Ask The Brewmasters

Hi,

Obviously you will want to minimise or eliminate dropped objects.

Having said that, I assume that you will need to keep fittings, hoses etc somewhere when not in use.

In my opinion, steps 1, 4 & 5 should suffice to ensure sterility of the equipment. The caustic and hot water steps seem like overkill to me. Also there is a safety risk which would need to be mitigated.

Finally, choose the sterilant carefully. Beware of anything which may contaminate your product (e.g. halogen based sterilants). Best to ask the experts if you are unsure.

Hope this helps. Good luck,

Chris Williams (Hoppy Bulldog, Hong Kong, China)

Hi Napat,

I don't have a direct answer to your question but I do have some thoughts that I hope help lead you to a procedure for dealing with parts that have been dropped.

First off, I agree with @Christopher Williams's point about caustic. In order to explain why I agree, I think it's worth taking a step back to consider the role of caustics in a brewery: they are intended to remove soil from surfaces so that sanitizers can do their job. In a brewery setting, there are many instances where soil has adhered strongly to a surface (and is also possibly hard to reach) such that the best and easiest method is to use a caustic. However, there are also many instances where soil comes off of a surface very easily and the surface can be inspected easily (to insure that all soil has been removed). In those cases, rinse water is often good enough. 

Let me take this a step further. I would be surprised if a part that has been dropped (and immediately picked up) has taken on soil that is hard to remove, and so caustic seems unnecessary--once again, a simple rinse with water is likely enough. However, if parts are picking up soil that is hard to remove, then a caustic soak may be necessary. But, at that point, I would also suggest that the floors need more attention and more regular cleaning.

I also have a few thoughts about the hot water step you listed. I think the place to start is to consider the role of both hot water and sanitizers: both of them can sanitize parts of course. The reason I highlight this is because if one of them is properly used to sanitize parts, then the other one isn't necessary because the exterior of the parts is already sanitized and won't become "extra sanitized".

However, in your list of steps you mentioned that you rinse the sanitized parts before giving them a hot water soak and I think that step also deserves attention. The question that comes to mind is this: Is the rinse water itself sanitary? If the answer is "no" the parts that were just sanitized become "un-sanitized" because of that water. This is important because the sanitizer step becomes a waste of time and money if the rinse water isn't sanitary and a second sanitization step, in that situation, becomes necessary.  

You had also mentioned a desire to sanitize all cracks and crevices and I can totally understand a desire to do that! Here are my thoughts on that. If your soft parts are cracked that may be a sign that it's time to replace them with new parts, and those new parts won't require that level of deep cleaning. If replacing them is difficult or prohibitively expensive, then I would suggest only doing a hot water soak instead of the sanitizer for the reasons listed above. Once again, consider both steps: they are both sanitizing the exterior, but only one of them will is more likely to also sanitize cracks and crevices. If the exterior is sanitized properly once, then there isn't really value in sanitizing the exterior a second time.

One more consideration: if your soft parts are cracking it may not be that long until they start to fall apart and pieces end up in your product. In other words, using a hot water step to sanitize all the cracks/crevices is fine in the short run, but in the long run you really should replace those parts.

One other question comes to mind related to your sanitizer: what kind are you using? I ask because there are a number of sanitizers available that do not require rinsing (such as peracetic acid). You may want to consider something like that.

Hope this helps!