MalFet's bottle washer for lazy homebrewers

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I read many of these posts before building my own bottle washer. I wanted something compact that didn't require dedicating a sink, and that I could leave running for a while if needed without worrying about water splashing out of the tub.

I built something that completely fits inside a storage tote, without anything hanging over the sides. So, the goal was to maximize the use of space and try to have washing posts on all 4 sides of the rig.

What I came up with is in the pictures. This version can clean 20 bottles at a time. With some modification (or a bigger tub), you could probably increase that. As you can see, the pump fits UNDER the tub, so that saves on the footprint as well. I also hard-piped the pump to the rig, so you can use the handle on the pump to left the entire rig out of the tub as one unit.

I also wanted something that was somewhat powerful, and was willing to spend a little more to get it. I get about 10' of water height without any bottles on the rig with a pump I got from harbor freight for $50.

I can post a parts lists if there's interest. I also took pictures of the construction, if anyone wants those.

I'm considering building another one so that I can have one rig that's cleaning and another that's sanitizing simultaneously.

The only downside so far is that the risers are a bit wide, and on some bottles the cleaning solution doesn't drain as fast as it enters. Some of the bottles will have several inches of liquid in them waiting to drain while the pump is running. This seems to reach equilibrium, however, and since I made the posts tall enough, there's a good stream of water that hits the bottom of the bottles, even if liquid is backing up a bit.

If anyone has any suggestions for improvement, let me know.

Hi,
I would love to see a parts list and photos of construction if you still have them.

Thanks
Rob
 
I recently bought several cases of used bottles from a guy on craigslist, so I decided to build a washer. I should have read the entire thread before I bought parts, but oh well.

This is a 3/4 hp pump with a 1.5 fix outlet. Regular price is $99, but it was on sale for $69. https://www.menards.com/main/plumbi...7-c-1489153238832.htm?tid=7633306690796898321 A couple adapters brought it down to 3/4 hose barb.

3/4 pvc all the way around, it was intended to fit 24 bottles and in my sink, but I ran out of copper tube. If I had cut my copper at 5 in instead of 8, I would have had enough to do all 24. As it is, I have enough to do 15, with about 5" left over. I used that to make it a full 16 bottle capacity. All my tees were cut down to bring the bottles closer together. The corner where the hose connects is a 3/4 ell with a 1/2 threaded port on the side. The tees where the bottles are have plugs with 1/4 holes drilled in the center, and the copper tube is 1/4 OD. The tubes seemed to fit snugly in the holes, but I have had a few wiggle out, so I will flare the end inside the plug.

The pump has a lot of pressure and a lot of flow. So much that doing 24 at once probably would have worked, but not as well as the 16. With no bottles, there is enough pressure to hit the ceiling! In the initial test I've found that as it is, the bottles lean this way and that. I'd like to make a frame to hold them all straight up and down and see how that works, otherwise they lean and I rotate them each a 1/4 turn every few minutes.

I noticed that some of the bottles fill with water, some more than others. It was especially true of the single short copper, which was originally opposite the water inlet. It might even work better, having anything dried up soaked in moving water. It also didn't seem to make a difference whether the water level level was above or below the mouth of the bottles. Although, with the water higher, if one of my tubes wiggled out, it wouldn't spray everywhere.
 
Rob,

Sorry for the very late reply, but I missed your message somehow.

Unfortunately I don't have a parts list. Everything was purchased at the local hardware store. Most of it is PVC fittings, with some adapters to shrink down the pipe to plex-size.

I do, however, have pictures which show the majority of the assembly and most of the parts. Apologies for the long post, but hopefully someone else might benefit from this and figure out how to make it better.

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Has anyone set up their washer with multiple tanks so they can change from wash to rinse easily?

Re-reading this thread I was thinking if there was a way one could build a bottle washer like this that used a dishwasher so you could wash both the inside and outside at the same time.
 
