What is this rust on my brand new kettle?

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arnobg

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Brand new kettle of very high quality. I'll leave the name of the company out until I've gotten answer from them from the email I've sent.

I filled it with water yesterday, threw a couple pieces of grain in and tested my new pump/whirlpool setup with it. I then cleaned it with Oxi as usual and rinsed many times then dried.

Today I filled it with 6 gallons and did a trial boil to calculate losses. After cooling and draining I notice these on the bottom of the kettle....is it rust? I sure hope not, as I said this is a high quality stainless kettle with tri-clad bottom.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1475536009.801583.jpg

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1475536019.855959.jpg
 
From the picture it looks like heavy pitting. Is it smooth or are those pits? Either way I wouldn't be happy. If it is smooth try bar keepers friend and give it another go.
 
Impurities in the metal maybe...? Are they just stains or is it pitted also? I'm curious because I'm in the market for a new pot and I'd like to know which ones to avoid.
EDIT: Looks like TX beat me to the punch.
 
looks like bad pitting..... it must have been there before you added heat and water, just didn't oxidize until then. I'd be amazed if the seller didn't take it back
 
Pitting? Didn't oxidize yet? Send it back?? What!? :face palm: The amount of misinformation that gets spread on here sometimes makes my head spin. It's a small spec of rust probably caused from a free iron particle on the surface. Hit it with bar keepers friend and be done with it. This is nothing out of the ordinary.
 
Use a sharp instrument, needle, etc to determine if it is pitted. It sure looks like it might be. Hard to tell from photos. If it is pitted contact the seller.
 
The manufacturer instructions that came with the kettle specifically said not to passivate it that it was unnecessary. It said a simple wash with dish soap is all that is needed to passivate it, that the oxygen would react with the stainless and form a barrier... which is what I did.

The bar keepers friend did the trick for now. I also sent the "after" photo back to the manufacturer as the first thing they recommended was bar keepers friend. The manufacturer replied to my after photo and said that with 99.9% certainty I shouldn't have an issue again that it looks like a very small surface imperfection and to let them know if any issues come up later.
 
It did specifically state in addition to the instructions above that they passivate all welds according to ASTM standard.
 
It's a stainless steel kettle. Passivation should have been done before it ever left the factory...

Cheers!

Stainless steel passivates naturally when exposed to oxygen so unless it came in a package evacuated of oxygen you're good...
 
For the sake of comparison, here's a picture of the bottom of my 5 gallon stainless pot. It's about 18 months old and I've boiled 16 (2.5 gal.) batches in it so far. You can see where it developed a dark spot which I removed (mostly) with an SOS pad. That spot isn't pitted, but there is pitting in the upper left corner of the pic. I paid $20 for this pot. If I had paid what I suspect you paid for yours, I'd contact the seller about it. Just my $.02.

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For the sake of comparison, here's a picture of the bottom of my 5 gallon stainless pot. It's about 18 months old and I've boiled 16 (2.5 gal.) batches in it so far. You can see where it developed a dark spot which I removed (mostly) with an SOS pad. That spot isn't pitted, but there is pitting in the upper left corner of the pic. I paid $20 for this pot. If I had paid what I suspect you paid for yours, I'd contact the seller about it. Just my $.02.

time to re passivate your brew pot I think.
 
The manufacturer instructions that came with the kettle specifically said not to passivate it that it was unnecessary. It said a simple wash with dish soap is all that is needed to passivate it, that the oxygen would react with the stainless and form a barrier... which is what I did.

The bar keepers friend did the trick for now. I also sent the "after" photo back to the manufacturer as the first thing they recommended was bar keepers friend. The manufacturer replied to my after photo and said that with 99.9% certainty I shouldn't have an issue again that it looks like a very small surface imperfection and to let them know if any issues come up later.

You spoke to the manufacturer in China? 😉.. more likely a distributor who brands and sells them.. They likely aren't going to know what caused that for sure but it looks like some ferrous metal got impregnated in the stainless during the manufacturing process. It happens from time to time sometimes from the tooling.
 
time to re passivate your brew pot I think.

It's repassivating itself in the garage as we speak, I'm certain of it. I'm about to demote it to HLT status, and I'm thinking of buying a nice aluminum pot this time around. I doubt it'll give me the Alzheimer's, but if it does I'll let y'all know. Then again, if that happens I probably won't remember posting this. Kind of a Catch 22-type situation.
 
You spoke to the manufacturer in China? 😉.. more likely a distributor who brands and sells them.. They likely aren't going to know what caused that for sure but it looks like some ferrous metal got impregnated in the stainless during the manufacturing process. It happens from time to time sometimes from the tooling.

