Charlie Talley (Five-Star Chemicals) Notes from Brewcasts

[JoePerri]

That is a very good question! I use 1.5oz per gallon. You go through it FAST at that rate. If I can get just as good performance with 2oz in five gallons I'll be happy.

 

[SPLASTiK]

Thought I'd mention that the newest episode of Brew Strong is available: The Brewing Network.com - :

They interview Jon Herskovits of Five Star Chemicals on the topic of Sanitization and discuss the use of Star San, Iodophor, Bleach and other ways to sanitize. A couple weeks prior you can get their interview with him on the subject of cleaning.

 

[wendelgee2]

The directions on the PBW say 1-2 oz per gallon. So is 1 oz per 5 galls good enough?

I second this question. Anybody remember what they said on Brewstrong?


Also, if you're going from a PBW scrubdown straight to the Star San rinse is there any reaction? Or, does the PBW negate the Star San...PBW being an alkali (basic) cleaner, and Star San being an acid sanitizer??

 

[WortMonger]

Why would you not want to rinse the PBW before your Star-San wendelgee2?

 

[berwick12]

F***ing hell. I wish I read this sticky before I used PBW yesterday on my non stick bread pan and skillet. My dumb ass roommate doesn't believe in using coking oil, of any sort. Let the skillet soak and bread pan, the pans sucked anyways, but the PBW lifted about a 1/4 of the non stick coating in the bread pan. LOL

 

[JoePerri]

The directions on the PBW say 1-2 oz per gallon. So is 1 oz per 5 galls good enough?

I was very curious about this as well so I emailed Five Star and asked them. This is the response:

PBW is effective at dilutions ranging from 0.6 oz (by weight) per gallon, which is 2-oz per 5 gallons, up to 2 oz per gallons for heavy soil loads. For great water profiles and low soil loads dilutions of only 1 oz per 5 gallons will still outperform water alone but that seems a bit weak a solution for most applications, even for the home brewer.

So I think I will use about 2-3 oz. per 5 gallons.

Joe

 

[craprocker]

Do all you weigh your pbw or just use a table spoon measurement like I do? So am I correct with 1/2 oz = 1 tbsp?

 

[WortMonger]

I use the tablespoon measure or a shot glass marked with 1-1.5-2 oz marks. Yes, 1 tbsp = .5 US fluid ounces.

 

[SupraSPL]

Resurrecting here but I think it was Jon who said when it comes to PBW, consider the four factors CTTA Concentration, Time, Temperature, Agitation. He said it rinses easily and works well enough in cold water. I am always trying to save energy so I go low on the temperature and concentration part but go long on the time and agitation part. Great product.

 

[starsailor]

But there's no point keeping it when mixed with tap water, the minerals and chlorine will rise the pH and it will be useless. If you plan to store, you need to only mix with demineralised or RO water.
I keep a plastic trigger pack on hand with a starsan/demineralised mix to spray everything I come in contact with on brew and bottling days. I also take it to work and spray any air conditioners that have built up odours due to bacteria breeding in evaporators.

I know it been a while since this was posted, but I'm reading this whole thread through for the first time. Then, it occured to me several posts later that spraying StarSan on AC evaporators might not be a good idea. Almost all newer ones are aluminum and some old ones are copper. Isn't that a no-no unless it's rinsed off after a few minutes? Won't the acids just eat up the thin aluminum or copper?

On a related note, has anyone had an issue with rinsing copper brazed plate chillers with StarSan? Won't it just disolve the copper and separate the plates?

 

[WortMonger]

I have never had an issue with Star-San and my Therminator. I do worry though, so I only use the Star-San in the chiller when it is hooked to the cleaning loop on my brewery (actually it is just hooked up to my lautering grant and pump combo and recirculates there). Otherwise, I stick that bad boy in my king-size pressure canner and fire it up after cleaning it. I have quit using Star-San on my brewing equipment (no need to sanitize that anyways), so the chiller only gets PBW or Oxy followed by a slight vinegar water rinse. Then nothing but tap water before everything is left to dry.

As for the AC coils... I would think it would be fine if you rinsed off before it set all day. Couple hours and a rinse should be fine once a year. The rest of the time I would just use a pressure hose and be careful not to bend the fins with the spray.

 

[Lyikos]

Does anyone know of the fate of DDBSA when its diluted by starsan. The Sulfate is probably used by the yeast, but there is still that whole complex of a benzene ring with a dodecane tail. Both of those are pretty toxic to people, so anyone knows what happens to them?

EDIT: NM found an answer in another thread.

 

[Xoxon]

My tap water causes Star San to go very cloudy immediately - the podcast infers that this might reduce the product's effectiveness (he asks a caller how long it takes to turn cloudy due to ions in his local water supply), but doesn't say how severe this issue is.

Should I be using distilled water?
Is a cloudy diluted Star San still doing the do?

 

[WortMonger]

Buy some RO water and use that. You don't want to use distilled because it can also make the product work differently IIRC. RO has a minute enough volume of minerals to buffer the water so you get what the product says you get. I'd buy a 5 gallon water bottle and just go refill it when needed. You don't need much star-san since it foams, and you can always use that until it is used up.

