HELP, I think I've got an infection, and it hurts....

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Ali

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...the pocket and ego!

I am experiencing batch after batch of, I think infected beer; it certainly isn't drinkable! It has a slight TCP/ very sour taste,even after leaving for some months. In fact leaving it seems to make it worse, leading me to think that an infection is getting in somewhere.

I clean with sodium percarbonate, rinse it and then star san everything. I never used to have any problems, but since switching to using stainless steel for everything (to make cleaning and strilizing easier!), Grainfther for brewing up, I've had nothing but problems.
My routine is: hot water to dissolve percarbonate, more water to cool slightly (about 5 litres of fluid in total), shake and or wipe all surfaces with solution,leave for 10 minutes or so, rinse once or twice and finally spray with Star San, leave for one minute and drain before using.
As the problem seems to have started with using percarb to clean, I am starting to wonder if the problem is the percarbonate after all? I used to use brewcleans or similar, and had few, if any problems ( and with far less 'sophisticated' equipment).Since using oxi clean, then 'pure' sodium percarbonate, my spoiled batches have increased from none to a considerable amount!
Any and all advice greatfully received! Or if not there may soon be a grainfather and an awful lot of equipment up for sale!:-o:-o
 
i would try to change one thing at a time to find the culprit.

For your thoughts here but I used starsan and found that I got a wild yeast infection. Starsan has poormicrobrial activity against wild yeasts I am told.

TCP tastes can sometimes be due to chemicals and chlorine. So maybe the change of your cleaning routine has something to do with it. I know that when I changed from starsan to VWP there was definitely a chemically type after taste. My solution was to rinse and rinse and rinse and rinse and my problem cured.

Also a TCP taste can be a result of plasticiser leeching into liquids. If you have new equipment, is there any new plastic parts that wort/brew comes into contact with???

Only some thoughts.
 
First off, the likely culprit for what you're describing is either 4-ethylphenol or a reaction with chlorine-based cleaners. Of course, that is with an assumption that you haven't shared any ordinary beers with equipment that used Brett yeast strains.

I'd go back to basics with cleaning. I'm sure people have had success with sodium percarbonate but when I looked into it I wasn't impressed.

I'm not familiar with the Grainfather, but I'd be looking more closely at the cold side of the brew for infections and the hot side for reactions.

I would clean every bit of kit using traditional methods (elbow grease and washing up liquid and the hottest water you can stand - try some washing up gloves) then I'd boil every rubber gasket and seal. Rinse the whole shooting match with boiling water then use Star San. Don't wipe or spray; use enough to fill the whole thing and leave it for a few hours.

Then I'd make a simple beer and see what happened.
 
I've had what might be called "medicinal" off-flavours occasionally, due to yeast type or too high a fermentation temperature. The taste is pretty unmistakeable, being like a German wheat beer full of estery/phenolic flavours (one of the short list of alcoholic beverages that I find totally undrinkable. Sorry, aficionados! :-? )
 
When using percarbonate or oxi i tend to leave it as long as possible, percarbonate on it's own will fizz for hours. Two things about the CF chiller, are you running boiling wort through it back into the grainfather to properly sterilise it? and when cleaning it are you allowing the cleaning solution to run through it for 10 mins or do you shut of the valve and stop the pump and let the percarbonate sit and clean it without pumping it?
 
When using percarbonate or oxi i tend to leave it as long as possible, percarbonate on it's own will fizz for hours. Two things about the CF chiller, are you running boiling wort through it back into the grainfather to properly sterilise it? and when cleaning it are you allowing the cleaning solution to run through it for 10 mins or do you shut of the valve and stop the pump and let the percarbonate sit and clean it without pumping it?

Hi.
Yes I always run boiling wort for 10-15 minutes through the chiller, and when cleaning, I recirculate the solution for another 19015 minutes, but I don;t let it sit in the coil without being pumped. I did wonder if I should so I think for the sake of some solution it may be worthwhie, and I don;t think it will cause more problems than those I have at the moment. Thanks for taking the time to reply:thumb:
 
i would try to change one thing at a time to find the culprit.

For your thoughts here but I used starsan and found that I got a wild yeast infection. Starsan has poormicrobrial activity against wild yeasts I am told.

TCP tastes can sometimes be due to chemicals and chlorine. So maybe the change of your cleaning routine has something to do with it. I know that when I changed from starsan to VWP there was definitely a chemically type after taste. My solution was to rinse and rinse and rinse and rinse and my problem cured.

Also a TCP taste can be a result of plasticiser leeching into liquids. If you have new equipment, is there any new plastic parts that wort/brew comes into contact with???

Only some thoughts.

Hi and thanks!

Some time ago (1 year +) I was using a plastic fermenter that got a wild yeast infection; there was a green 'cobweb' on the top of the beer, so I threw out the bucket, sterilized everything thoroughly and haven't had any further problems until the last 2-3 months. I'm wondering if I may have missed something or not been as thorough as I thought! It certainly smells like the original infection did, so my guess is that may well be my problem. Interseting that you said about Star San not being that effective agianst wild yeasts, I didn't know that, so maybe a reversion to something like bleach will help, both for cleaning and sanitisation. When I used bleach I never had any problems, may be all this new fangled stuff isn't all it's cracked up to be and the old ways are best!?
 