You've made this comment many times recently and it's so asinine. Do you know what an OEM is?? Ford, Apple, GE, Boeing, Microsoft, etc, etc, etc use OEMs. Do you think Ford manufactures every single piece in house?? I've seen you make this comment or a "just buy it on Alibaba" comment literally 20 times in the past week. You come off as an idiot that is just spewing stupid information. Companies design and engineer products. Then they go out and find a manufacturer to build said product to their specifications. "Just go buy it on Alibaba" is just so stupid it hurts my brain.

/rant
 
You've made this comment many times recently and it's so asinine. Do you know what an OEM is?? Ford, Apple, GE, Boeing, Microsoft, etc, etc, etc use OEMs. Do you think Ford manufactures every single piece in house?? I've seen you make this comment or a "just buy it on Alibaba" comment literally 20 times in the past week. You come off as an idiot that is just spewing stupid information. Companies design and engineer products. Then they go out and find a manufacturer to build said product to their specifications. "Just go buy it on Alibaba" is just so stupid it hurts my brain.

/rant
You Sir have anger management issues... I'm having difficulty understanding your rant as well. obliviously my comments strike a nerve with you since your always spewing these negative comments based at me for comments unrelated to you. Or are they? what do you do for a living? are you one of those guys at the fleamarket who buys chinese trinkets in bulk and trys to resell it for profit of something? why does me telling people how it is bother you so much?

It funny because I had two notifications... one from a person liking my comment above and one from you throwing a tantrum because you dont, even though you werent even in the conversation you felt you needed to jump in and go all third grade school yard crazy on me.

The op is looking for answers about manufacturing quality issues for a kettle he supposedly paid a lot of money for...He incorreclt thinks he bought it from the manufacturer and its a high quality kettle because of the higher price. so yeah I thought it pertinent to point out this isnt so unless its a new blichmann kettle since ALL the rest come from overseas through a middleman company which likely isnt going to have much of an explanation for his question and the fact that they didnt replace it immediately just goes to show you dont always get what you pay extra for.. The one exception here might be spike who does a lot of fabrication and finishing work themselves to the kettles they buy from overseas.
I got a serious question for you Sconnie, Why is it so taboo here to talk about where something came from when its being resold through an american distributor yet people (like yourself ) love to bash and hate on the people who bought it directly from china? Its like im not allowed to mention that the expensive brewing dohicky IS just a product someone might be ordering in bulk from alibaba and resells? Why? How exactly is that to OUR benefit?
 
My Kettle's directions said to never use oxyclean to clean it.

That makes no sense unless its made of some sort of low grade of stainless other than 201 or 304 which are the 2 most common types for kitchen and brewery use.. Where did you buy it? this is a good example of a reseller not knowing enough about what they sell and why it might be good to know they may not always the real authority on what you bought,
If you cant use oxyclean you cant use PBW (powdered brewery wash) they have the same active ingredient. these 2 are the most common home brewing cleaners. ( star san is not a cleaner)
 
It's repassivating itself in the garage as we speak, I'm certain of it. I'm about to demote it to HLT status, and I'm thinking of buying a nice aluminum pot this time around. I doubt it'll give me the Alzheimer's, but if it does I'll let y'all know. Then again, if that happens I probably won't remember posting this. Kind of a Catch 22-type situation.

Not really... Those little specks wont hurt anything... even if they continue to develope tiny rust spots they will still only contribute an untracable amount of iron to the beer... If you want to be concerned about a crazy amount of iron think about this...Total cereal used to be so fortified with iron it would be attracted to a magnet if you dunked it in a bowl full of cereal and milk..

and since its a boil kettle theres no santitary concerns with the pitted area.
 
Yeah, those specks/pits gave been there a while and I don't give a rat's ass. My 4 gallon pot is an even bigger POS. The catch 22 was saying I would warn y'all about getting Alzheimer's from aluminum but not remembering I said that due to the Alzheimer's.
 
Easy to dismissed when you were not the one who paid $250 for the pot. I say hold the supplier accountable to replace. They will, the power of internet bad press on forums like this demands that they do. They may just restock it, and take a chance that the next buyer is Sconnie12 ... because for him it's not a problem.

Pitting? Didn't oxidize yet? Send it back?? What!? :face palm: The amount of misinformation that gets spread on here sometimes makes my head spin. It's a small spec of rust probably caused from a free iron particle on the surface. Hit it with bar keepers friend and be done with it. This is nothing out of the ordinary.
 
Looks to me like you had something stuck to the bottom before start of boil and you have a powerful (like 100K BTU) burner. Looks like heat staining around the particle. scrub it with barkeepers friend to make it look nice and use again. Bet it will be fine.
 