Finally had enough of bottle brushes and built myself a washer. I picked up a 1000gph pump from amazon via homebrewfinds a couple of weeks ago. This past weekend I bought the bits and pieces to build a rack that fits on top of my pump and sets down nicely in a tub I already had. Initial tests with full open 1/2" verticals yielded a max 1" vertical flow. Today I designed some restricted nozzles inspired by those on pressure washers, a hemispherical dome with a 60deg transverse groove filed through to generate a knife blade-like spray pattern. I printed them out on the stratasys 3D printer we have at the office and installed them tonight with standard all-purpose pvc cement which worked well. Goodby bottle brushing nightmare, hello easy-street.

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Finally had enough of bottle brushes and built myself a washer. I picked up a 1000gph pump from amazon via homebrewfinds a couple of weeks ago. This past weekend I bought the bits and pieces to build a rack that fits on top of my pump and sets down nicely in a tub I already had. Initial tests with full open 1/2" verticals yielded a max 1" vertical flow. Today I designed some restricted nozzles inspired by those on pressure washers, a hemispherical dome with a 60deg transverse groove filed through to generate a knife blade-like spray pattern. I printed them out on the stratasys 3D printer we have at the office and installed them tonight with standard all-purpose pvc cement which worked well. Goodby bottle brushing nightmare, hello easy-street.

Combining two of my favorite things, 3DP and beer! =) While I get that the Stratasys is a long ways away from my gaggle of home FDM printers, I find this idea interesting. Do you have a STL you'd be willing to share? And of course, pictures!
 
Combining two of my favorite things, 3DP and beer! =) While I get that the Stratasys is a long ways away from my gaggle of home FDM printers, I find this idea interesting. Do you have a STL you'd be willing to share? And of course, pictures!
Here is a photo of the nozzles, I'll upload stl and iges files later this afternoon. The 60deg slot is easy to widen with a triangular file making it possible to balance the pressure across all 16 jets.
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Here are the 3D files for the nozzles sized to press fit inside 1/2" cpvc. I would suggest cementing them in place on the risers.
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Attachments

  • Spray_nozzle_for_half_inch_cpvc.zip
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So far my washer has been working well, after dialing in my cleaning process. Some of my older bottles which have been used dozens of times have developed a film that wasn't coming out. I ended up with a process of soaking them in a strong bleach solution for an hour, rinse, then wash for an hour with a moderately strong pbw solution, then blast rinse with hot tap water. This routine is a lot of work but results in sparkling clean bottles. The bleach soak takes place in a plastic tote next to the sink, while a load of them washes in pbw, so the 'cycle time' is 60 minutes for 16 grimy bottles. I wish it could handle 24 at a time but 16 is working well with the limited space I have available. I added a few drops of fermcap to the pbw solution to eliminate foaming, and twist each bottle 90 degrees every 10 minutes during the wash cycle. After doing this all day long I feel like rosie the robot but I have just over 200 ready-to-use clean bottles to show for it.

I really need to get into kegging.
 
Hi everyone,

I'm currently building a similar bottle washer and I was wondering something : Do you actually need to glue all the cpvc pieces with cpvc cement glue or squeezing everithing in place is enough? Is the pressure that important?

I'm wondering because in most images out there, it seems like there is no traces of glue.

Thanks everyone,

Loup
 
I didn't use any glue. Mainly because I wanted to be able to twist them if I needed to change the direction of the water holes individually .

Hi everyone,

I'm currently building a similar bottle washer and I was wondering something : Do you actually need to glue all the cpvc pieces with cpvc cement glue or squeezing everithing in place is enough? Is the pressure that important?

I'm wondering because in most images out there, it seems like there is no traces of glue.

Thanks everyone,

Loup
 
I didn't use any glue. Mainly because I wanted to be able to twist them if I needed to change the direction of the water holes individually .

Good to know. You didn't had any leaking issue or any drawback from not using any glue? If so, that is going to be the way i'll take too...
 
Hi everyone,

I'm currently building a similar bottle washer and I was wondering something : Do you actually need to glue all the cpvc pieces with cpvc cement glue or squeezing everithing in place is enough? Is the pressure that important?

I'm wondering because in most images out there, it seems like there is no traces of glue.

Thanks everyone,

Loup
I didnt use glue for most of the assembly, the friction fit is plenty tight. I learned the hard way that 3d printed parts don't glue well to pvc with solvent glue, I recommend a short length of shrink tubing to l ock down the spray nozzles.
 
