Starsan immediately turns cloudy.......

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190Shilling

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If I use tap water to mix up Starsan, it immediately turns cloudy. I have read that it is no longer good if it is cloudy. Does anyone know why this might happen and if there is a solution. I have not tried filtered tap water yet, but i'm curious about what is in my tap water that would make it do this.
 
My water does the same thing. Some minerals in the water can react and make the starsan cloudy, but that doesn't make it immediately not good. The best way to know whether your star san is good is to measure the pH. As long as it is below 3.5 it is fine.

If I use water through my filter it stays mostly clear though. But in both cases the pH was the same when I measured it.
 
Mine does the same thing! I found that if I buy a gallon jug of distilled water, and mix it up right in the jug, it never turns cloudy and I use and reuse and reuse indefinitely and just pour it back in the jug when I'm done. One gallon of distilled water will last seemingly forever- but I usually end up spilling it all (should use a funnel, I guess) before it turns cloudy! The longest I've kept a one gallon jug of star-san around is about 6 months- not bad for a $.99 cent distilled water purchase- and it would be longer if I wasn't sloppy and messy with it.

One great thing I do after I mix up the gallon jug is to put some of it in a spray bottle and I use that to sanitize the hydrometer, and small stuff like that when I keg or bottle. I often just use the spray bottle instead of the jug I have, as it's super convenient.
 
Interesting info in the lab results on that thread. I have been using distilled water, but I can't seem to keep it for long periods of time. Good to know that my use of tap water in a pinch is still effective.
 
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