[euge]

I use a sponge with a green scrubbie side to go to work on my kettles when the hop and protein gunk builds from the boil. For the fermenters it is just best to clean them immediately once draining. Otherwise you'll be doing some real scrubbing there!

I rarely use oxyclean on my kettle or fermenters. I will use it on my kegs though.

[anje]

Also, any suggestions about that white oxyclean film I get on everything? Even soaking my bottles in a bucket of Starsan (which turns cloudy the moment it hits my water) barely gets it off.  Can I add a bunch of vinegar to the water, or will that affect the beer flavor?

Rinse with hot water in between cleaning with PBW/Oxiclean and sanitizing. PBW/Oxiclean is basic, StarSan is acidic, so if you don't rinse, you're neutralizing the Star-San. Star-San gets cloudy as it loses its effectiveness.

I'll try that, as I've been inconsistent about rinsing after the Oxy step. Honestly, though, my tap water is basic enough that the Star-san is cloudy the moment I add water, in a well-rinsed bucket. (That stuff, I use immediately. For longer-term use and spray bottles, I mix my Star-san with distilled. But I'd rather not have to use gallons of the stuff for a quick bucket of sanitizer.)  If the water here were any harder, I'd have to switch to taking baths to avoid getting knocked out by rocks falling from the showerhead.

[hopfenundmalz]

.  Also, with the film issue, I take steel wool to the inside of my keggles about every 4-5 brews before the oxyclean and starsan. 

If you have stainless steel, don't use steel wool. You will abrade the surface and even end up with iron from the steel wool, that can cause rust spots.

A copper scrubie is better. The green scrub pads are better yet.

[davidgzach]

I'm lucky to have a separate wash sink in my laundry room.  I spray off the gunk, put the bucket in the basin and fill it with a bleach solution.  It's perfectly white in an hour.  Spray the heck out of it with hot water and it's ready for the next batch.

I rinse out my kettle and like was said above, clean it every 4-5 batches with a sponge.  It's aluminum.

Dave

[anje]

I do have a potential trick for the bleach users. A little baking soda/bicarb in water kills the bleach-y smell immediately. Haven't tried it on the beer equipment yet, but I suspect it'd be enough to ensure there's no bandaid flavor without having to leave the plastic sitting in the sun for hours to de-stinkify.

[tschmidlin]

.  Also, with the film issue, I take steel wool to the inside of my keggles about every 4-5 brews before the oxyclean and starsan. 

If you have stainless steel, don't use steel wool. You will abrade the surface and even end up with iron from the steel wool, that can cause rust spots.

A copper scrubie is better. The green scrub pads are better yet.

I use a blue scrubbie to get out the visible dirt and don't worry about the rest.  Every few years I have a need for a large amount of PBW, that's pretty much the only time they get it.  If the PBW from the keg washer doesn't look too bad at the end of the day I'll throw it in a kettle to sit, but only if I expect to be back in the brewery the next day.  They never look that bad though, maybe it's our low mineral water.

[hopfenundmalz]

.  Also, with the film issue, I take steel wool to the inside of my keggles about every 4-5 brews before the oxyclean and starsan. 

If you have stainless steel, don't use steel wool. You will abrade the surface and even end up with iron from the steel wool, that can cause rust spots.

A copper scrubie is better. The green scrub pads are better yet.

I use a blue scrubbie to get out the visible dirt and don't worry about the rest.  Every few years I have a need for a large amount of PBW, that's pretty much the only time they get it.  If the PBW from the keg washer doesn't look too bad at the end of the day I'll throw it in a kettle to sit, but only if I expect to be back in the brewery the next day.  They never look that bad though, maybe it's our low mineral water.

One guy in our club recommends the blue scrubbie too! He says it is a little softer than the green.

[hubie]

How long do you guys let PBW go?  When I'm done with bottles, whether they're my homebrew or commercial, I give them a quick rinse and set aside.  When enough have accumulated, I will fill one of those home center 5 gallon buckets with PBW solution and I will submerge as many bottles in there that I can (usually about a dozen).  The next day I'll pull them out, drain them back into the bucket, then do a few twists with a bottle brush, rinse them with a bottle jet, then put another batch of bottles in the bucket.  If the bottles were commercial, then the labels come off real easy this way.  Is there a feel for how long PBW is good?  There doesn't seem to be a quick test to tell, like the pH test for StarSan.  After a while, especially if there were a lot of commercial bottles with all the dissolved glue from the labels, the water gets pretty murky, but I'll gladly keep using it as long as I am confident that it is doing its job.  Right now I'm verifying its efficacy by visual inspection of the cleanliness of the bottle.

Another interesting thing I've noticed is that if I have a bottle that is only partially submerged, then right at the water line something starts to accumulate, like a mineral scale, and it does not want to wash off.  Thinking it might be some kind of caustic scale, I've soaked the bottles in a StarSan solution hoping it would dissolve, but it doesn't.  I have to use some kind of abrasive scrubber and really work to get it off; if it ends up around the bottle lip, then I usually just recycle the bottle instead of spending the effort needed to get it off.  Any ideas what that deposit is and how to easily remove it?  Is it PBW coming back out of solution?

[davidgzach]

I do have a potential trick for the bleach users. A little baking soda/bicarb in water kills the bleach-y smell immediately. Haven't tried it on the beer equipment yet, but I suspect it'd be enough to ensure there's no bandaid flavor without having to leave the plastic sitting in the sun for hours to de-stinkify.

If there is a bleach-y smell, then it was not rinsed properly!  If you use bleach, you need to rinse very well with hot water.  Bleach rinses out entirely this way.  In 20 years, not one bandaid batch. 

Damn, just jinxed myself!

Dave

[tschmidlin]

How long do you guys let PBW go?

I dump it when it's dirty.  But then I also leave kegs and carboys sitting and clean them in batches, so it is pretty much done for by the end of the day I made it.