Not getting into a pissing match with anyone but if the group consensus of this forum is that the below picture warrants a return then I might need to find a new forum..... :facepalm:

ImageUploadedByHome Brew1475540721.525832.jpg
 
That makes no sense unless its made of some sort of low grade of stainless other than 201 or 304 which are the 2 most common types for kitchen and brewery use.. Where did you buy it? this is a good example of a reseller not knowing enough about what they sell and why it might be good to know they may not always the real authority on what you bought,
If you cant use oxyclean you cant use PBW (powdered brewery wash) they have the same active ingredient. these 2 are the most common home brewing cleaners. ( star san is not a cleaner)

It is an SS Brewtech.
 
It's repassivating itself in the garage as we speak, I'm certain of it. I'm about to demote it to HLT status, and I'm thinking of buying a nice aluminum pot this time around. I doubt it'll give me the Alzheimer's, but if it does I'll let y'all know. Then again, if that happens I probably won't remember posting this. Kind of a Catch 22-type situation.

Maybe but that will take forever! Re-Passivate it using BKF.

http://www.eckraus.com/blog/cleaning-a-new-brew-kettle
 
Not getting into a pissing match with anyone but if the group consensus of this forum is that the below picture warrants a return then I might need to find a new forum..... :facepalm:

Not to add fuel to the fire (but I am). I am of the opinion that when you pay good $$ for a piece of gear it should be as near flawless as possible. Pitting in a brand new kettle is unacceptable to me. If he had bought a cheap eBay kettle then that is one thing, but the OP put out some decent cash for the kettle and deserves it to be near perfect.

Different strokes for different folks I guess, OP will have to make a decision on which way he wants to go with the given information.

If those are in fact deep pits I would ask for an exchange, honestly without seeing it in person it is very hard to evaluate exactly what is happening.
 
honestly I would shoot a note to SS Brewtech after hitting the spot again with BKF. If I am not happy post BKF treatment again I would see what SS Brewtech says. My guess, based on experience, would be they will exchange it with a pristine unit no questions asked.

I have a lot of SS Brewtech (Mash Tun, BK, chronicals, brew buckets, FTS, MTS, et al.) gear and you are paying for high quality so I would expect a high quality finished product.

In the end you need to be happy so it is up to you.

My $0.02.
 
The OPs kettle is a Spike bargain cave purchase.

To clarify on the SS Brewtech kettle, they recommend not using oxy with hard water.

First of all what does bargain cave purchase have to do with anything? Spike bargain cave kettles are normally listed because of blemishes on the exterior and those blemishes are described in the listing. They would be held to the same quality standard as other kettles with the exception of the issues described in the listing.

Secondly how would you know what kettle this is? Maybe based off another thread I posted in, but who's to say I don't have two other kettles? Anyways, that's not the point..... though I do have two other kettles....

I brewed my first batch in this kettle today. As soon as I started heating my mash water the rust came back in both spots. After my brew day I cleaned the kettle thoroughly and with BKF again and it was gone. Seems I am going to have to clean with BKF every brew day which seems annoying. It doesn't rust though until water sits in it.
 
I brewed my first batch in this kettle today. As soon as I started heating my mash water the rust came back in both spots. After my brew day I cleaned the kettle thoroughly and with BKF again and it was gone. Seems I am going to have to clean with BKF every brew day which seems annoying. It doesn't rust though until water sits in it.


Curious.
Electric or gas?
 
First of all what does bargain cave purchase have to do with anything? Spike bargain cave kettles are normally listed because of blemishes on the exterior and those blemishes are described in the listing. They would be held to the same quality standard as other kettles with the exception of the issues described in the listing.

Secondly how would you know what kettle this is? Maybe based off another thread I posted in, but who's to say I don't have two other kettles? Anyways, that's not the point..... though I do have two other kettles....

I brewed my first batch in this kettle today. As soon as I started heating my mash water the rust came back in both spots. After my brew day I cleaned the kettle thoroughly and with BKF again and it was gone. Seems I am going to have to clean with BKF every brew day which seems annoying. It doesn't rust though until water sits in it.


Sorry, I think my tone didn't come off right. Nothing wrong with the bargain cave. I would have purchased that same kettle...but I'm curious what return policies are on a bargain cave kettle. I'm sure Spike would do you right. It's easy to identify the kettle based on your pictures, and I saw you post this in a Spike thread. I do not think you should have to clean with BKF everyday. They say you hit the spot once and it's gone for good. If that didn't happen, I would get back in touch with Spike.
 
Sorry, I think my tone didn't come off right. Nothing wrong with the bargain cave. I would have purchased that same kettle...but I'm curious what return policies are on a bargain cave kettle. I'm sure Spike would do you right. It's easy to identify the kettle based on your pictures, and I saw you post this in a Spike thread. I do not think you should have to clean with BKF everyday. They say you hit the spot once and it's gone for good. If that didn't happen, I would get back in touch with Spike.

They did say if I had any issues later on to let them know. Right now it is an annoyance more than anything. If it rusted just sitting there for a few days I would be concerned however, it takes putting water in it to do the deed.

