star san question

[400d]

I intend to buy my first star san bottle and start to sanitize my equipment with it. By now, I used bleach solution. With bleach I had a huge water consumption by one sanitizing cycle. I had to fill each bottle with water, I had to fill each bucket and carboy with water, and of course I had to thoroughly rinse them, which also consumed huge amounts of water....

I live in europe and it is very hard to get it shipped here from the USA... Anyway, I managed to arrange it with seller.

Now, as far as I understood, one 32 oz bottle makes 32*5=160 gallons of sanitizing solution....

Can I make a mixture of starsan with one gallon water and use it with vinator for bottle sanitation for a longer time/repeated sanitizing? For how long Star San is active after it has been diluted in water? How to store it?


I also thought of sanitizing my carboys by spraying star san solution inside from a spray bottle. Can I do it like this without filling it with water to the top?


thanks
I thought of keeping it in plastic bottles, is this ok?

 

[frazier]

Star-san can keep for quite a while, and can be reused. I keep a spray bottle for treating surfaces etc., and a bucket w/lid for sanitizing equipment. On brew day, all my hose, siphons, tubes, anything that might ever touch the wort, goes into the bucket. I siphon a gallon or so into the carboy, swish it and shake it periodically during the boil, and dump it back into the bucket when the wort is cool. Not much of it goes down the drain unless I want it to.

 

[Sean]

You can use it multiple times. I put half gallon or so in the carboy and shake, wait while I do something else, shake again. When I am done I pour it into a plastic bucket with a sealed lid to store.

I started useing it a few months ago and am very happy with it.

Luck!

 

[imasickboy]

Mix as much, or as little as you want, but be sure you mix properly.

Mix it with distilled water, and store it in a sealed container, (spray bottles, sealed bucket, etc.) and it will keep indefinitely. As long as the pH remains at 3 or below, it is still effective to use.

Your 32 ounce bottle could possibly last you for many, many years, if mixed and stored properly.

 

[KeithMoonsLiver]

you don't need much. I pipette about 1.5 ml into a liter of distilled water and put it into a spray bottle. that usually lasts me through one bottling and one brewing session.

 

[beersydoesit]

Starsan will last a long time. I was amazed how for I could get with starstan and a vinator. Ideally get some litmus paper and test it for a PH <=3 and as long as it is you're good to go. You'll be pleased at how long it lasts.

 

[yodalegomaster]

Make sure to use distilled water.

 

[TheDom]

Check out this podcast here. You'll want the March 29, 2007 episode. All you ever wanted to know and more about Star San.

Make sure you use distilled water to mix it. It also helps if you get a pack of pH test strips so you can verify that the pH is 3 or below. If you don't do that, make sure you throw it out once it gets cloudy.