Did I just ruin my equipment?

Background: So the day after my brewday, I realized I forgot to rinse off my wort chiller after cooling wort/pitching yeast. So needless to say there was nasty trub and hops dried on it. So I decided to give it a chlorine bath (1 tbsp bleach/gallon water) and the only thing I had that was big enough to soak the chiller in was my brewpot. So I soaked my copper immersion wort chiller in my aluminum brew pot for a few days (I would've just done over night, but I forgot about it). Today I remembered about it and here's what I found...

The pot of water had stuff floating around in it, clinging to both the surface of the pot and the surface of the chiller. I pulled the chiller out to find that the previously smooth copper tube was now very rough. I dumped the water, and found that the inside of the aluminum pot was also very rough. So I scrubbed both with soap and a brillo sponge and the stuff on the copper came off, but the stuff on the aluminum did not. What the hell happened here?

I've now read that bleach and aluminum don't mix very well. But it almost seemed like chips of the aluminum were attaching to the copper or something. My very very limited chemistry knowledge lead me to thinking of something like an anode/cathode or ox/redox reaction, or something like that between the copper and aluminum... or was it just the aluminum and bleach thing?

Bottom line: the chiller is probably fine, I scrubbed the stuff off, but the aluminum is still very rough and looks very ugly. did I ruin my brewpot?

Thanks for any help.

 

Dump the aluminum pot and get yourself into stainless.

PBW works well for gunk from brewing, but never expose dis-similar metals to an acidic or caustic environment. I use plastic to contain my cleaning solutions and sterilizers, never metal, nor do I expose my brew kettle to anything other than PBW for cleaning.

Good luck, maybe someone else will have better news for you.

 

Just a heads up, stainless wouldn't have worked any better in that situation. I'm pretty sure bleach pits stainless after awhile and, since you soaked for several days you would have just been out an even more expensive brew pot.

A little Oxyclean or PBW might have worked fine on the chiller, but not in an aluminum pot, as it would have removed the oxidized layer that you want to maintain with an aluminum boil kettle.

 

Correct, Shooter....Bleach causes the solution to become acidic...add copper and you have a battery!!

 

Yeah that sounds about right, it looks like spots of the pot are chipped away. Is there anything I can do to re oxidize that layer? I read boiling water for 30 minutes, or sticking the dry aluminum pot in the oven for a while works, but neither of those sound like reasonable solutions...

 

Sounds like this little "experiment" could lead to a visit from the EPA... jk

 

Re-oxidizing the aluminum is easy, but you'll still have heavy pitting.

 

But that shouldn't matter, right? Sure it won't look as shiny as it did before, but its not a sanitation risk because its being boiled. Only thing I'm worried about it the possibility of the "aluminum pits" imparting a flavor on my beer. Is that an issue? If not, how would I go about re-oxidizing aluminum?

 

Just boil some water in it for an hour or so, or put it in the oven for a half hour at 350. That will build up your oxidation layer in no time (well, an hour or half hour ).

PS Stick with aluminum...I don't ever want to use stainless as a brew pot!

 

Mixing copper and aluminum in an electrolytic liquid will cause galvanic corrosion. I know it's a concern for people who use liquid cooling on their computers.
Plus aluminum dissolves in acid.

 

Thanks germelli, I'll try that soon. I may just spend the $30 to get another one, but I plan on brewing with my brother next weekend, so if it doesn't come in time its nice to know I have a backup.

dotnetdotcom, I KNEW it might have something to do with the copper and aluminum together, and not just the bleach and aluminum. it seemed too weird that the copper seemed to have some sort of aluminum deposit building up on it. thanks for confirming that.

thanks everyone for your help. Cheers!

 

Hey, if you are going to get a new aluminum pot, might as well get a bigger one at a resturant supply store in the area! I want to upgrade to 10 gallon pot in the future so my 7.5 gallon turkey fryer isn't loaded to capacity with each boil haha

 

Oh woah, I didn't realize you were from my area. Do you know of any restaurant supply stores in Herndon? I'd be looking for 6-7.5 gals because I only do 5 gallon batches (and usually only about 4.5 gal boils).

Also, if you brew in Herndon, which homebrew store do you use? I only know of Jay's Homebrew Shop in Clifton, and myLHBS in Falls Church, but I usually go to Jay's.

 

I have only ever gone to Jay's but I usually only get yeast, specialty grains or hops that I don't have stockpiled...but his prices seem very high on everything except specialty grains.

I buy everything I can at the LHBS in blacksburg when I am at tech.

I recently upgraded to a turkey fryer I got on craigslist for $30 that can do full 5 gallon batch boils. I usually boil 6.5-7 gallons at a time for my 5 gallon batches