I had custom work done to the kettle, so in my book it's as good as a normal purchase just with a discount.
 
First of all what does bargain cave purchase have to do with anything? Spike bargain cave kettles are normally listed because of blemishes on the exterior and those blemishes are described in the listing. They would be held to the same quality standard as other kettles with the exception of the issues described in the listing.

Secondly how would you know what kettle this is? Maybe based off another thread I posted in, but who's to say I don't have two other kettles? Anyways, that's not the point..... though I do have two other kettles....

I brewed my first batch in this kettle today. As soon as I started heating my mash water the rust came back in both spots. After my brew day I cleaned the kettle thoroughly and with BKF again and it was gone. Seems I am going to have to clean with BKF every brew day which seems annoying. It doesn't rust though until water sits in it.

There is ferrous metal contamination embedded into the stainless.. it will continue to rust there for a while at least till its gone.... lIts just cosmetic and wont hurt or effect performance or the beer. a couple years ago we all used steel based electric elements that often rusted in the kettle too.

If it was a discounted bargain cave blem I am not shocked at spikes lack at jumping to replace it...
I dont see how it really matters if you got it from ss or spike though they both seem to normally have tight control over the quality coming from their respective chinese manufacturers (if they arent the same one). again this is a factory second so to speak and they are usually sold without warranty's for cosmetic defects. unless of course its not the spike kettle your talking about but since you decided to not disclose this again we can all just assume and draw our own conclusions then... unless your planning on using that bit of info to try to force spike into replacing it or youll give tham bad press here?
 
Easy to dismissed when you were not the one who paid $250 for the pot. I say hold the supplier accountable to replace. They will, the power of internet bad press on forums like this demands that they do. They may just restock it, and take a chance that the next buyer is Sconnie12 ... because for him it's not a problem.
For that kind of money I would expect the pot to do some fabulous things my regular 15.5gallon stainless kettles with ballvalves couldnt do for $120... :p Seriously though to pay that much for a chinese made kettle I would expect it to be the vary cream of the crop polished and all with custom fittings welded in... Otherwise what are you paying twice retail for? its certianly not steller customer service..... Unless this is a bargain blem buy in which case the buyer already got a large discount for cosmetic reasons..

Of course since its a mystery pot who knows how much it was and what was included or not included in the purchase.
 
It is an SS Brewtech.

not to get off topic but if its 304 stainless PBW/oxyclean is completely safe and how breweries clean thier 304 stainless equipment.. In fact the whole reason breweries even use 304 stainless is its ability to hold up to even much straonger caustic cleaners they use...

SSbrewtech doesnt make thier products. they may design them but it seems they have a bit to learn about 304 stainless and why its normally used... Its not just for a cool marketing term in real brewery use.

I'm actually having a hard time swallowing that they told you this. Are you sure your not mistaken?
 
There is ferrous metal contamination embedded into the stainless.. it will continue to rust there for a while at least till its gone.... lIts just cosmetic and wont hurt or effect performance or the beer. a couple years ago we all used steel based electric elements that often rusted in the kettle too.

If it was a discounted bargain cave blem I am not shocked at spikes lack at jumping to replace it...
I dont see how it really matters if you got it from ss or spike though they both seem to normally have tight control over the quality coming from their respective chinese manufacturers (if they arent the same one). again this is a factory second so to speak and they are usually sold without warranty's for cosmetic defects. unless of course its not the spike kettle your talking about but since you decided to not disclose this again we can all just assume and draw our own conclusions then... unless your planning on using that bit of info to try to force spike into replacing it or youll give tham bad press here?

It doesn't matter who it came from...and this wasn't a discounted kettle due to this "blemish" or I wouldn't have asked about it to begin with. Who would buy a dented kettle for example and then post something one a forum asking why a kettle is dented?
 
It doesn't matter who it came from...and this wasn't a discounted kettle due to this "blemish" or I wouldn't have asked about it to begin with. Who would buy a dented kettle for example and then post something one a forum asking why a kettle is dented?

I get what your saying but it doesnt normally work that way though... if you buy a scratch and dent item and then find another scratch elsewhere the store usually sees that as the same defect... its cosmetically flawed period. like a blem tire or car battery the warranty if any doesnt cover any cosmetic flaws that may result from use.
Granted Spike may still replace it especially due to this thread but the fact it you stated you bought a high end kettle and left out the fact that you did not pay the high end price for the full "support" which no doubt is one of the reasons they cost more normally to cover losses from people who want to return them...\ Honestly if they were super quick to replace it with a new one I might question what kind of costs replacement policies like that would have on the overall cost being higher for it... I for one like reasonable prices for quality products with reasonable warranties vs high costs for great return policies.... getting the most for your money is obviously a factor for you too since you bought from the bargain blem clearance section..
 
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