Re-using screw top beer bottles

My favourite shop beer comes in a screw off top bottle, and I'm wondering if I can reuse em by just screwing the cap back on with my own homebrew inside? Btw I don't have a bottle capper, this is another reason it would be perfect for me.

Nope no dice. No way you can get a pressure tight seal by just twisting the cap back on.

Buy a bottle capper, a bench press is awesome.
Otherwise PET bottles (homebrew ones)

Are you sure? I mean have you tried?

I screwed one back on using a rubber cap gripper and it was definitely water tight. Also seemed to lock at a certain point, and to open again felt just as tight as when I bought it.

Try it and let us know the results!

my local brew shop uses screw top bottles all the time. they don't carry any glass bottles because it's easy to get your hands on "free" screw tops. he has yet to have any problems with them.

I used the miller lite plastic bottles for a while and they worked fine. After 2 or 3 times the bottles would start degrading and would have to be tossed out.

Are these plastic or glass bottles? I use coke bottles, Pepsi, anything carbonated will work. I've used them 3-4 times before I toss them. Never had a problem or any off tastes. And that's using the cap that it came with.

I will use the soft drink bottles for short periods. I started kegging and when I go to someones house I will fill up a few bottles to take with me. Dont use the clear bottles for long term as the sunlight will skunk the beer.

No no sorry I guess I wasn't clear enough, I mean glass twist cap beer bottles like this

I tried with water and they hold it in fine, and I guess the pressure can not push a screw cap off right?

Noz03 said:

No no sorry I guess I wasn't clear enough, I mean glass twist cap beer bottles like this

I tried with water and they hold it in fine, and I guess the pressure can not push a screw cap off right?

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I've heard of some people successfully doing this but I'm unable to. Never seals right for me.

Actually I am now recalling a time when the shop beer actually exploded in its own bottle after I carried it home and I guess shook it up a bit :/ Could that happen to any bottle or do you think it might be more because it was a screw cap?

I'd say the exploding bottle was either the result of too much priming sugar or possibly contamination of some sort. I suppose if the caps were in good enough shape and you did in fact get a good seal then it could work. I personally wouldn't trust that though.

Noz03 said:

Actually I am now recalling a time when the shop beer actually exploded in its own bottle after I carried it home and I guess shook it up a bit :/ Could that happen to any bottle or do you think it might be more because it was a screw cap?

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For it to explode the cap would of had to have a good seal. Basic science will tell ya that but. IMO I wouldn't risk amazing beer and find out a month later that your screw top didn't seal and u have flat skunked beer. That's just my opinion. Take it or leave it lol. Hope I've helped. Cheers.

ooooops... sorry explode was a very bad word to use. I meant the cap came off and as the bottle was on its side, at the very top of the fridge the mess was pretty bad! Wasnt even my own fridge, was at my friends house! Btw that was a shop bought beer, i didnt bottle it myself.

Noz03 said:

ooooops... sorry explode was a very bad word to use. I meant the cap came off and as the bottle was on its side, at the very top of the fridge the mess was pretty bad! Wasnt even my own fridge, was at my friends house! Btw that was a shop bought beer, i didnt bottle it myself.

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Ahhh gotcha. I'd be asking for another beer lol.

You asked, we told you "no, don't do it," you didn't like our answer, you're gonna do whatever you want, that's fine, but we're telling you the prevailing wisdom says it's not safe/reliable.

We use screw-on PET bottles or pry-off glass bottles with a proper capper. We know that works. Re-screwing on your twist-off caps might work, but I wouldn't gamble a batch of beer on it.

I do it all the time with no issues at all.

How do you think the commercial guys seal them?

They crimp them on just like us.

"prevailing wisdom" was you MUST rack to secondary. Now all of sudden when people actually started not using secondaries they figured out it is not needed.

Try both types of bottles and see what works for you.

cooldood said:

How do you think the commercial guys seal them?

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With massive automated production lines that screw-and-crimp hundreds of bottles per minute.

cooldood said:

They crimp them on just like us.

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The OP isn't asking about "crimping" them on - he's admitted he doesn't have a capper - he's talking about just screwing them back on "tightly."

kombat said:

You asked, we told you "no, don't do it," you didn't like our answer, you're gonna do whatever you want, that's fine, but we're telling you the prevailing wisdom says it's not safe/reliable.

We use screw-on PET bottles or pry-off glass bottles with a proper capper. We know that works. Re-screwing on your twist-off caps might work, but I wouldn't gamble a batch of beer on it.

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You say it won't work, others said it will, some say it might. Its called a discussion. No one has actually come and said that they have tried it and they wasted their beer, so until that time it is undecided, even you admit you are not sure. I am still hoping someone will turn up with actual experience of trying this and tell us for sure or not if it will work, otherwise it will be up to me to try it out on a few bottles, of course not a whole batch.

edit:
Btw I don't think the commercial guys are crimping them on, the caps are designed differently with a screw inside of them. Unless their machine is crimping and adding the screw in exactly the right place on the head of the bottle... possible but I think it might just be working like a regular screw top bottle.

Sorry about that I would never rescrew, but as I said earlier they work for me.

PS they do not screw/ crimp. they just crimp. I used to work at Pepsi and Bud.
Pepsi screwed (plastic of course) Bud just crimps

You guys are posting faster than I can type. LOL

It is a plain cap that is crimped the exact same way as we do.

