Bad taste from Silicone Hoses.

[Fordiesel69]

We have a brand new nano brewing setup from rubystreetbrewing. Its called the alpha ruby, and is total electric.

We have diagnosed the issue to the rubber / silicone hoses they provided. As soon as we taste the boiled water from the kettles, it has no flavor, and is just fine. The moment we circulate the boiling water thru the hoses, it picks up an absolute horrific chemical / rubber/ hose taste. So far we have dumped 45 gallons of beer as a result and hundreds upon hundres of flush water with no imporvment.

Any idea why these hoses are so foul.

 

[Fordiesel69]

we have also boiled the hoses seperate and there is no improvement.

 

[Epos7]

Are you sure it isn't the valves or pumps? Silicone is just about as inert a material as you can find for a hose. If it is the hoses, that's very strange.

 

[kh54s10]

Easy way to find out. Keep those hoses, replace with different hoses, taste gone? = it was the hoses. Taste still there? = either the new hoses give the same taste or it lies elsewhere. You are eventually going to replace the hoses anyway, so you might not lose anything testing this way, if the hoses are good. If they are the culprit you need new hoses anyway.

Contact the manufacturer to see if anyone else has reported the same??

 

[beernutz]

What did Ruby Street say when you contacted them?

 

[Fordiesel69]

They said they used food grade hose and that they have had no complaints.

However.....if you boil water and drop the hoses into the boiling water the taste instantly appears in your water. We no longer need to brew to get the flavor, just hot boiling water brings it out....

 

[Bobby_M]

I would hope they would perform the same dip test to verify it for themselves just in case they got a bad batch. I would demand it. I'd be glad to send you a short test piece of my silicone to do a test.

 

[Fordiesel69]

BobbyM,

That would be absolutly appriciated. My email is my username at aol.com

We are using 3/4 tubing on this nano brewery setup.

Our hose stinks on the outside and inside. The factory says theirs does not and that they have had no issues. (ya right...). They are willing to do a test, but not for a bit as they have to do a test on a newly built unit.

 

[Queequeg]

The smell is peroxide curing. You want platinum cured hoses. Peroxide cured are food grade but all that means is it won't kill you, it can still spoil flavour.

 

[Fordiesel69]

Ok, so ruby sent some replacement hose..no dice, still smells, still tastes terrible, and looks the same cloudy white color as the originals.

 

[augiedoggy]

Ok, so ruby sent some replacement hose..no dice, still smells, still tastes terrible, and looks the same cloudy white color as the originals.

are you using any chemical cleaners to clean it? if so what? my hoses turned white but only after being left in starsan for a prolonged period of time? Mine are all from bargain fittings though.

 

[mabrungard]

There is no way that true silicone hoses are tainting your beer. Look elsewhere.

 

[Fordiesel69]

I think ruby is using some chinese import hose. I dont beleive they will disclose their source.

On the flipside, I have called every food and beverage supplier in my local area, and none have heard of silicone food grade hose. This blows my mind.

 

[SpeedYellow]

Silicone has an amazing ability to absorb and hold odors, but I don't think it will typically impart flavors despite smelling. Seems more likely that your silicone has simply absorbed the aroma resulting from some other problem. I.e. your silicone is the canary in your coalmine.

 

[dyqik]

I think ruby is using some chinese import hose. I dont beleive they will disclose their source.

On the flipside, I have called every food and beverage supplier in my local area, and none have heard of silicone food grade hose. This blows my mind.

Have you tried calling around any homebrew stores in the area? Google says that Beer & Pop Discount sells brewing equipment, although they don't have an online catalog to let me tell what they sell.

Failing that, MoreBeer have a warehouse in western PA, and will get hose to you in a day. They also sell EJ Beverage High Temp tubing which is an alternative to silicone.

 

[Fordiesel69]

We are going to try the hose from brewhardware.com, they get it directly from the manufacture here in the USA. Will see how it works out.

 

[Dcpcooks]

We are going to try the hose from brewhardware.com, they get it directly from the manufacture here in the USA. Will see how it works out.

I have 50' of the hose from Brewers hardware and I have not had any problems with it.

 

[kh54s10]

BrewHardware silicone hose is more clear than most other suppliers. They are all somewhat milky in color. If it is clear it is vinyl. I have not had any smells coming from the BH silicone tubing. I have soaked it in Oxyclean and Starsan with no issues from either.

The suppliers that haven't seen "food safe" on silicone tubing--- It might be that, AFAIK, all pure silicone tubing is food safe. So it is not labeled as such. I could be wrong on that since BH tubing is the only source that I have used.

 

[Fordiesel69]

UPDATE:

We conducted a test on the Brewer's Hardware silcone hose, and it is indeed better, but not usable for brewing, still imparting a terrible taste. Here is the testing we did.

-We used very good well water (filtered, and treated with UV)circulated at boiling temp, and grabbed a sample. Yep, nasty rubbery taste.
-I took a sample of hose to my house and tried 3 different water sources to test thinking there must be an issue with water quality. I tested with 30 minute boils of municiple water, deep well water that is high in iron but otherwise very flavorful, and Deer Park bottled water. All water types are still pulling a horrific rubbery taste from the hose.

