European bottle capping question + yeast starter question

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Rev2010

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 3, 2011
Messages
3,247
Reaction score
642
Location
Brooklyn
I've read some posts about european bottles having different sizes. I'm thinking lately to start capping glass bottles as I get so many Franziskaner bottles with all the cases I drink :drunk: I figure why deal with more plastic bottles (which I do like) when I can simply clean and cap the Franziskaner bottles? So the question is, will they cap fine with the regular wing capper and caps and is there any specific size cap I need or something?

And for the yeast starter, I've read some people refrigerator it for a while for the yeast to drop so they can dump out the starter wort. Is that really necessary? Would a liter or two of starter wort of an impact on a 5 gallon batch?


Rev.
 
Should do. Tho am obviously working the other way round, my red capper seems to work ok even with imported SN bottles. As long as they are the 26mm (?) caps.
 
. . . . I figure why deal with more plastic bottles (which I do like) when I can simply clean and cap the Franziskaner bottles? So the question is, will they cap fine with the regular wing capper and caps and is there any specific size cap I need or something? . . . . .

Plastic bottles, never used plastic bottles. I think the Franziskaner bottles are the regular size caps.

. . . . And for the yeast starter, I've read some people refrigerator it for a while for the yeast to drop so they can dump out the starter wort. Is that really necessary? Would a liter or two of starter wort of an impact on a 5 gallon batch?

Not necessary, plus you will have less lag time if you pitch it while still fermenting.

Brew on my friend:mug:
 
Just measured with my digital tape measure and yep, 26mm. So are the wing cappers pretty consistent? I was looking at various cappers online and the wing cappers still seem rated the highest even compared to bench cappers which a lot report breakage with.


Rev.
 
One more question... will an Oxyclean soak remove the gold foil on the bottles? Since it's foil I'd think it won't absorb the solution and would need to be scrubbed off. Boy I hope I won't have to scrub the foil off!


Rev.
 
One more question... will an Oxyclean soak remove the gold foil on the bottles? Since it's foil I'd think it won't absorb the solution and would need to be scrubbed off. Boy I hope I won't have to scrub the foil off!

Not sure about this, maybe scrape the foil off then soak them. Actually starsan seams to loosen stuff better than oxyclean if you have some.

Just measured with my digital tape measure and yep, 26mm. So are the wing cappers pretty consistent? I was looking at various cappers online and the wing cappers still seem rated the highest even compared to bench cappers which a lot report breakage with.

Wing cappers work for us because we only cap a sixer or two from a batch, we have 3 but we end up using the old metal wing capper because it's more solid (Not sure you can buy them anymore). You have to be carefull with any capper because you can break a bottle whatever you use.
 
The foil is definitely a PITA. In my experience, the Oxyclean will loosen it but you'll still have some scrubing to do.
 
One more question... will an Oxyclean soak remove the gold foil on the bottles? Since it's foil I'd think it won't absorb the solution and would need to be scrubbed off. Boy I hope I won't have to scrub the foil off!.

Just wanted to update here... SUCCESS!! I've put 4 Franziskaner bottles in a hot water with Oxyclean soak for a few hours and not only were all the labels already off and floating in the water, but they all had the foil peeling off substantially. When I took them out all but one I was able to simply peel away the foil. The other one I got off 95% of the foil and simply scrubbed the rest off with a plastic brillo style pad, no problem there at all.

Now, I don't know if it was the Oxyclean or just simply sitting in hot water, so I now have 6 more bottles sitting in the now -not so hot- solution and will see if the results are the same or if less peel off. If less peel off then I will just do a hot water soak.

Either way, I'm psyched! Buying 500ml bottles from Northernbrewer for example would cost $1.37 each, which is quite expensive. And considering I drink sooo much Franziskaner I always have a large supply of bottles I'm putting in the recyle bin. I know the family will definitely like the extra room in the recycling bin :D


Rev.
 
And for the yeast starter, I've read some people refrigerator it for a while for the yeast to drop so they can dump out the starter wort. Is that really necessary? Would a liter or two of starter wort of an impact on a 5 gallon batch?

Pretty much two schools of thought: Pitch the starter at full krausen or wait until it's done, refrig, decant, swirl and pitch a slurry.

The starter wort is unhopped and very neutral (extra light or light DME), so it won't make a difference in your beer's flavor.

If you are a few days out from brewing, I would make a starter and do the fridge and decant method. If you're brewing sooner, time it so you pitch the starter at full krausen.
 
LOL I've found buying bottles costs as much as buying beer. Even with good beer, it's like the beer is a bonus.

Exactly, so I definitely didn't want to buy any bottles. I did buy two cases of 500ml PET bottles and caps so I have 48 of them now and 38 of them currently contain my hefeweizen that I bottled Saturday. But now that I found out it's not heard to remove the foil I'm just gonna keep the Franziskaner bottles after I use them to build up a decent supply.

On another note, I found that it's primarily the Oxyclean that's removing the labels. Even after the water came down to room temperature it still took the labels off nicely after a soak. The foil turned out to leave just a slight tad on the bottles more often in the cooler water, but the left over came right off rising in the sink and rubbing it off with my finger.


Rev.
 
And for the yeast starter, I've read some people refrigerator it for a while for the yeast to drop so they can dump out the starter wort. Is that really necessary? Would a liter or two of starter wort of an impact on a 5 gallon batch?

Rev.

What you can do, especially for an expected high ABV brew, is to "step up" your starter a time or two by basically putting your starter on a stir plate for 24 - 48 hours or so, cold-crashing and adding fresh wort and letting it run for another 24 - 48 hours or so.
 
There are some European bottles that don't cap well but it's been so long I don't remember which. Has more to do w/the capper beinging able to grip the bottle. I just settled on SN bottles and that's all I use. Everything else that get bought gets recycled for the deposit. Besides it "looks better" when all my bottles are the same. :)
 

Latest posts

Back
Top