Hi guys,

I have to tell you, I am quite dissapointed with the bottle washer i've built. It isn't scrubbing my bottles as I would have expected. A lot of junk wont get out of the bottle (junk that is easily scrubable withe a brush, but i've built this bottle washer not to have to do this ever again...). I'm using a 1/3 HP column pump and get a good 2 feet high water jet.

Is there something I am not doing properly?? Have someone experienced similar experiences??
 
I like bottling. I tend to keep several dozen different kinds of beer on hand, and a kegerator of any size would need to pay rent if it wanted to live in my very small New York City apartment.

The only part of bottling that I find at all time consuming or tedious is washing the bottles. No longer!

----



It's a very simple concept, but it can wash, rinse, and sanitize 30 bottles with virtually no effort. I built a frame out of 1/2" cpvc fit to a standard rectangular milk crate, used 1/4" copper refrigerator coil for the vertical bottle spouts, and push water through it with a 1/4 HP submersible pump. The pump sits in my sink filled with whatever I want to wash with (pbw->rinse water->star san), and the milk crate rests right on top of it.

I made three of them since I always bottle two ~4.5 gallon batches at a time, and washing those 90 bottles is now trivial. I fill the sink with PBW, let it run on each crate for 5-10 minutes, drain the sink, fill the sink with star-san, and then run it again for a minute or two. My active time for 90 bottles is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 minutes. It's so painfully easy that I kind of hate myself for only doing this now after all these years.

I get plenty of power from this pump, and without the bottles to block it the stream of water coming out extends 3-4 feet above the spouts. I ran through a batch of very grimy, dried out bottles and they came out completely clean after 15min of PBW. If I built it again, I might actually use copper for the frame and sweat it all together. The JB Weld holds reasonably well, but in knocking the washer around a bit a few have come loose. They still work perfectly fine even when loose, but welded metal would obviously be more durable over the long run.

One major caveat: I have only tested this on 12oz longneck bottles (Sam Adams type). I don't have any of the shorter, fatter bottles (Sierra Nevada type) to try with. I suspect they might not fit, but I'll post back if/when I'm able to test them.

It's a pretty self-explanatory build. Parts and steps are as follows:

Parts
pump and connector
1@$47.99 - 1/4 hp submersible pump (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000X05G1A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20. I strongly recommend this pump or its 1/3 hp cousin. If you get something else, I can't promise that it will work. At the very least, make sure you get a pump capable of at least 25 feet of head pressure.)
2@$3.19 - barbed to female garden hose adapter (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006PKMU7U/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20)
1ft@$2/ft - 1/2" silicone hose
2@$0.20 - 1/2" worm clamps
1@$1 - 1/2" threaded to male garden hose adapter
1@$1 - 1/2" cpvc straight female to threaded male adapter
1@$0.20 - 3" of 1/2" cpvc pipe
__________
TOTAL: about $59

washer
1@$6.50 - rectangular milk crate (MILK CRATES - Plastic Crates For Sale | Buy Direct & SAVE ✅)
1@$22.49 - 1/4" refrigerator copper tubing (for example: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002FYAI42/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20. There appears to be significant variation in wall thickness among different types of copper tubing, and to get a good spray height you need a relatively small inner-diameter. If you get the relatively larger stuff, you should be able to pinch the ends of the tubes to get better results.)
4@$0.40 - 1/2" cpvc elbow (straight)
5@$0.40 - 1/2" cpvc tee (stright)
1@$0.80 - 1/2" cpvc cross (stright)
1@$3 - 10' length of 1/2" cpvc pipe
__________
TOTAL: about $36

tools
* hand drill with 1/4" bit
* JB Weld
* something to cut cpvc pipe and refrigerator coil (a simple cheap-o $20 rotary pipe cutter does the job handily)
* something to drill a 3/4" hole in the side of the milk crate (I used a cheap step-bit)