 

[stonebrewer]

Question about Star San: a buddy of mine swears it has to be at least 120F or it will not properly sanitize. I tend to keep mine around for a few weeks before I dump it, going from carboy to keg to bucket and back again. Should I be heating it up to get it to work properly or is that just not necessary?

Thanks!

 

[rales]

Five Star's Tech Sheet on Star San says nothing about heating... I think it would be there if it were important.

 

[medusa1066]

Ask him to show you where on the packaging it says that

 

[stonebrewer]

Five Star's Tech Sheet on Star San says nothing about heating... I think it would be there if it were important.

Thanks for checking that. I never saw anything on the bottle but he was pretty adamant that he had read it "somewhere" so I will let him know that it works without heating. He was in food service in college and I think he was taught then to heat all sanitizers and that just has stuck in his brain...

 

[WortMonger]

It doesn't need to be heated up. He may be thinking of PBW or another cleaner, but not a sanitizer like Star-San.

 

[Dan]

if we want to know quite a lot about cleaning and sanitizing. Great information here which is no doubt why it is stickified.

The other day I listened to a podcast with Charlie Talley (Five-Star Chemicals, the maker of StarSan) talking about cleaning and sanitizing. (Thank you HBT and beer historian Revvy for posting that episode)

There is a lot of information in the talk, most of it I'd picked up through reading but one thing Charlie said gave me an idea.

StarSan is a cold blooded very effective killer of molds, spores, and bacteria when the pH is 3.5 or below. But above that it becomes a nutrient for yeast.

So what if a diluted solution of StarSan with a pH higher than 3.5 was used in the water of a yeast starter? I add nutrients when I make a starter and they are not exactly pricey but cost more than a few liters of diluted StarSan.

Any merit in trying this out or is the gain minimal compared to inexpensive powdered nutrients readily available?

 

[Revvy]

So what if a diluted solution of StarSan with a pH higher than 3.5 was used in the water of a yeast starter? I add nutrients when I make a starter and they are not exactly pricey but cost more than a few liters of diluted StarSan.

Any merit in trying this out or is the gain minimal compared to inexpensive powdered nutrients readily available?

People in threads have wondered the same thing, but noone's tried it. I've even wondered about using it in a boil with extract batches.

The only way to know is to conduct a controlled experiment. Doesn't seem like it would take too much, just a ph meter and some dme.

 

[Dan]

So Revvy, let's just say I tried an experiment with a starter. The control would be a starter made using same water, yeast and powdered nutrient as I normally use. The variable >3.5 pH StarSan water and no powdered nutrient but everything else being the same. What do you think, or anybody else who wants to chime in, be the determining factor on which method is most effective? What would be the measure?

 

[Ryush806]

So Revvy, let's just say I tried an experiment with a starter. The control would be a starter made using same water, yeast and powdered nutrient as I normally use. The variable >3.5 pH StarSan water and no powdered nutrient but everything else being the same. What do you think, or anybody else who wants to chime in, be the determining factor on which method is most effective? What would be the measure?

I would consider a starter with no powdered nutrient or starsan as the control. Then a starter with powdered nutrient only. Then a starter with starsan only. That way you can also see how the starsan does compared to the powdered nutrient.

 

[Dan]

That's a great idea Ryush! Any idea what would be measured to determine which method most effective?

 

[Ryush806]

That's a great idea Ryush! Any idea what would be measured to determine which method most effective?

Hmmm...

Volume of slurry produced might be a decent measure. Or maybe time to obvious fermentation activity in the main wort?

I'd think that attenuation of the final beer would be a good measure too but there would be a lot of variables in the way between the starter and the finished beer.

You could also do subjective measures like tasting panels or just your own experience with the whole process but they wouldn't be as scientific.

 

[Dan]

Hmmm...

Volume of slurry produced might be a decent measure. Or maybe time to obvious fermentation activity in the main wort?

I'd think that attenuation of the final beer would be a good measure too but there would be a lot of variables in the way between the starter and the finished beer.

I think these are all good measures. This sounds like something that could occupy my mind for a while. Thank you!

 

[ncbrewer]

I imagine the pH of 3.5 is not a sharp cut-off for sanitizing – it probably includes a safety factor. There is likely a pH range slightly above 3.5 that still wouldn’t work as a yeast nutrient. Might be worth trying at least a couple of different pH solutions of Star San. Just speculation.

 

[Ryush806]

I imagine the pH of 3.5 is not a sharp cut-off for sanitizing – it probably includes a safety factor. There is likely a pH range slightly above 3.5 that still wouldn’t work as a yeast nutrient. Might be worth trying at least a couple of different pH solutions of Star San. Just speculation.

Yeah that might be a good point. I was thinking 3.5 sounded a little low. Isn't most beer around 4.0-4.5? That might be a better pH if you don't want to do several different pHs.

 

[Curtis2010]

...
On a related note, has anyone had an issue with rinsing copper brazed plate chillers with StarSan? Won't it just disolve the copper and separate the plates?

I use it to sanitize my Duda diesel plate chiller before use, but I do flush it with clean rinse water. No problems so far. I don't believe that relatively short exposure time is an issue (long enough to sanitize, but don't leave for an extended time).

 

[Curtis2010]

And another great reason to use Star San...a yeast powered bubble machine!