Bottle Cleaning

I am gettting alot bottles form neighbors. Some have dried beer and crud on the bottom.

1. Is PBW good to soak them in?
2. How long should they soak?
3. I don't have bottle washer for my sink. Is rinsing 2-3 times under faucet good enough to get all PBW out?
4. After they are clean what is best way to sanitize? I have heard dishwasher w/o detergent is ok or should I use StarSan? If StarSan can you do it a few days in advance?

Thanks

PBW or Oxyclean is the way to go.
Overnight makes them shiny clean.
Rinsing works just fine.
I don't use my dishwasher because I know it won't really sanitize them (YMMV). Star San is a wet sanitizer so I wouldn't do it beforehand. Some folks seal them with foil after they sanitize but I use a vinator bottle rinser and bottle tree so it takes only a couple minutes to do it on bottling day.

RichN said:

I am gettting alot bottles form neighbors. Some have dried beer and crud on the bottom.

1. Is PBW good to soak them in?
2. How long should they soak?
3. I don't have bottle washer for my sink. Is rinsing 2-3 times under faucet good enough to get all PBW out?
4. After they are clean what is best way to sanitize? I have heard dishwasher w/o detergent is ok or should I use StarSan? If StarSan can you do it a few days in advance?

Thanks

Click to expand...

1.) Yup
2.) Two days should be enough
3.) Bottle washers are great, especially the dual-nozzle one that sits in the bottom of the sink. Rinsing 3 times is fine, but will use a lot more water than using a bottle washer.
4.) You have to sanitize just before you bottle. I use a sulphiter/vinator with StarSan. It doesn't take very long to sanitize a batch that way. Others use dishwashers or ovens with success.

Invest the few bucks in a dedicated bottle rinser. I bought a brass version way back in 1997 and it still works great today! The washer is very efficient at getting cleaner, crud and yeast cakes out of bottles AND carboys and you will recoup the cost of the bottle washer after bottling a few batches. The re-payment will come from the conservation of your hot water, of course.

It also saves quite a bit of time during the rinse process.

Thanks for great info:
I will buy vinator and StarSan. Then put on my bottling tree.
Question?? I guess it is ok for Star San to dry while you are botlling????
I would buy bottle washer but I do not have sink faucet that I can screw it in. They are all fancy spray handle type.

Since the bottles are upside down on the tree, it's not going to hurt if some of them dry.

Unless your dishwasher is broken it will sanitize just fine.

B1B what is (YMMV).

Your mileage may vary.

RichN said:

B1B what is (YMMV).

Click to expand...

or Your Method(s) May Vary, I think he meant that quite a few people use dishwashers for sanitizing bottles... but if there's stuff in them, it definitely needs to be removed before putting them in the DW, it isn't capable of 'cleaning' soiled bottles.

got it...............................

android said:

or Your Method(s) ... but if there's stuff in them, it definitely needs to be removed before putting them in the DW, it isn't capable of 'cleaning' soiled bottles.

Click to expand...

that's not what the bastard who sold me mine said!

For the first cleaning, I'm a big fan of bleach and TSP. It will get all the crud out and the labels will come off easier. Then rinse well and sanitize with starsan.

I found a $3.00 lint remover brush for a dryer at Target. I gave it a little bend at the end and it'll get in to any size bottle and scrub it clean. I put a little Bon Ami in the bottles to soak for ten minutes, hit it with that brush and it's off to the sanitizer ready for bottling. Hope that helps someone out there with cruddy bottles

when you enpty the bottle, rinse it well and half the future battle is averted.

I combine some of the techniques recommended in this thread. As "mordantly" states in the previous post, by all means, rinse the bottle thoroughly after pouring the beer. Don't let crud dry in there. This is the big first step.

When it's time to bottle, usually the evening before, I use a vinator (a sanitizer pump originally used to spray sulphite solution up into wine bottles, now used by many homebrewers) to spray Star San solution up into the bottle. These go immediately upside down into the dishwasher, which sits just to the right side of the sink, which serves exactly the same purpose as a bottling tree. This takes very little time.

The next morning, I run the dishwasher. This procedure seems redundant, but the dishwasher will not sanitize anything inside the bottle, obviously, so the Star San takes care of that. Some would argue that the 190F temperature generated by the dishwasher does the work, which I won't argue with, but this cleans off the outside of the bottle and buys me some insurance.