It's hard to pinpoint the point of infection. I've yet to suffer from any. My cleaning process is more traditional though. Chlorine based sanitiser and sponge, followed by three to four rinses.

For bottles I tend to fill them with warm water and the same sanitiser and rinse. It's a pain but I've never had an infection.

I only recently bought some no rinse sanitiser but I'm still a little dubious about using it.
 

This can be done very cheaply with Tescos value thin bleach, dilute with water in amvemtilated area e.g. Outside and then use Tesco white (distilled) vinegar to neutralise it
 
Yeah I use Tesco bleach and vinegar but for anyone having problems the chemical reaction of hydrogen peroxide and vinegar mixing with each other will obliterate pretty much anything that may be present.

Sent from my HT7 using Tapatalk
 
...the pocket and ego!

I am experiencing batch after batch of, I think infected beer; it certainly isn't drinkable! It has a slight TCP/ very sour taste,even after leaving for some months. In fact leaving it seems to make it worse, leading me to think that an infection is getting in somewhere.

I clean with sodium percarbonate, rinse it and then star san everything. I never used to have any problems, but since switching to using stainless steel for everything (to make cleaning and strilizing easier!), Grainfther for brewing up, I've had nothing but problems.
My routine is: hot water to dissolve percarbonate, more water to cool slightly (about 5 litres of fluid in total), shake and or wipe all surfaces with solution,leave for 10 minutes or so, rinse once or twice and finally spray with Star San, leave for one minute and drain before using.
As the problem seems to have started with using percarb to clean, I am starting to wonder if the problem is the percarbonate after all? I used to use brewcleans or similar, and had few, if any problems ( and with far less 'sophisticated' equipment).Since using oxi clean, then 'pure' sodium percarbonate, my spoiled batches have increased from none to a considerable amount!
Any and all advice greatfully received! Or if not there may soon be a grainfather and an awful lot of equipment up for sale!:-o:-o

Sounds to me like its the change of equipment and steraliser. If its an infection I would expect gushers but you havent mentioned that. I wonder if there could be a coating on one of the steel surfaces or if the pure precarbonate you are using is reacting with the metal and leaving it so it imparts a taste to the beer. I would suggest trying the steraliser you had before and see if it helps. Also, how well do you clean every single component of the grainfather? I would suggest running a cycle with steraliser in there so the pump, all pipes, etc get thoroughly steralised. Make sure everything that comes into contact with the beer including the wort chiller are totally clean.

If you use the bleach and vinegar someone suggested make sure its somewhere well ventilated as that mix might release chlorine gas.
 
TCP/medicial flavour is usually associated with the yeast reacting with chlorine in the water creating chlorophenols. Are you treating your water for chlorine/chloramines i.e. using a camden tablet
 
The taste threshold for chlorophenols is incredibly low - 300 nanograms per litre (ref). Because of this I'm switching my final equipment rinse to tap water treated with sodium metabisulphite instead of chlorinated tapwater alone.
 
If its an infection I would expect gushers but you havent mentioned that.

Depends how old the brew is, you normally get gushers after months not weeks - the infection slowly chews on the non-fermentables producing more and more CO2. The only way to tell if it's really an infection is to sample some 3-4 weeks apart: the latter samples should have more CO2 and a worse taste. Leave them too long and you'll have gushers. Leave them much too long and you'll have exploding bottles, the CO2 just keeps coming and coming.

I got rid of infections in my kit by cleaning with Oxy, then a bleach solution, then a good few kettles worth of boiled water. May sound like overkill but it worked.

Since then I've always used a recently-boiled kettle full of water prior to filling the FV and I've not had an infection since (18 months).
 
Thanks for the replies and help, just what I needed.

I've had a thorough ( and I mean THOROUGH!) clean down of everything. Sanitised with bleach, rinsed well and now trying a first brew through to see what happens.

From all the comments I think that;

1) Cleaning wasn't thorough enough, even though I used the recommended cleaners/regime
2) No rinse sanitisers have drawbacks I wasn't aware of
3) Time spent cleaning and sanitising, although time consuming and laborious is well worth the effort (or at least I hope it is!)

The one thing I hadn't given much thought to was the rinse water. I always use half a campden tablet in the brew water, but never for rinsing, and our chlorine level is quite high.
I think that once all the percarbonate is gone, I'll just use bleach to both clean and sanitise. I have never had problems with that and I always rinse thoroughly, probably more than I need to. I'm just concerned now that the rinse water could cause a problem....
 
TCP/medicial flavour is usually associated with the yeast reacting with chlorine in the water creating chlorophenols. Are you treating your water for chlorine/chloramines i.e. using a camden tablet

I have had that flavour a lot in my beers. More than i care to count but i have never used chlorinated water. Only RO. Its very puzzling.
 
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