Alcohol for Sanitizing?

I'm a poor college student wanting to start brewing and looking for any kind of way to work around a budget, finding cheaper ways to brew something great while keeping it safe and clean! Any advice will help but for now these are the main questions I have.

Can you use rubbing alcohol when sanitizing equipment for brewing? If you can what are the ratios of rubbing alcohol to water? Along with the soak times.

Along with that what are your thoughts on bleach for sanitizing (as it is really cheap) and what are the ratios and soak times? I've read many different variations, 1 Tbs per gal to 1/4 Tbs per gal and just wondering if someone with more experience has anything to say on it?

I would not use rubbing alcohol. I would imagine that can cause serious problems. Bleach would be your best bet for a low cost sanitizer. A better option would be idophor (sp). I have heard you can get it at feed stores for really cheap. Even at a home brew store it is only about $10 for a bottle that would last you most of college if you are careful. The advantage is that this is no rinse. If you are not careful you will get off favors with bleach or if your rinsing water is contaminated you will then loose the batch. One batch of beer lost to infection or off favors it $20-$50 which is alot of sanitizer.

If you want to use bleach check out www.howtobrew.com. It should have the ratios there.

I suggest Iodophor. B-T-F Iodophor is what is most commonly stocked at homebrew supply stores, and it's what I use. 3 ml (slightly more than a half teaspoon) per gallon of water makes the recommended 12.5 ppm solution. As rjsnau mentioned, a pint bottle of it will last you a very long time. A quart should last you several years.

Forget the outright incredible danger of using a highly combustible fluid as a sanitizer on Brew Days, I'm left wondering how alcohol would be less expensive than far safer alternatives...

Cheers!

...not to mention rubbing alcohol isnt a sanitizer to begin with. there are many things that can survive in iso alcohol.

if you cant afford $10 for 80 gallons worth of starsan concentrate, i dont know how you think $3/qt for rubbing alcohol is going to be any less expensive.

For using alcohol as a sanitizer, it needs to be at 70% or greater concentration with a 20 minute contact time, and preferably you should use ethanol for food prep sanitation. Iodophor is much more economical, and starsan/pbw really is not that expensive in the long run.

Star San FTW. It's only $8 for 8 oz. You need only 1/5 oz per gallon of water and can store it for weeks at a time. If you're smart about it, you can get 20 brews out of $8, which is like $0.40 per batch.

Never any worries about off flavors either. Well worth preventing infections and money lost!