Old rubber stoppers

[ChrystieBrewing]

My uncle gave me all of his old equipment which included grolsch bottles, carboys, rubber stoppers, and airlocks. All the equipment has been in his basement for a while now (9 years ish) so of course I have my concerns with how clean they are!

Glass carboys no problem throw them on my keg/carboy washer.

Grolsch bottles no problem lots of scrubbing. He did give me an unopened bag of washers for them so they will be replaced.

Now to the rubber stoppers.... How can I clean them to be sure they dont have any nasties? Should I just chuck them? Same goes for the plastic airlocks.

Under normal circumstances I would soak in pbw and rinse good but these babies were musty!

 

[Myron17]

I would just chuck the rubber stoppers and air locks. They are pretty cheap! Don't go though the hassle of saving something so old. Start new and stay up on the cleaning/sanitizing and you'll have piece of mind! I don't brew fantastic beer, but its pretty good, without good equipment hygiene everything is a loss! Just my opinion!

 

[augiedoggy]

You can sanitize it in starsan.. The age of a rubber stopper has little to do with hygiene IMO but the condition of them might.

If they look and feel off toss them. If not go ahead and clean and use them.. If it still makes you feel better to toss them and buy them again then do it.. same with the airlocks usually a soak will do wonders for them.

Im using seals on my grolsh/flip top bottles that are at least 10 years old and look and work great... They are likely better quality then the replacements I can buy for them now so theres that aspect too...