Tainted equipment?

[chrisc]

I started homebrewing approximately 8 years ago, mainly making beer from kits and had results that I was very happy with, fairly consistent good batches for a few years. : : . Mainly lager and bitter, but also experimented with wheat beer kits etc.

After a while I decided to have a go at making a partial mash brew; with pretty disastrous results. It was a long time ago now so I don't exactly recall what I did but my conclusion at the time was that I *really* overdid the hops giving the beer a really unpleasant aftertaste. To the extent that it was only fit for going down the drains. I mean, really really nasty stuff that you would not offer to your worst enemy, foul tasting even after sitting for many months (hoping it would get better).

After that, I had a few attempts to make kits again, and they always came out with a hint (or more) of this unpleasant taste, even though I went to lengths to try make sure that everything was totally clean. One of the issues is that it takes at least a few months just to discover that the new beer tastes bad too, and back to the drawing board.

Then kids came along, and with that and a more busy work schedule I haven't brewed anything for about 4 years or more.

I'd like to get back into brewing again, maybe just making kits to start with. The obvious thing would be to get all new equipment, then I can be sure that there will be no flavour "history" from the bad brew. But there's a part of me that feels guilty about throwing away things which might be pretty much OK.

I tried quite a few searches on google etc with no luck. But is it possible that the brewing equipment can retain the flavour of a bad batch almost indefinitely? I have a plastic 40 litre fermentation bucket and 2 king kegs, plus the usual paraphernalia of tubing, stirring spoons, thermometer, hydrometer etc.

What items would be suspect and I should get rid of? One idea I had was that the rubber seals and tubing inside the king kegs might get impregnated with the bad taste no matter how much cleaning is done. What would be more likely to cause the problem, the fermentation bucket, the keg or both.

I'm hoping that there would be someone that has come across this kind of problem before, because it would be better not to have to wait a 2-3 months just to find I've made another dud brew. I was thinking of trying a new fermentation bucket (not so expensive anyway) and replacing all the workings of a king keg, with extremely careful/thorough cleaning of the plastic. But maybe if someone has been through this before they can tell me what to concentrate on (or just replace everything...).

Thanks for any advice! :drink:

Chris

 

[tubthumper]

as plastic degrades over time i would in all honesty get some new kit , however you can get away with just new tubing and seals for it as long as you can get it sterilised/sanitised properly , but if any of it is sctarched inside then throw it out or use it for something else. they probly got scratched when and habour some nasties thats why the brews went off.
so a new fermenting bucket and new tubing( should be replaced every couple of years anyway)
and put some in bottles and check if its the kegs or not.
that way you can work out the cause of prob. but if its bad in bottles too then maybe have a rethink of the sterilers/sanitiser you use and how you rinse e.c.t

 

[chrisc]

Ok, so far I got myself a new fermentation bucket, and started a kit about a week ago.

Today for about 8 pounds I got hold of all the bits I need to replace all the dodgy workings of the king keg - new float, tubing and every rubber seal, as well as a few bottles so that if there is still a problem I'll know if it was the keg or not - good suggestion. The barrel itself didn't have any obvious scratches inside.

So will see in a while how it all turns out.