I while back, I didn't clean my copper manifold for a while after brewing and it developed a black oxidized layer. Something Palmer said or wrote made me realize I could take it off by soaking in star san and then scrubbing. I now have a lot of oxidation on my chiller. I soaked it in Star San, and the darkened layer will now scrub off. But scrubbing is a pain because of the coils - it's hard to get all the surface area. Recommendations?
IIRC, soaking in a vinegar solution will dissolve it. At least I seem to remember doing that to clean new chillers.
That may be why I soaked in star san - acid action. Maybe with more patience, it will dissolve completely without need for scrubbing. I'll give it more time before switching to white vinegar.
I soak in starsan, and from time to time, I will use a green scrubby pad and knock some of the oxidized layer off of it. I haven't brewed in a while, but will be next weekend, and will probably pull it all out to give it all a little TLC. LMK what works for you, as I'd like to knock mine out before it gets too much.
A few hours in Star San and the scrubby pad did the trick. I was hoping for the lazy approach. It came off easily, but not without a little elbow grease.
Fair enough.. It's what I've done in the past, and will probably continue to do then. Thinking a salty vinegar soak and a pipe cleaner wrap brush might make quick work.
I believe copper is a better conductor of heat, so my coil might be more efficient than stainless. But the true reason I haven't upgraded is inertia.
White Distilled Vinegar the cheaper the better. Use one part of Vinegar + five part of worm water 105F and let it sock over night. Then give it nice wash.
Copper is a better conductor, but this application is convection-conduction-convection. SS will have about 88%.of the heat transfer compared to copper for this case.
That shows that there is only a marginal advantage for copper. One thing that also should be taken into consideration is that copper tubing has thicker walls than a same size SS tubing, well at least visually for the tubing I have.
But what about the physics of inertia? My chiller and I, we are objects at rest. Seriously, if I were to do it all over again today, I might not find a $25 used copper chiller on ebay, in which case I would probably go SS.
On brewnight. just the way I do things. I never have that black layer that you guys talk of. I rinse off the chiller. I then soak it overnight ( if I don't feel like cleaning it right away) in pbw and rinse the next day. no problems.
