Star-San

[rodwha]

I leave my simple plain sponge in my bucket of Star-San, which I also use to wash my beer glasses with.

This time, while bottling my IPA, I noticed a BUNCH of small green sponge particles dropping through my bottling wand!

I marked all of those bottles after figuring out what it was.

I'm guessing the Star-San, being a low grade acid, ate away at the sponge?

I'll not be keeping my sponges in the bucket anymore!

 

[unionrdr]

Properly mixed,it is a food grade acid sanitizer. I keep it in a 1 gallon jug with nothing in it.

 

[progmac]

those sponges leave a lot of residue. when i clean my buckets with oxyclean, i notice tons of green sponge particles at the bottom. i spend about 5-7 minutes per bucket.

 

[Gonzo_Don]

I used a new sponge - one of those 3M jobs with green on one side and yellow on the other and I had the same problem with my primary fermenter--little green "crystal" looking things left after sanitizing with Star San. I boiled some water in a Pyrex 5 cup measuring cup, tilted the bucket on a rolled up towel so it would drain in the sink, and then poured the water into the bucket right around where the crystals were. It washed them out and everything was fine. Seems like the "crystals" were only present the first time I used the sponge, but now I use a cotton towel--seems more organic. But from now on, I wear gloves both in cleaning and sanitizing--I cleaned and sanitized my primary today and my hands look like they're shedding.

 

[rodwha]

I always see little green specs when using a new sponge with the green scrubby side. The sponges I use for this have no scrubby side.

 

[rodwha]

A long day working with Star-San does a number on my hands too!

 

[unionrdr]

I make sure whatever I'm sanitizing is completely clean as possible. I use a dobie brand scrubber with PBW when needed. It's a yellow, fine grain sponge with nylon mesh woven on the outside. The nylon is heavy enough to last a long time for brewery cleaning applications in my experience. You can see it in my article about PBW.

 

[rasmith18]

I've also noticed when using a microfiber rag, that starsan pulled the die out of the rag and colored my whole bucket of starsan yellow. bummer

 

[unionrdr]

Yup. Like acid-washed jeans.

 

[liquidlunch]

I had to replace my entire kitchen counter top. I left the star San bottle on it with some of the liquid around the bottom. It left stains all over. My wife got her granite counter tops after all. Needless to say I brew and sanitize in the garage now!