Star San / Oxidation/ IO-star / no rinse

[fromhereon]

Hi Everyone,

I love Star San but recently when bottling it occurred to me that with all the foam in the bottle how would I actually be purging all the oxygen out? Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

I was considering using IO-star for the bottles and kegs but it's truly no rinse? I'd love to be able to use the Star San for everything. Has anyone ever considered adding a defoamer to Star San?

 

[BrunDog]

Foam or no foam there will be some headspace with some O2. Unless you purge it somehow with CO2 or N2 I don't see a way around it. That said, 5 Star does make a low foam version of SS.

 

[jddevinn]

Saniclean is a low foam alternative. However, there will be air in the bottle unless you purge it completely or fill it completely. They also make oxygen absorbing caps... although I don't bottle so I do not know if they are affective.

 

[fromhereon]

I am counter pressure filling the bottles so I am purging with C02. I thought Saniclean was more of a cleaner than a sanitizer. Is that the product you were talking about BrunDog?

 

[dmcman73]

I keg but when I use my bottling wand (racking cane jammed into a picnic faucet and a #1 drilled stopper) I generally fill to the top and let foam (starsan or foam from the beer) bleed out past the rubber topper by pressing on the side of the rubber stopper. What's left in the bottle is just beer. But once you pull the wand out, no matter what you're using, O2 will get sucked into the headspace that is being created once the wand is out.

I don't own one but I would imagine if you used a Blichman Beer gun or the Midwest version of it, as you pull the wand out and the headspace is created, use the tip of the want to inject some Co2 into that headspace to displace any O2.

 

[jddevinn]

Saniclean is an acid wash, same as Starsan. They just didn't go through the process to get it rated as a sanitizer.