# Washing Yeast, Is Starsan Helpful?



## Bribie G (20/7/10)

Pitching a cream ale this afternoon and I've run out of US-05 or anything remotely similar. However I'm bottling an oatmeal stout today and will have a shedload of sediment, Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale.
It's a good clean fermenting yeast, especially at lower temps so should be good in the cream ale. Now of course it is going to be as black as the ace of spades so I'll need to wash it a couple of times before pitching into the light straw coloured cream ale. 
I was thinking that I might do the 'acid wash' thing as well. 
Since Starsan is Phosphoric acid based, would a weakish solution be a good medium for washing? Has anyone acid washed using Starsan?


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## marksfish (20/7/10)

i seem to remember from a podcast that starsan contains glycol or some thing similar and the maker did not reccommed it.


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## MHB (20/7/10)

Wouldn't think so, Star San is a sanitiser so you would expect it to kill yeast.
Just because something contains Phosphoric Acid doesn't mean that's all that's in there take Iodophor for instance, the Iodine is the steriliser and it will kill yeast.
I use Pureau water from the supermarket and either Lactic Acid or Phosphoric.
MHB


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## Bribie G (20/7/10)

Thanks. Where would you get lactic acid from at short notice - chemists? I also have citric acid - would that work?


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## praxis178 (20/7/10)

BribieG said:


> Pitching a cream ale this afternoon and I've run out of US-05 or anything remotely similar. However I'm bottling an oatmeal stout today and will have a shedload of sediment, Wyeast 1084 Irish Ale.
> It's a good clean fermenting yeast, especially at lower temps so should be good in the cream ale. Now of course it is going to be as black as the ace of spades so I'll need to wash it a couple of times before pitching into the light straw coloured cream ale.
> I was thinking that I might do the 'acid wash' thing as well.
> Since Starsan is Phosphoric acid based, would a weakish solution be a good medium for washing? Has anyone acid washed using Starsan?



For acid try adding a teaspoon of tartaric acid (easy to get at the supermarket in the spice aisle) this is a good acid because it is biologically stable under most yeast favorable conditions.


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## Bribie G (20/7/10)

Wow acids coming at me from all directions :lol: Never thought of the tartaric.


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## Shed101 (20/7/10)

I could offer you the US-05 krausen of an amber ale if you wanted to venture to Landsborough.


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## cdbrown (20/7/10)

Any reason why not to just use half a cup of the slurry and just pitch it - would that small amount actually cause discolouration?


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## Bribie G (20/7/10)

Shed101 said:


> I could offer you the US-05 krausen of an amber ale if you wanted to venture to Landsborough.


Thanks for the offer, much appreciated, but can't get away today. Anyway if Incider found out he'd be waiting to waylay me on the old Bruce Hwy -- eeek


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## Shed101 (20/7/10)

BribieG said:


> Thanks for the offer, much appreciated, but can't get away today. Anyway if Incider found out he'd be waiting to waylay me on the old Bruce Hwy -- eeek



No worries ... i forgot to say i'd charge you $50 and expect half of the stout as payment :lol:


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## MarkBastard (20/7/10)

Bribie, I've asked this before. What I really wanted to know though is the concentration of Starsan required to kill bugs in water. As you know the dose supplied on the container is for sanitising surfaces using a water/starsan mixture.

I wanted to know what the minimum amount of Starsan in water is to make the actual solution itself sanitised. Presumably this should be much less than the mixture you use to sanitise surfaces.

If this hypothetical solution was weak enough to NOT kill yeast, then this would be a very easy way to wash yeast, rather than having to boil water and then cool it etc.

I even emailed the Starsan guys. They said my question was VERY interesting (they seemed genuinely excited at the prospect) but that they couldn't tell me anything because of the way the FDA approves their chemical over there for one specific application only (sanitising surfaces) and that they can't just give out advice about miss-using their product for legal reasons.

But I got the impression it'd be a worthy thing to look into if you had the right gear to do the research.


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## Bribie G (20/7/10)

That's what I was thinking. The 'no rinse' advantages of Starsan are touted as it not leaving residual flavour or harming the beer etc and sometimes the bottles are full of foam when I do a bottling session so there's still a possibly non-trivial concentration ending up in the beer anyway. Look I might just bite the bullet and do a drop of SS in my wash water and see how it goes. I'll measure the pH as well to see what I get. At worst I'll have to buy a pack of US-05 when I'm near Brewers World tomorrow.