The cap will take the shape of whatever it is crimped against.

Would it work? Probably , Would it be reliable to work consistently? Probably not. Stick with plastic soda bottles, they work and are cheap.

Stay with in the lines
the lines are your friend.

Do not think go directly past the twist off and collect the pop tops.

+1 to plastic soda bottles. They work great and are free if you like soda fine. Keep them out of the light and you are good to go.
Much easier than using a capper, don't break easily, and you can feel when your brew is ready. That for me is as good as it gets.

There was a post quite some time ago in one of the twist cap-bottle threads by somebody who claimed their main method of bottling was to screw twistoff caps back on. I'll see if I can find it. I believe his method was to use a squash ball he had cut in half to get a good grip on the cap and really make sure it was on tight.

I've never tried this, but I can tell you that most of my bottles are Yuengling twist-offs and I hand cap them with no problems at all. I think a lot of the paranoia about twist-off bottles is pretty irrational actually.

Yeah properly sealed twist tops are great for beers not destined for long storage. Sierra Nevada did research about traditional crown sealed bottles vs twist top crown seals, the full crowns held full pressure for longer, but only by a small margin, but significant enough that they chose to stick with full closures.

The whole thought of trying to reuse the original caps and re-screw them on leaves me very skeptical.

Great if it works for you but I would feel that it's got too much of a chance of not achieving an pressure resistant seal.

I'm bottling on Monday and I have a few screw tops in the Batch 19/Shock Top style. I'll bottle a sixer in the screw tops with my capper and compare them to regular pry offs in a vertical test over say 8-12weeks, opening one every week after a normal carb and conditioning. I can spare a sixer for the edification of The Rabble.

Down with conventional wisdom, blah blah blah....

moski said:

I'm bottling on Monday and I have a few screw tops in the Batch 19/Shock Top style. I'll bottle a sixer in the screw tops with my capper and compare them to regular pry offs in a vertical test over say 8-12weeks, opening one every week after a normal carb and conditioning. I can spare a sixer for the edification of The Rabble.

Down with conventional wisdom, blah blah blah....

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let us know how you make out with that.

I also bottled 3 screw tops, I will be drinking it as soon as its carbed but will report back if those 3 bottles carb ok over the next 2 weeks.

OK, I just finished bottling my Shire Brown. The 6 screw tops went easy, sonewhat less backpressure from the capper (Red Baron). I tested one screwing off the fresh cap and it appeared to hold well. After they're carbed up and chilled I'll report back, call it three weeks.

Hi folks. I was wondering if it would be ok to re-use 40 ounce beer bottles to bottle home brew in. The caps from those seem to be quite sturdy and since its a beer bottle they also seem to be able to hold pressure quite well too.

Anybody have any experience? Any thoughts?

Just opened my last of the screw tops and I don't think I'll be using them again. The carb level was consistently low compared to the pry offs, early on resulting in almost no head at all. I'm also not confident about the thinner glass of the screw tops. Just the carbonation leaks were enough to put me off the screw tops. I still think the bottles are neat looking but not worth the beer IMO.

I've had mixed results with recapping screw top bottles. I finally figured out that the key was firm and even pressure to create the seal, crimp, turn slightly, and crimp again. Seems to hold the carbonation much better that way.

7/10 at least leaks for me. Almost ruined my batch of wine if I didn't end up drinking them, within a week the last 2 bottles had off flavors. I'm going to start using beer bottles and capping them for wine, aging not a worry for me.

Avoid screw top bottles unless if you have new screw caps, can't say much there as I never used new screw caps before.

EDIT: Actually, what if I we're to use them and wax them to prevent air? Is that worth investing in rather than spending more money to buy corks and bottles?

edit:
Btw I don't think the commercial guys are crimping them on, the caps are designed differently with a screw inside of them. Unless their machine is crimping and adding the screw in exactly the right place on the head of the bottle... possible but I think it might just be working like a regular screw top bottle.[/QUOTE]

I do believe that commercial beers also crimp their screw-tops, if you take a look at the cap afterwards it's a standard cap that molds to the glass thread on the bottle, anyways I have a lot of bluemoon bottles that I plan to reuse next week, I filled one with coke before and crimped it (regular wings crimper, regular new beer cap) checked for leaks, none, shake it, leave it overnight, shake it some more and again no leaks. I was able to twist off the cap like it was brand new, and the coke still had CO2

Faquesca said:

I do believe that commercial beers also crimp their screw-tops, if you take a look at the cap afterwards it's a standard cap that molds to the glass thread on the bottle, anyways I have a lot of bluemoon bottles that I plan to reuse next week, I filled one with coke before and crimped it (regular wings crimper, regular new beer cap) checked for leaks, none, shake it, leave it overnight, shake it some more and again no leaks. I was able to twist off the cap like it was brand new, and the coke still had CO2

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Enough of you have sold me, especially the guy who worked for Bud & Pepsi. My neighbor worked very hard to empty a couple 12-packs of bottles so we can use them in my upcoming brew. Didn’t realize until I got home (because, u kno, I was drunk) that they’re screw top.

Good to know I should be able to crimp new caps on; this could save us some real $$ since I’m getting low on traditional bottles.

The batch in question will be a quickie ale - maybe 4 weeks fermenting tops, so we have something to drink when we brew this year’s Christmas ale. That way, we probably won’t run into the longevity issues.