Instructions
1) Cut five 14" lengths from the CPVC pipe. These are your traversals.
2) Cut eight 1" lengths from the CPVC pipe. These will attach your elbows, tees, and cross together. They should be just long enough to join your joints without space between them.
3) Assemble the two ends of the frame like in the picture below. One edge is composed (elbow-tee-tee-tee-elbow), and the other (elbow-tee-cross-tee-elbow).
4) Join the two ends together with your five 14" traversals. Make sure this assembled frame fits into the milk crate.
5) On each traversal, drill six evenly spaced 1/4" holes, pointing straight up. The first and the last should be right up against the joint caps. Test the first hole with a small piece of copper coil to make sure it fits. It should be a snug fit, but if not you can pinch the end a bit with a pair of pliers.
6) Cut thirty 7" lengths of refrigerator coil.
7) Slip the lengths of copper into the drilled holes, and use the JB Weld to seal the joint between the CPVC and the copper. Let bond set overnight.
9) Drill a 3/4" hole into the lower side of the milk crate right where the cross open end of the cross joint is. This cross joint should be the only open part of the frame.
10) Assemble the connector (3" cpvc pipe -> 1/2" cpvc straight female to threaded male adapter -> 1/2" threaded to male garden hose adapter)
11) The connector should be able to pass through the hole in the side of the milk crate to attach to the frame inside, and the silicone hose with the garden hose adapters should connect this up to the pump.
12) Plug it all together and let 'er rip!
(Apologies if these instructions are confusing. If there's anything I can clarify, let me know. If I build another one at some point, I'll take pictures of the actually assembly process.)

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Hello. I'm a new member and appreciate this is an old post, but can you re-do the jpg's again please. I can't get them to download. I presume it's the time factor.

Thanks

shunter50
 
Hi guys,

I have to tell you, I am quite dissapointed with the bottle washer i've built. It isn't scrubbing my bottles as I would have expected. A lot of junk wont get out of the bottle (junk that is easily scrubable withe a brush, but i've built this bottle washer not to have to do this ever again...). I'm using a 1/3 HP column pump and get a good 2 feet high water jet.

Is there something I am not doing properly?? Have someone experienced similar experiences??

I built something similar. Mine can shoot water 6 feet into the air, but I found it wasn't really loosening yeast that was stuck to the side of the bottles.

Since then I've found that having the PBW solution hot makes all the difference. If I wasn't moving to kegging I'd probably install a heating element in the plastic box I'm using as a sump to keep the PBW solution really hot, although then my problem would be keeping the pump from overheating.
 
I built something similar. Mine can shoot water 6 feet into the air, but I found it wasn't really loosening yeast that was stuck to the side of the bottles.

Since then I've found that having the PBW solution hot makes all the difference. If I wasn't moving to kegging I'd probably install a heating element in the plastic box I'm using as a sump to keep the PBW solution really hot, although then my problem would be keeping the pump from overheating.

How big is the plastic box? I’m looking at my wife’s collection of crockpots and instapot
 
The traditional route would be an immersible bucket heater with some sort of guard, then plug it into an inkbird temp control. It would be easier and probably cheaper to just pick up a cheap sous vide, drop it in the tank and set the temp. You can set a countdown timer too so it shuts off after a set amount of time. I would set it up and hit start, then drop a solo cup over the top portion just to protect it from splashes.
 
So far my washer has been working well, after dialing in my cleaning process. Some of my older bottles which have been used dozens of times have developed a film that wasn't coming out. I ended up with a process of soaking them in a strong bleach solution for an hour, rinse, then wash for an hour with a moderately strong pbw solution, then blast rinse with hot tap water. This routine is a lot of work but results in sparkling clean bottles. The bleach soak takes place in a plastic tote next to the sink, while a load of them washes in pbw, so the 'cycle time' is 60 minutes for 16 grimy bottles. I wish it could handle 24 at a time but 16 is working well with the limited space I have available. I added a few drops of fermcap to the pbw solution to eliminate foaming, and twist each bottle 90 degrees every 10 minutes during the wash cycle. After doing this all day long I feel like rosie the robot but I have just over 200 ready-to-use clean bottles to show for it.

I really need to get into kegging.
I'm kegging now, soooo much easier and actually really fun compared to bottling. I still have my bottle washer and a supply of bottles for the beers I intend to cellar, and no way I'll ever let my vintage bench capper go.
 
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