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## dicko (20/7/10)

Hi Bribie,

Here is a link to some good info on acid washing.

http://oz.craftbrewer.org/Library/Methods/...YeastWash.shtml

Cheers


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## drsmurto (20/7/10)

BribieG said:


> That's what I was thinking. The 'no rinse' advantages of Starsan are touted as it not leaving residual flavour or harming the beer etc and sometimes the bottles are full of foam when I do a bottling session so there's still a possibly non-trivial concentration ending up in the beer anyway. Look I might just bite the bullet and do a drop of SS in my wash water and see how it goes. I'll measure the pH as well to see what I get. At worst I'll have to buy a pack of US-05 when I'm near Brewers World tomorrow.



What's in starsan?

The MSDS states some of what's in it but not all. 

Do you know that the 'secret' ingredients aren't going to harm your yeast when you choose to use it in a way the product hasn't been designed too? (Ross and co, i am all for using starsan as a no rinse sanitiser but this thread is suggesting using starsan for something its NOT designed to do.)

At no rinse concentrations, following the manufacturers guidelines, drained, you are fine.

At the much higher concentrations you are referring to (ie. not an entire wort and not drained) you are no longer in the no rinse category.

So if you do that and you cant rinse, what exactly have you added to your beer?

Cheers
DrSmurto


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## MarkBastard (20/7/10)

DrSmurto said:


> What's in starsan?
> 
> The MSDS states some of what's in it but not all.
> 
> ...



Yeah but didn't the Starsan guy drink a glass of Starsan at the recommended mixing level to show that it's perfectly safe, and you should not fear the foam?


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## drsmurto (20/7/10)

Mark^Bastard said:


> Yeah but didn't the Starsan guy drink a glass of Starsan at the recommended mixing level to show that it's perfectly safe, and you should not fear the foam?



Last time i checked people aren't yeast.


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## unrealeous (20/7/10)

DrSmurto said:


> Last time i checked people aren't yeast.


This is a great site - you can learn all sorts of things.

Starsan is phosphoric acid and dodecylbenzenesulfonic acid. I've never heard of the second item - I'm not even sure how you say it. Anyone know if its just an acid or does it do anything special (and thus not safe to acid wash yeast).

http://www.fivestarchemicals.com/tech/starsan.pdf


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## MarkBastard (20/7/10)

DrSmurto said:


> Last time i checked people aren't yeast.



What I meant is there are presumably no health and safety concerns.

So it could simply come down to trial and error.

But you need to know for sure the Starsan is killing bugs, rather than having no affect at all, as if it has no affect at all you could perhaps think a lack of infection + healthy yeast meant the process worked, when it could just mean you got lucky and plain tap water would have had the same affect.


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## WarmBeer (20/7/10)

Mark^Bastard said:


> Yeah but didn't the Starsan guy drink a glass of Starsan at the recommended mixing level to show that it's perfectly safe, and you should not fear the foam?


Have done this myself, except by accident, not by design. Putting starsan in a PET for handy use is not always a good idea.

No ill effects have surfaced so far. SWMBO may have other opinions


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## drsmurto (20/7/10)

unrealeous said:


> This is a great site - you can learn all sorts of things.
> 
> Starsan is phosphoric acid and dodecylbenzenesulfonic acid. I've never heard of the second item - I'm not even sure how you say it. Anyone know if its just an acid or does it do anything special (and thus not safe to acid wash yeast).
> 
> http://www.fivestarchemicals.com/tech/starsan.pdf



The link you provide doesn't include the breakdown of what's in it. 

They aren't legally required (in Australia) to tell you the entire make-up of the product as it would be giving away proprietary information.


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## Scruffy (20/7/10)

Like in the same way Coles' don't tell you what goes into their Apples.


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## Nick JD (20/7/10)

I used the wrong acid and now my yeast keep FREAKIN OUT, man.


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## zoidbergmerc (20/7/10)

Nick JD said:


> I used the wrong acid and now my yeast keep FREAKIN OUT, man.



iLold


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