sanitation

You're in a hurry, so I'll chance answering this. I'm no expert, but I've run off several five-gallon batches of extract-kit beer. A weak solution of ordinary unscented / no additives chlorine laundry bleach (about one tablespoon to the gallon) would do the job. Let the bleach work for a couple of minutes and then rinse it with boiled water to remove the chlorine odor. Otherwise, hey. Vodka might work.

Karl S.

Be careful advising Chlorine with Kegs. If it's a Corny, it's more than likely made of Stainless Steel. Stainless and Chlorine are two things that should not be put together.

I'd ask this: what's the hurry? Aging beer is usually the best route to making better beer. Wait a few days while you order some sanitizer, then sanitize and rack.

Being in a hurry and brewing beer are two things that, like SS and Bleach, shouldn't ever go together.

Having spent several days shooting a safety video at a Coca Cola bottling plant I can conclusively say that they sanitize all their Corny kegs with hot chlorinated water.

In fact part of the safety video focused on making sure the plex door on the keg cleaning machine was closed before starting it so you don't get hit in the face with hot chlorinated water.

Everything else stainless (everything in the entire building is stainless) including the zillion dollar 120 station bottle filler is purged and sanitized with chlorinated water between batches.

Pete C.

This topic is an open wound with salt in it.

Some people say don't use Chlorine with Stainless, others say it's ok.

Kegs are made from the same Stainless Steel as surgical instruments (various degrees obviously, 304, 316, etc), having worked in a Central Sterile Supply of a hospital we were not allowed to use Chlorine to clean or sanitize the instruments.

All the literature I find on the internet & reading of books (not just homebrewing, but metalurgy, sanitation and others) supports NOT using Chloride (salts), Iodine or Chlorine on Stainless, it destroys the passivative nature of the metal (the ability of the metal to protect itself from corrosion). Chlorine is fine for anything but stainless.

If Coca Cola uses Chlorine to sanitize their kegs, then that would explain why Coke tastes like crap, they are cutting corners & using a cheap alternative sanitizer, just to save a few bucks so their corporate execs can drive a company Mercedes to & from work. They may even be using (ugh) aluminum kegs (again...cheap).

Since you aren't CC & don't work for them, don't follow their practices. Sure, sanitizing your keg with Chlorine once or twice, or three times or more may not seem to cause any harm, but in the long run, why take the risk?? Corny Keg, 1/4 barrel or 1/2 barrel, it doesn't matter, Stainless Steel is Stainless Steel.

I have to agree completely with NobodyMan on this one. Wait a couple days until you can get the proper sanitizing solution, your beer isn't going anywhere and a couple of extra days in the secondary fermenter shouldn't matter.

Take about 5 minutes and Google "Stainless Steel Chlorine" and see what we mean.

Another alternative I will suggest is called a Quaternary Ammonia sanitizer, almost all restaraunts use this as their sanitizer of choice, it's safe even if it's not fully rinsed off and it's as effective as Chlorine. Any food service store worth their weight carries it and it is very inexpensive.

Relax...have a homebrew!!!

Kent

However, if you don't have a Stainless Steel keg (which has only been assumed) then go ahead and use chlorine..... but remember how strong that stuff is so only use a small amount as advised (1 tblspn per gallon)

Thanks for the heads-up on stainless steel and chlorine bleach. It seems counterintuitive that there'd be a problem, but I'll defer to the more experienced brewers. I'll avoid that combination now.

Karl S.

John Palmer, the author of How to Brew, is a metallurgist by trade. He says don't use bleach on stainless and that's good enough for me.

----------->Denny

-- Life begins at 60...1.060, that is.