Cleaning Old bottles with mold in them.

Found my dads old Moosehead beer Canadian Logger wooden box full with Vintage looking green bottles...I wanted to use them to bottle my Barley Wine, but not with the mold and crud on the bottom. I have a ton of oxygen Cleaner/Oxyclean, will a good soak in this stuff do the trick. Or should i resort to something else...Any suggestions

I've cleaned up a few bottles with mold on the bottom. I soaked them in oxyclean over night, shook the hell outta them and then used a bottle brush. If they weren't clean, back in the soak bucket they went and repeat. If you get all the nasties you can see out, and sanitize (I use Starsan) you should be good to go!

Yup. Oxyclean will do the trick. Just soak them for a couple days in a bucket of strong (1 scoop / 5 gallons) solution.

that's a lot of hassle. as much as i hate bottling: mold=trash

I usually keg but I will be bottle conditioning this Barley, and am over going to buy bottles for a one time use. I figure if i have them I might as well use them, Right? I'll try the usual carboy over night soaking and see how that goes...

lumpher said:

that's a lot of hassle. as much as i hate bottling: mold=trash

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+1

But I can afford to toss one of my 360 bottles, because it seems that the multiply like rabbits anyways

GillandCo said:

I usually keg but I will be bottle conditioning this Barley, and am over going to buy bottles for a one time use. I figure if i have them I might as well use them, Right? I'll try the usual carboy over night soaking and see how that goes...

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for barleywine, yep, soak the hell out of them, then go for it. they'll age a couple years anyway...

Yep and if you really want to get crazy do a bleach dilution. But Oxyclean will take care of it for you.

wedge421 said:

Yep and if you really want to get crazy do a bleach dilution. But Oxyclean will take care of it for you.

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This is what I Originally had in mind...The Oxyclean usually leaves a white mask left behind after soaking but usually I make a mix of vinegar water that seems to take care of the issue...I recently converted to Oxygen Cleaner because its so cheap yet does the same thing!

I always attack mold with a 10% bleach solution, let it soak and rinse the hell out of it.

GillandCo said:

This is what I Originally had in mind...The Oxyclean usually leaves a white mask left behind after soaking but usually I make a mix of vinegar water that seems to take care of the issue...I recently converted to Oxygen Cleaner because its so cheap yet does the same thing!

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PBW (Powdered Brewery Wash) has the rinse agents (chelators) actually built in to avoid the "haze" ... I'm switching over to it now because the cost is worth it to me, I don't get much time to brew, and I like to save steps. Star San bath for bottle rinsing isn't on the schedule on the days I have to clean bottles.

I also use to love PBW but 10 bucks for a tiny tub wasn't worth it for me...I'll stick with my broke college ways for a 2$ tub of the oxy. And spend the rest on ingredients/equipment!

try beer line cleaner??

I've wondered about a bottle brush, with the handle cut down a bit, chucked into an electric drill for that same situation. After a good soak, put the brush in the bottle, hold on tightly, and fire away. Sure seems like it would be a whole lot easier and way more aggressive than doing it by hand.

Never heard of using a drill and bottle brush...sounds like a good idea if your in a time crunch.

If mould stays despite various cleaners and shaking, try using a paintbrush!! a long narrow one, something cheap that a kid might use for artwork.
I can reach anything at the bottem of Grolsh bottles this way, whereas a bottle brush was never flexible enough and less easily maneuvered at an angle through the narrow bottle neck.

Green bottles? Are there no hops in your barley wine? Do you like skunky beer? Can you really keep them in the dark while you age your barley wine? Personally, I have had too many skunky beers from green bottles to even buy them anymore, much less put the beer I brew into them. I would look for another source of bottles. I bought my share of commercial beer in suitable bottles. Some guys have hit up friendly bartenders. I would put my efforts into a source of better bottles, not cleaning green ones.

The barley wine sat in secondary for around 6 months then kegged and racked to "brown bottles" I'm keeping the old green ones in storage for that vintage look. Not sure if skunky would have been bad for this beer, since we used 'special hops' soaked in a grain bag for the final 2 weeks (to extract, 'flavor') guess you could call it a type of dry hop. surprisingly the beer had no green tannin taste what so ever. Appreciate the concern and suggestions, thanks

I have cleaned many bottles that had crud in the bottom. Stood them up in the bathtub, filled until all the bottles were under water in the upright position, Oxyclean, and all the crud bubbled out of the top. Removed all the lables at the same time.

johnboy1313 said:

I've wondered about a bottle brush, with the handle cut down a bit, chucked into an electric drill for that same situation. After a good soak, put the brush in the bottle, hold on tightly, and fire away. Sure seems like it would be a whole lot easier and way more aggressive than doing it by hand.

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I was actually just going to suggest this. I did this with the very first batch I made and it worked great.

Haven't done it since though, I find it's easier to just rinse them out when I'm done with them and throw away any I forget about that get funky.

+1 on OxiClean

I use a 6 gallon plastic bucket full of bleach solution. After I finish a beer I just throw it in there. After it starts to fill up I drain the bottles back into the bucket and just put a tin foil cap on them (no rinse until bottling time).

I just got 4 cases of brown bottles from my father-in-law that were used by one of his workers but have been in a warehouse for a few years. I need the bottles but seems like a ton of work. I kind of started one case and doesn't seem like alot of mold, but they need a good cleaning. Its looking like soaking in oxyclean is the best method here. I was thinking of soaking in that or bleach, scrub inside with bottle brush, take labels off, put in dishwasher, dry, and then sanitize when ready to use. I'd have to think that would be good. Its just a tedious job I've been putting off.

Old bottles that have not been cleaned.

Soak overnight in Oxy. Gets off the labels and loosens any crude inside....(bleach is a sanitizer-not a great cleaner)

Brush or sponge off any remaining labels and glue.

Rinse well with hot water and inspect. Brush out any crud still in bottles.

Drain with bottoms up until bottling day.

Star San (vinator is great) them and fill with beer.

Aside from the rinsing (to some it is a PIA) let time and the Oxy soak do all the work. End result is four cases of sparkling clean bottles.

OMO

bosco

boscobeans said:

Old bottles that have not been cleaned.

Soak overnight in Oxy. Gets off the labels and loosens any crude inside....(bleach is a sanitizer-not a great cleaner)

Brush or sponge off any remaining labels and glue.

Rinse well with hot water and inspect. Brush out any crud still in bottles.

Drain with bottoms up until bottling day.

Star San (vinator is great) them and fill with beer.

Aside from the rinsing (to some it is a PIA) let time and the Oxy soak do all the work. End result is four cases of sparkling clean bottles.

OMO

bosco

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Thanks for the information! This seemed to work on majority of the bottles and ended up with about 3 cases worth of usable boxes.

This is just amazing. This helped me clean bottles with thin heads that had olive oil inside. The bottles were very greasy and I never imagined this would work. It worked perfectly. I added warm water instead! Thanks

Sodium percarbonate
.soak in hot water leave for awhile even removes old labels..rinse and sanitise.place some foil over the bottles to keep out the dust.i clean my beer lines/kegs with the above product..