StarSan rinsers?

[nostalgia]

I am not a rinser. I lurve my foam. I drink Coke.

I just wanted to point out that the, "It's safe because the manufacturer drank some" is a flawed argument. When health arguments against leaded gasoline were raised, a representative drank a glass of it to prove its safety.

I'm still trying to find where I read that, but even if the story is a cute made up one, the point is the same. Just because someone is willing to drink it doesn't mean it's safe for me to

Now if I'm shown that the amount of bad stuff in a product is no worse than the bad stuff I consume on a daily basis, as with StarSan, that I'm on board with.

-Joe

 

[SumnerH]

YI say Google it out my friend and see for yourself, i have heard of close people that have been drinking soft drink since youth and now are dealing with serious dental porous issues, cannot eat anything hard like nuts in fear of actually seeing their teeth break out in their own mouth... (True issue)

Beer will not do that to me.

The primary reasons soft drinks rot your teeth are:
1) Loads of sugar feeds plaque, promoting tooth decay
2) Carbonated beverages (by nature) have carbonic acid in them, which erodes enamel.
3) When you drink more soda, you drink less milk, resulting in lower calcium intake.
4) Caffeine increases the excretion rate for calcium

1-3 apply to beer as much as to soda. The effect of 4 is minimal in practice, as increased excretion rate after taking caffeine results in lower excretion rate later in the day, for a negligible overall impact on calcium retention.

Phosphoric acid has nothing to do with it. See, e.g., Carbonated beverages and urinary calcium excretion -- Heaney and Rafferty 74 (3): 343 -- American Journal of Clinical Nutrition

Results: Relative to water, urinary calcium rose significantly only with the milks and the 2 caffeine-containing beverages. The excess calciuria was {approx}0.25 mmol, about the same as previously reported for caffeine alone. Phosphoric acid without caffeine produced no excess calciuria; nor did it augment the calciuria of caffeine.

Conclusions: The excess calciuria associated with consumption of carbonated beverages is confined to caffeinated beverages. Acidulant type has no acute effect. Because the caffeine effect is known to be compensated for by reduced calciuria later in the day, we conclude that the net effect of carbonated beverage constituents on calcium economy is negligible. The skeletal effects of carbonated beverage consumption are likely due primarily to milk displacement.

Beer is just as bad for your teeth as soda.

And Star-San has almost zero effect on the pH or phosphorous content of your final brew, anyway. Yeast consumes the neutralized phosphorous during fermentation, and the amount is tiny in the first place.

 

[Stef1966]

There is no such thing as the 'bones system' - for the legal record.

Phosphoric acid in sodas nearly as damaging to teeth as battery acid

 

[nostalgia]

Sorry, my bad. He didn't drink it; he bathed in it Note that he had made himself seriously ill from overexposure and still tried to tell the public it was safe.

In 1923, a consortium of General Motors, Du Pont and Standard Oil registered a patent on tetraethyl lead as an additive to gasoline, leading to an immensely profitable business (see Bill Bryson: "A short history of nearly everything". Anchor Canada, 2004, pp 149-152). Very soon, however, plant workers were showing signs of lead poisoning, which management denied strenuously. At least 15 deaths occurred, but the real number remains unknown. Bryson records: "As rumors circulated about the dangers of the new product, ethyl's ebullient inventor, Thomas Midgley, decided to hold a demonstration for reporters to allay their concerns. As he chatted away about the company's commitment to safety, he poured tetraethyl lead (TEL) over his hands, then held a beaker of it to his nose for sixty seconds, claiming all the while that he could repeat the procedure daily without harm. In fact, Midgley knew only too well the perils of lead poisoning: he had himself been made seriously ill from overexposure a few months earlier and now, except when reassuring journalists, never went near the stuff if he could help it." (page 151)

Emphasis mine. Source

As I said, my point is the same: a manufacturer drinking his product does show his faith in it, but doesn't make me feel any better about drinking it myself.

-Joe

 

[SumnerH]

Phosphoric acid in sodas nearly as damaging to teeth as battery acid

I don't even know where to begin explaining how misleading that article is.

Most importantly, the reason sodas are acidic is almost entirely because of carbonic acid (caused by dissolving C02 in water), not the relatively low levels of phosphoric acid.

Secondly, it's incredibly narrow in scope and sensationalistic against one product. Orange or lemon juice have even lower pH levels than most sodas. Of course, "Natural News" isn't going to point at them even though they're more likely to erode your teeth and also have a pH "that approaches the level of battery acid".

Third, it repeats the long-discredited "phosphoric acid dissolves away your skeletal system" urban legend.

Finally, it's not particularly relevant. Suppose you rinse a bottle with a solution that has a pH of 3 (e.g. StarSan), leaving 2 ml of solution coating the bottle. Then fill it up with 12oz of water. Now you'll have something with a pH around 6, which is about equal to that of a glass of milk or a typical river or stream's water. The point being, the amount you leave behind is so tiny that the effect on pH is incredibly low.

 

[olllllo]

Phosphoric acid in sodas nearly as damaging to teeth as battery acid

From the same site:

Poor habits such as smoking, excess alcohol consumption and a lack of exercise can all reduce bone formation by interfering with the bone's ability to properly absorb calcium.

Strong Body, Strong Bones - Six Steps to Prevent Osteoporosis

also
Research shows how alcohol is linked to cancer by Mike Adams the Health Ranger

 

[Stef1966]

Well, this is very interesting, strong and accurate debaters in here, i gotta admit it changed me mind about star san, i may try it if i run into it one day at my LHBS.

 

[Homercidal]

Actually, drinking milk to add bone mass is a bit misleading. There are a large number of cultures that do not drink milk of any sort and do not have any of the health problems that we Westerners claim we will have if we stopped drinking it.

There are plenty of sources of calcium other than milk and you really only need a miniscule amount to maintain bone density. Also, it have been proven that exercise is a good way to create bone density, as shown by comparing pitchers' throwing arms to their off-arms.