Passivating my kettles

[Homer]

Been doing a bunch of searching and about to try it, but just wanted to see what people thought of my procedure.

All kettles have been cleaned with tsp, bkf and pbw (in no particular order).

1. Fill the hlt with a few gallons of water and heat to about 150, add citric acid to make a 5% solution.

2. Pump solution to BK via spray ball until hlt is empty (I can not recirculate since my kettle's outlets are too small)

3. Pump it back and forth between all the kettles a few times via spray ball.

4. Empty citric acid.

5. Rinse out kettles and leave to air dry.

I would be spraying rather than soaking the kettles. Any suggestions or comments on any of this would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

 

[Sconnie12]

Sounds like you're wasting some time. Stainless naturally passivates with oxygen. Simply clean with some Dawn dish soap to cut any manufacturing oils and you'll be good!

 

[drgonzo2k2]

I would just give them a good scrub with Bar Keeper's Friend and let the oxygen do the work like the last guy said.

 

[normonster]

I fired mine up out of the boxes and they've been rippin ever since. Passivate schmashivate.

 

[Homer]

I did a bunch of silver soldering on them, so had to scrub a lot of burn and heat marks out of them, so figured I should passivate.

 

[Big Monk]

Use 1 oz. per gallon of Star San filled to the brim. That'll do the trick.

 

[Sconnie12]

Use 1 oz. per gallon of Star San filled to the brim. That'll do the trick.

Star San (phosphoric acid) does not passivate. If the area is discolored from the soldering process give the area a good scrub with Bar Keepers Friend.