or anyone and everyone for everything. Go there at your own risk :D )
 
ScottT said:
So I render here my apology for being an A-hole last night.

Good man! It takes a lot in a person to make an apology for some reason. It's something I've never understood. I'm quick to say I'm sorry when I'm in the wrong, and my wife says that I don't understand how hard it can be to do that for some people. (She's bad about apologies... I've only gotten ONE from her that I didn't have to outright ask for, and half of the time the ones I request aren't what they should be... like... she'll snap at me, I'll ask for an apology, and she'll say "I'm sorry I'm tired" instead of "I'm sorry I snapped at you.")

Anyway... kudos, Scott.

Heck, there's someone on this board that I've apparently ticked off, and I don't know WHY they got mad. I apologized several times for upsetting them (even though THEY were the one that got nasty), but they are just ignoring me now. (They won't see this post, because they have me on their ignore list.)

Maybe it also takes a lot in a person to ACCEPT an apology and not hold a grudge.

-walker
 
Back
Top