 

[runningfarmer]

You have not dug in far enough.At a local brewery they fought it and and found steam vent would collect and run moisture back in. Once cleaned problem solved.Take it a part piece by piece till find crap in valve or something

 

[Fordiesel69]

runningfarmer,

This is a brand new system. It is properly passivated. And spotless.

I also cut a section of tubing and put it in a pan of boiling water and was able to narrow it down to the tubing itself with no other things involved.

 

[augiedoggy]

UPDATE:

We conducted a test on the Brewer's Hardware silcone hose, and it is indeed better, but not usable for brewing, still imparting a terrible taste. Here is the testing we did.

-We used very good well water (filtered, and treated with UV)circulated at boiling temp, and grabbed a sample. Yep, nasty rubbery taste.
-I took a sample of hose to my house and tried 3 different water sources to test thinking there must be an issue with water quality. I tested with 30 minute boils of municiple water, deep well water that is high in iron but otherwise very flavorful, and Deer Park bottled water. All water types are still pulling a horrific rubbery taste from the hose.

So what your saying is silicone rubber hose which most breweries and many homebrewers here use imparts a "horrific rubbery taste " but your the only brewery that noticed this issue? Dont you find this a bit odd?

Forgive me for being skeptical but as someone whos been using silicone hoses for years in my home brewery with no horrible rubber or otherwise bad flavors imparted by the hoses im just having a hard time believing this is actually the case here..

As mentioned Silicone is known to not impart flavors... This is why its popular for such things as this and even hookahs

 

[Scottanooga]

You mentioned using well water. Could that be the issue? Try your boiling test with RO or distilled water.

 

[brick_haus]

Yea, has to be either your water or your sensory glands or...
Clean silicone hose simply does not impart flavor into food/beverages, including water suitable for brewing

 

[kh54s10]

I too think the issue lies elsewhere. I have been reading these posts for 6 years and this is the first time I have read anything about getting a rubbery flavor from silicone tubing.

I would think someone else would have had the problem.

Have you used any cleaning products or other that might not have gotten fully rinsed that may react with the silicone tubing?

 

[Bilsch]

Some people can perceive things that others cant. If you smell the hose then by all means try a better quality.
https://www.coleparmer.com/p/platinum-cured-silicone-tubing/41153

 

[day_trippr]

Genetics?

I run a lot of silicone tubing on my rig. But, specifically, the HLT recirculation hoses never see anything but hot and even boiling water (O2 reduction), are run for well over an hour on the typical brew day, and I've never noticed any character emanating from the HLT (or the beer) that would suggest the hoses were leeching something into the water.

It seems water was ruled out, and at least the second batch of hose was purchased from a reasonably reputable retailer, so I'm definitely at a loss to explanify what's happening.

Unless it's genetics

Cheers!

 

[Fordiesel69]

UPDATE:

We purchased "Platinum Cured" silicon hose from williamsbrewery.com. It is identified with the orange stripe and is more transparent. It is only rated at 5psi up to 350 degrees but that is a non issue. This hose has yet to affect flavor. We recirc'ed boiling water thru it for 1 hr and picked up no flavor. It seems like the "Platinum Curing" process is far superior and is used in medical field. Not sure if this has anything to do with it, but so far so good.

As for the ruby hose, and the brewhardware hose, it was sampled by many people, some unaware of the issue, and they thought it was horrific. 4 different water sources including bottled water all had the same result. I think that those who are not experiancing the flavor, either are not able to detect it for whatever reason, or after hundreds of gallons passing thru it, stripped the rubbery chemicals off the tubing.

 

[Dcpcooks]

I'm glad you found a solution to your problem. Now I'm going to be smelling hoses at the next brew day

 

[Fordiesel69]

Honestly, it may be worth all of the doubters to perform this simple test.

-Cut a 6" piece of hose off.
-Place in a small 6-8" sauce pan of boiling water making certain the hose is NOT touching the bottom of the pan.
-Boil for 1 hr, and pull a sample.

I would bet you will be able to detect a flavor of some kind, probably very nasty if a new hose. If an old hose maybe not.

We cannot comment on old used hoses.

 

[stratslinger]

Or, for those of us who have already been using BH silicone tubing for years - recirculating the mash, recirculating at the end of the boil to sanitize counter flow chillers, then circulating through the chiller, all processes utilizing that selfsame BH silicone tubing, maybe don't need an "extra" test to tell us that the stuff just isn't imparting any flavors? Like a few have posted already, it seems highly dubious that you're having this sort of issue and literally nobody else has come forward to report similar findings...

 

[kh54s10]

Good to hear that you solved the problem. It is still a mystery why no one else has that problem????

 

[steveoatley]

Is it possible that the OP was just tasting his 'poor' water ?

If you boil 2 gals water for an hour, and you are left with 1 gallon
You are still left with the "residual" minerals that were in your water
those... that can't be boiled off

Perhaps its that taste of those 'residual' minerals that are the real problem ?

