On Friday night, I was kegging my first batch of brew. I had a bucket with warm water and one step in it and also had my brewing accessories soaking in it. After the keg transfer, I left my brew accessories (siphon, vinyl tubing, hydrometer & hydrometer tube) in the bucket. I realized last night that I had not yet cleaned or removed those items from the bucket so I went to do so. I found a hazy film on pretty much all the items. I put everything into a bucket full of hot water and let it soak. I then used a brush and brushed everything. I was able to remove the haze from all items except for the tubing and hydrometer tube. The hydro tube (plastic) looks to be permanently hazed now (dis-colored, not clear). I also have no way of cleaning the inside of the tubing. I guess it’s time to replace.
Is this expected if you leave plastic/vinyl in cleaning/sanitizing solution for too long?
Very high pH and low pH solutions such as carbonate brewery cleaners and sanitizers like Star San will leach plasticizers from vinyl tubing and other common plastics. That’s probably where that haze came from. The tubing is still usable.
OK great, thank you for the feedback. I ran quite a bit of hot water through the tubing and all of the other components. I do not smell any chemicals, it just has the haze.
I have used One Step for years and my tubing and stuff has also turned hazy. The buckets seem to even get a chalky feel. I only use one bucket for it because of that and marked it with a Sharpie.
One Step did an amazing job on a stainless steel conical getting “beer stone” removed without scrubbing much at all so I will continue to use it.
Star San has given some of my tubing an almost sticky feeling. Anyone else find that?
Definitely - especially if I leave stuff in it overnight, it’s almost slimy the next day. I just soaked everything in oxy-clean this last weekend because I left my bottling stuff sitting in star-san a little too long. A hot oxy-clean soak for an hour or two really makes it look new again.
Definitely - especially if I leave stuff in it overnight, it’s almost slimy the next day. I just soaked everything in oxy-clean this last weekend because I left my bottling stuff sitting in star-san a little too long. A hot oxy-clean soak for an hour or two really makes it look new again.[/quote]
Same here. Mine looked like a neglected beer line. I forgot it was soaking and left it for a week.
I buy the 20’ rolls, so I replaced it. Might have to try the oxy clean soak.
