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White spots on walls and ceiling in fermentation room

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  • White spots on walls and ceiling in fermentation room

    Hello, we are starting small 3 bbl (or cca 500 liter, we are situated in Czechia) nanobrewery with open fermentation vessels situated in separated and insulated fermentation room. We just brewed our 3rd batch and sudenly small white dots appeared on some surfaces - walls and ceiling. I´m wondering if it can be mold or something similar? The surfaces were sanitized one day before - one time with sodium hypochlorite and then (just for sure, I´m sanitation freak) with warm caustic.

    Can it be mold or perhaps is the beer yeast taking control over the room. Another idea is, that the sodium hypochlorite and caustic formed some kind of sediments of minerals from water (we have quite hard water in water line). Any ideas please? I´m beginning to panic a little. Thanks very much!

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    Last edited by Starwalker; 03-12-2019, 01:36 AM.

  • #2
    Obvious caveat that I can't positively confirm just from a picture but from looking at the images but based on your timeline and the fact that you sprayed caustic and sanitizer its most likely residue from cleaning as mold wouldn't have established so quickly. Secondly, you can see in the image that it seems there were drops of liquid after cleaning that deposited the salts as the liquid dried. Be sure that you are following the manufacturers directions on using your caustic and sanitizers. Reach out to whoever sold you your chems and have them help you come up with a cleaning SOP that won't leave a residue or at least minimize what does form. Additionally, this is a great example of why basic lab facilities are a necessity for any brewery regardless of size.

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    • #3
      Just a thought... you should wipe your ceiling after cleaning and sanitizing to remove condensation. You could use a clean and sanitized squeegee wrapped with cheesecloth. This is very common in the food industry as condensation is a no no over an product contact surface.

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      • #4
        Many thanks for suggestions. I made some research and spoke with few frends probrewers and (thank god) it's probably just caustic residue after left and unrinsed after cleaning. We were doing it wrong. I just contacted a guy from cleaning agent supplier (Ecolab) and made an appointment straight in brewery for choosing right cleaning agents and procedures.
        Many thanks!

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