Cheap DIY Alternative to Vinegar for cleaning equipment

[BigJohnny]

I use A TON of vinegar to clean equipment and qt tanks etc, and it works great, but I am so tired of buying like 5-10 1g jugs at a time at the grocery store. Does anyone (looking at you Randy ; )) know of a cheaper DIY solution using some cheap bulk powdered acid compound or something I could just mix with Rodi to a mild strength comparable to what I currently use, a 50/50 5% vinegar/RODI mix?

I know tunze sells citric acid for cleaning their pumps but it's expensive from them, but maybe I can buy bulk and make it up myself.

Thoughts?

Thanks!

 

[dragon99]

Search citric acid on Amazon or eBay. You can buy it in up to 50lb buckets of you want.

 

[LobsterOfJustice]

I don’t know if it’s cheaper (vinegar is pretty cheap...) but you could look into muratic acid from the hardware store.

 

[BigJohnny]

Search citric acid on Amazon or eBay. You can buy it in up to 50lb buckets of you want.

Will do, do you use it? If so what brand/purity and what % do you mix it to?

 

[BigJohnny]

I don’t know if it’s cheaper (vinegar is pretty cheap...) but you could look into muratic acid from the hardware store.

Thanks but I'm pretty sure muriatic acid would have to be extremely diluted to be as gentle as vinegar etc.

Vinegar isn't cheap when you rip through it like I do.

 

[brett_schn]

Get buy one get one deals and get the vinegar cheaper

 

[BigJohnny]

Get buy one get one deals and get the vinegar cheaper

It's not even really the cost it's having to buy a ton of jugs all the time.

 

[BigJohnny]

Maybe if I can get a much more concentrated acetic acid and dilute that.....I'll look into it. Apparently it's harder to concentrate citric acid in a solution.

 

[BigJohnny]

Yup, that's the ticket. You can buy 99.85% pure acetic acid, commonly referred to as glacial acetic acid. 5 gallon tub for $129 would let me make 100 gallons of 5% vinegar essentially, for $1.29/gallon, which is $ .70 cheaper/gallon then my grocery store, but more importantly, I only need to store one 5g bucket and it will last me for a long time.

 

[Som1else]

Muriatic Acid, unless you like waiting forever for vinegar to work. MA cuts through everything very fast, I add about a cup to 2-3 gallons of water. Just remember to add the acid to water and NOT the other way around.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Muriatic acid is cheaper from an acid perspective, but won’t dissolve certain organic compounds as well. It all depends on what you use it for [emoji3]

 

[BigJohnny]

Muriatic acid is cheaper from an acid perspective, but won’t dissolve certain organic compounds as well. It all depends on what you use it for [emoji3]

I mainly use vinegar to clean qt equipment (tanks, heaters, powerheads, thermometer) between "patients" and clean precipitation/algae off of powerheads and pumps from my display tank. The thing I like about 50/50 5% vinegar/rodi is that I know how long I can leave the pumps in there (and part of their powercords) without causing any damage. I'd be scared the muriatic acid would eat through the rubber on the powercords or something unless you could help me come up with a recipe to make the potency similar? Is a 2.5% vinegar solution the same strength as a 2.5% muriatic acid? I don't think so.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Pure muriatic acid is about 11 M acid and has a pH of -1. Vinegar is about 0.8 M but has a pH of only 2.4 because much of the acetic acid is not ionized in vinegar.

You can dilute muriatic acid to the same pH, but it gets depleted a lot faster then in contact with calcium carbonate deposits.

The usual recommendation for cleaning is 9 parts water and 1 part muriatic acid.

 

[BigJohnny]

Pure muriatic acid is about 11 M acid and has a pH of -1. Vinegar is about 0.8 M but has a pH of only 2.4 because much of the acetic acid is not ionized in vinegar.

if I made an acetic acid dilution would it behave differently than vinegar?

You can dilute muriatic acid to the same pH, but it gets depleted a lot faster then in contact with calcium carbonate deposits.

so vinegar/acetic is a better option for calcium carbonate?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

The diluted muriatic acid (pH ~0) is about 100 times faster at dissolving calcium carbonate since the pH is far lower.

Diluted acetic acid and vinegar at the same acidity would be identical.

 

[BigJohnny]

The diluted muriatic acid (pH ~0) is about 100 times faster at dissolving calcium carbonate since the pH is far lower.

Diluted acetic acid and vinegar at the same acidity would be identical.

What about that same strength solutions effects on rubber and plastic though? Vinegar even eats into cords a bit if I leave em too long (not much, just color shift)

I just have this image of melting equipment in my head when I think of muriatic acid.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

What about that same strength solutions effects on rubber and plastic though? Vinegar even eats into cords a bit if I leave em too long (not much, just color shift)

I just have this image of melting equipment in my head when I think of muriatic acid.

I think the effect on plastic may be worse with vinegar than muriatic acid but it may depend on the plastic.

Vinegar can be in the form of acetic acid and that neutral molecule can enter plastic. Diluted muriatic acid won't have any neutral acidic molecules in it to enter plastic, so just exposes the outermost leading edge of plastic. So while the muriatic acid after dilution is a much stronger acid, i would not assume it is worse on plastics.

FWIW, I've used diluted muriatic acid for decades as have others, and I've not heard of cords being damaged, but I've also not inspected them closely.

 

[BigJohnny]

I think the effect on plastic may be worse with vinegar than muriatic acid but it may depend on the plastic.

Vinegar can be in the form of acetic acid and that neutral molecule can enter plastic. Diluted muriatic acid won't have any neutral acidic molecules in it to enter plastic, so just exposes the outermost leading edge of plastic. So while the muriatic acid after dilution is a much stronger acid, i would not assume it is worse on plastics.

FWIW, I've used diluted muriatic acid for decades as have others, and I've not heard of cords being damaged, but I've also not inspected them closely.

Thanks randy. So how long would you soak equipment in the 1:9 ratio of muriatic acid:rodi?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Thanks randy. So how long would you soak equipment in the 1:9 ratio of muriatic acid:rodi?

Until the calcium carbonate stops bubbling. Might be an hour, but it depends on how thick it is, if it is stirred (or stirred by bubbling action), etc.

 

[BigJohnny]

Until the calcium carbonate stops bubbling. Might be an hour, but it depends on how thick it is, if it is stirred (or stirred by bubbling action), etc.

Gracias senor holmes-farley