OP
Did you try a test with
1. boiling 2 gals of H2O down to 1 gal and tasting that ?
With no hose sample in the test boil ?

just my 2 cents

Steve

 

[Fordiesel69]

As already mentioned WE USED 4 DIFFERENT WATER SOURCES.

1.) Known good / tested well water processed with a whole house rainsoft system + UV. (located where brew system resides)
2.) Known good municiple water from a different geographic area.
3.) Suspect high iron well water untreated from a different geographic area.
4.) Bottled Deer Park brand spring water.

It is not the water!!!!

We did boil the plain water without the hose in it. It tasted fine.

We are not willing to brew many batches of beer to prove / disprove this theory. However my theory / opinion is the tubing will impart a bad taste when brand new, and over several batches, fade away. I suspect this is the case as to why nobody is tasting what we are tasting.

 

[Dcpcooks]

Honestly, it may be worth all of the doubters to perform this simple test.

-Cut a 6" piece of hose off.
-Place in a small 6-8" sauce pan of boiling water making certain the hose is NOT touching the bottom of the pan.
-Boil for 1 hr, and pull a sample.

I would bet you will be able to detect a flavor of some kind, probably very nasty if a new hose. If an old hose maybe not.

We cannot comment on old used hoses.

I'm not doubting your off flavor or your solution. My experiences don't match yours but that doesn't mean yours are false.

I don't recall hearing of this issue in the past but that doesn't mean anything. It's entirely possible that the BH hose has come from a different source over the years or even more likely that they got a bad batch from China. QC is always suspect when buying from the cheapest supplier!

You've isolated the problem separately from your system and you've found a good solution that works for you, cheers!

As I said above I'll be looking for off flavors next batch.

 

[Bobby_M]

First, be careful with BrewHardware vs Brewer's Hardware. Two different companies.

Everything surrounding this issue should be considered in terms of exposure surface area to volume, time and temperature. In order to do valid testing on potential flavor leeching, you have to scale down a typical batch size so that's what we're doing with our testing in light of this claim.

Here's our test assumptions:
10 gallon batch at flameout being pumped for whirlpool for 15 minutes at full boiling temps.
A typical pumped system may use say up to 10 feet of tubing, 4 feet down to the pump and 6 feet up to the whirlpool port (this is probably more than necessary but it's a round number).
For every inch of 1/2" ID tubing, you have 1.57 square inches of surface area exposed to your media so 10 feet of hose is 188 square inches.

Ok, so to do a scaled exposure test with a small piece of tubing in a small volume of water, let's go down to 1 cup of water which is a 160:1 ratio. So, the surface area of tubing we need to expose to that cup of water is 1.175 square inches. This is where we can get in trouble because even a 1" long piece of tubing has 1.57 on the inside and 2.355 on the outside not counting the ends. So, I cut a piece and sliced it open to have a piece 3/4" x 3/4" square and that's a total of 1.125 on both sides plus the perimeter area of .375". It's a little more than our target but close enough for me.

We'll be getting our cup of RO water up to boiling, taking out a small control sample, then soaking that silicone sample for 15 minutes. Both samples will be chilled and compared. Of course there are other things to consider. RO vs. ion balanced. Wort vs water (acidic vs neutral), etc.

I don't think I would consider boiling the sample for a full hour as it's unrealistic in normal usage.

I've used peroxide cured silicone tubing for 10 years and never suspected leeching even once.

For the record regarding Dcpcooks last post, Brewhardware.com has NEVER EVER sold imported silicone tubing. Our tubing is extruded locally by a company using 100% DOW silicone base materials with FDA certification and it has been that way from the day we started selling it. Yes, we are apparently the cheapest on that particular tubing but it's based on volume and willingness to take less profit.

 

[Dcpcooks]

For the record regarding Dcpcooks last post, Brewhardware.com has NEVER EVER sold imported silicone tubing. Our tubing is extruded locally by a company using 100% DOW silicone base materials with FDA certification and it has been that way from the day we started selling it. Yes, we are apparently the cheapest on that particular tubing but it's based on volume and willingness to take less profit.[/QUOTE]


Thanks for clarifying your business name, position and the origin of your product. I have never used your tubing as I purchased from brewers hardware and not your company.

 

[Bobby_M]

We've only performed the test one time as described above and I let a few people compare the samples blind and there is no apparent difference. This is far from a good controlled experiment yet and the tasting sample size is very small but so far I'm not ripping the tubing out of my brewing rig anytime soon.

I will be boiling some tubing for a full hour to try to repeat the findings reported above, but again, the amount of tubing to amount of water probably matters as much as the long boil time does.

 

[jcav]

I use the clear silicone tubing from Bobby's store on my rig and have a lot of it. I use R/O water and I have never had off flavors in my beer from it. Just saying....

John

 

[brick_haus]

Has anyone here even heard of anyone attributing off flavor to silicone tubing? The OP claim seems absurd to me.