Reusing screw top bottles

So, I'm cheap. And also lazy. My wife likes Barefoot Mascato and I found they have it in 187ml screw top bottles. I've been saving them up and plan to use them for bottling testers/single servings of my mead as my mead is ready. These bottles are free, easy to fill and cap, and the perfect size to open one every couple months to test if my larger bottles have reached heavenly mead perfection.

Is there anything wrong with using these bottles? Will they keep the mead from oxidizing? Could I also reuse beer bottles with twist tops? Thanks.

cant really cap them with a reg crown capper.

oldstyle69 said:

cant really cap them with a reg crown capper.

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Yeah, the question is more of, do I need to get traditional bottles.

The issue with reusing screw tops is that they don't provide an airtight seal. However, you should be able to deal with That--provided the cap hasn't been stripped--by dunking the sealed top in melted wax.

I have also reused twist top glass soda bottles, and not found a problem with it--with the disclaimers that I may not be able to taste the oxidation if it happens, and that it hasn't been for particularly long storage; so I wouldn't use them for storing more than 6 months or so (although could be fine for longer)--fill them up all the way...

With the hot wax seal idea it might just work......

I don't routinely reuse screw tops as they don't reseal well and because there seems to be a range of threads used by the machines/bottles just getting hold of a bag of caps likely wouldn't work.

Even if you found some new glass and caps that fitted, the crimping tool is often expensive.

Plus the neck of the screw tops is often thinner glass so youd have to be very careful with using cork instead.

fatbloke said:

With the hot wax seal idea it might just work......

I don't routinely reuse screw tops as they don't reseal well and because there seems to be a range of threads used by the machines/bottles just getting hold of a bag of caps likely wouldn't work.

Even if you found some new glass and caps that fitted, the crimping tool is often expensive.

Plus the neck of the screw tops is often thinner glass so youd have to be very careful with using cork instead.

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I actually keep the caps. So no need for tools or replacement caps

screw cap wine bottles are much the norm here. i've had no problems reusing the cap. none have leaked so far.
also you could use nova twist which clamps onto the neck of the bottle.

tweake said:

screw cap wine bottles are much the norm here. i've had no problems reusing the cap. none have leaked so far.
also you could use nova twist which clamps onto the neck of the bottle.

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Awesome. How long have you had any reused bottles capped?

My wife doesn't like the taste of honey (mostly because her mom doesn't like the taste of honey so the expectation was set that she wouldn't like it). When it comes to food an drink my wife is very much governed by her expectations of if she will like it. So she thinks she doesn't like honey, and thinks she won't like mead, so she won't like it no matter how unlike honey it tastes or how heavenly the mead is. So, these bottles might also be nice for single servings for me, since I'll be the only one drinking my mead. If the reused bottles will last for a couple years that would be nice.

I've been pretty successful ramming corks into old twist top bottles without shattering the necks.

nitack said:

Awesome. How long have you had any reused bottles capped?

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i won't know for sure until i open them but some are around 2 years old now.
no signs of anything leaking out.