Bottling with Wax?

[Gluten]

I have a few glass milk bottles I'd like to use for bottling my apfelwein. I don't trust the plastic snap on lids very much and want to seal them with ordinary-run-of-the-mill candle wax. If the liquid comes in contact with the wax could this cause problems?

 

[Cheeto]

A little more detail would be nice.

Are you going to cap these bottles with something before applying the wax?

Have you looked in to corking the bottles?

On your method of coating them I have used a cheap sauce pan from goodwill and just dipped the tops of the bottle in to the melted wax, make sure the bottles are room temp!

Please post an update.

-Jason

 

[Skins_Brew]

I am pretty sure glass milk bottles were not intended to hold pressure.

 

[Tusch]

From his description I don't believe he is carbonating, but good point skins. I'm with cheeto though, how are you intending on capping these? Do they have some sort of cap that you are adding security to with the wax? Are you using solely wax or are you corking them first and then covering the cork with wax. Pictures might be helpful, I know I don't get milk in glass containers so I'm unsure of what type of seal they have.

 

[Gluten]

Oh sorry, I should have been more clear. I'm just using a couple of these.

One of the caps is intact but the other one has a small crack that would for sure let air in. Besides that I just don't trust them to be completely air tight so I want to use wax to make sure it has a good seal. In the case of the one with the crack there's a good chance of liquid coming in contact with the wax if it is sloshed around.

It is being bottled still.

I could get corks, but that would require me to go get corks

So back to the question. If wax is in contact with apfelwein will it cause an off-flavor?

Edit: the one on the left
<----

 

[Yuri_Rage]

You don't have any beer bottles? They work for apfelwein, too...

 

[Gluten]

I've got 10 gallons of beer being bottled in about a week and a half and I'm about 8 bottles short for that. I'm just trying to put to use the containers I already have.

 

[Yuri_Rage]

Milk bottles with broken caps don't exactly sound like a good plan. The apfelwein could stand to age for a bit longer while you procure some more suitable vessels.

 

[Yuri_Rage]

To answer your original question, sealing wax (available at most homebrew supply stores) is much more flexible than candle wax. You'll be disappointed in the results if you use candle wax for sealing bottles. I experimented with candle wax as a decorative seal, and it worked very poorly. Additionally, wax is an aid to preventing oxidation, but it probably shouldn't be used to fix a broken lid.

 

[Gluten]

Awesome, thanks for the info.

I suppose I'll just track down some corks for these instead.

 

[Tusch]

It'll probably be easier to track either more beer bottles or some wine bottles down. Check out local restaurants, bars and recycling centers. I imagine finding corks for those bottles would be easy. Also, are you saying you have some of just the glass containers from that picture or do you intend to use the plastic milk jug as well, I would definitely shy away from that.