Food Grade Cleaners: Removing Corn Syrup

Q. We currently use Alconox detergent to clean our cold-form extruders. While it’s great for grease, it doesn’t seem to help cut the stickiness we see from cane molasses and corn syrup. Do you have a recommendation for another cleaning agent?

A. Alconox® Powdered Precision Cleaner is indeed a great emulsifier of organic and oily residues.  However, heat is an often overlooked component of the cleaning process and can greatly help and accelerate cleaning applications.  Prior to investigating a different detergent, we would recommend increasing heat and perhaps concentration to remedy these problems.  Molasses and syrups can congeal at ambient and cold temperatures, making them very difficult to emulsify. Heat can help soften and liquefy.  It also accelerates cleaning. Finally increasing the concentration increases capacity and detergency to some degree.

For a more potent option for manual cleaning, you can consider Detonox® Ultimate Precision Cleaner. This liquid concentrate, powerful emulsifier, is one of our newer detergents.

For automated, high pressure cleaning via CIP or washers, we would recommend elevated temperatures and Alcojet® Low Foaming Powdered Detergent or Solujet® Low-Foaming Phosphate-Free Liquid depending on the needs for a powdered or liquid concentrate detergent, respectively. 

The recommended starting concentration for these more viscous applications, including substances like corn syrup, is 1-3% (in contrast with our 1-2% recommendations for less challenging residues).

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Contact us any time: cleaning@alconox.com