Tommee Tippee electric steriliser

[Kristy&Alex]

Hi Girls,

Does anyone have the Tommee Tippee electric steriliser? I need to know what 'descaling' is? It says it needs to be descaled every 4 weeks with citric acid, obviously its some type of cleaning method but I am not familiar with this term. Also where do i get citric acid from?

Can anyone help?

Thanks

[Harmony83]

I read somewhere that you can use vinegar to clean/'descale' your steraliser?
I know thats what I use for the kettle anyway... :)

[Chickadee]

Descaling just refers to removing the white deposits that tend to build up in kettles, irons, coffee machines and anything else that is used regularly to boil water - like a steriliser. The white deposits are due to calcium & other minerals in the water. Perfectly safe to drink the water but when you boil it the minerals get left behind and tend to build up into the white deposits.

Vinegar is perfectly safe for descaling most things like kettles and irons. You just add the vinegar instead of water and let it boil a bit, empty it out and repeat with clean water (once with water usually gets rid of any vinegar taste). I'm not sure whether vinegar would be ok in the steriliser, I have a suspicion it might be a stronger acid than citric acid and so could damage some parts, or it could leave a taste residue on the bottles next time you use it.

[dee dee]

Hi Kristy,
I have an avent electric steriliser which also needs to be descaled every 4 weeks. my instructions say to use citric acid (from chemist ) or vinegar. If you cant find citric acid the instructions for using vinegar are:

Pour 100ml vinegar mixed with 200ml cold water into streiliser.
Allow to stand in the unit until any limescale has dissolved.
Empty the unit and rinse thoroughly.

I haven't descaled mine yet, so let me know how you go.

dee dee

[Courtycat]

I have the Tommee Tipee Closer to Nature Electric Steriliser too, I haven't descaled it yet but I did find citric acid in Woolies in the cooking isle near the food colouring, gelatine and spices. It is in a fluro yellowey-green round container (Mackenzies brand).

I did a bit of research on the net to find out how to descale it and I found these intructions from Tomme Tippee: http://www.tommeetippee.com.au/pdfs/ctn-elec-steri-leaflet-feb08.pdf

It's simply 1 teaspoon of citric acid to 80mls of water on a normal cycle. It then says to repeat 2 more cycles with clean water before using to sterilise bottles.

Hope that helps anyone in the same boat as me.

[Nemmy]

I have the Avent steam steriliser and usually descale about once a month with vinegar and it works fine. My instructions recommended this over the citric acid. Actually I think it read if you used cooled boiled water to fill it up you don't have to descale as much due to less mineral deposits being left in the water.

[~Bec~]

Just a side note - if you use only demineralised water you don't have to de-scale :)