Caps -- To Sanitize, or Not to Sanitize?

[SumnerH]

And there's certainly something to be said for that!

There are probably lots of examples of processes that we employ that are 'neurotic ceremonials', repeated because they are comforting. Maybe sanitizing caps can be categorized as one of those things, I dunno. Sanitizing everything that touches my beer up to packaging is just automatic- I don't think about it, I just do it.

Well, it's all about the odds. Honestly, the #1 thing you can do to decrease the risk of infection is to clean everything thoroughly. That probably buys you 95% of the benefit, and I'd guess most people who just did that wouldn't see an infection very often (if ever). Despite all the awesome killer antibacterials around, even in a hospital the #1 thing that helps prevent the spread of infection is basic cleanliness.

But sanitizing everything buys you a little extra, and gives a safety net in case something wasn't 100% clean. And at least it's actually proven to kill most bacteria.

Pasteurization requires that the item to be pasteurized is heated to over 160F for 15-30 seconds. That's the item itself, not the water pouring over it--it's going to take some time for water to heat something else to its temperature, and obviously water that's 160F at the most coming out of the tap is never going to heat anything to over 160F (without some other heat source).

Basically, rinsing with hot tap water is doing the "clean thoroughly" method and then tricking yourself into thinking that warming up your equipment is somehow sanitization. It's likely to be okay, but the fact that you rinsed with hot water has almost nothing to do with why it's likely to be okay.

 

[bottle-o-jeff]

Not laziness or corner cutting. Just my [perhaps mistaken] belief that an acid sanitizer will have a negative impact on the integrity of the cap. Was just putting some feelers out there for what others did, and indeed I might change my own techniques in light of this.

I guess what I've tried to say several times is that after contacting the manufacturer of said caps, they say that use of an acid sanitizer will not have a negative impact on the integrity of the cap.

It's your choice whether to sanitize your caps or not, but if the manufacturer of the caps tells me it's ok to sanitize them I'm going to go ahead and assume that it's ok to sanitize them.

Here's a quote from James Spencer's Twitter feed ( basicbrewing):

# From Oxy Barrier cap mfg: O2 barrier is activated when it contacts moisture, but it takes days to react. OK to sanitize if used right away.
6:23 AM Feb 19th from twhirl

He talks about it in more detail in the first few minutes of the next episode (About 2:00 on the 2-26-09 Episode).

 

[Pelikan]

I guess what I've tried to say several times is that after contacting the manufacturer of said caps, they say that use of an acid sanitizer will not have a negative impact on the integrity of the cap.

The manufacturer is (more or less) responding to getting the caps moist right before using them, not necessarily to the effects of an acid. Believe me, I understood what you were saying, each time that you said it.

Regardless, there are enough people sanitizing caps with positive results that I may now jump on the bandwagon. Just positing a theory (ie: that a low pH solution would impact the stability of the soft material lining the cap), but apparently this isn't an issue.

 

[EvilTOJ]

Hey c'mon Pelikan, we haven't had a good beer related flame war in awhile.

I sanitize my caps, because the cap bin is right next to the LHBS grain grinder. They're not in baggies, they're just in a drawer. So yea, I'm going to sanitize my caps for sure.

 

[Schnitzengiggle]

If it isn't a laziness issue, then why wouldn't one sanitize caps? I just won't understand it, I cannot even begin to rationalize why you wouldn't sanitize your caps! Maybe for a good debate on this thread. I can't wrap my head around it though, it's as simple as filling a bowl with water, and sanitizer, I mean WTF?!?! Really?!?! I'm having a hard time with this...I need a HomeBrew!!!

 

[Pelikan]

If it isn't a laziness issue, then why wouldn't one sanitize caps? I just won't understand it, I cannot even begin to rationalize why you wouldn't sanitize your caps! Maybe for a good debate on this thread. I can't wrap my head around it though, it's as simple as filling a bowl with water, and sanitizer, I mean WTF?!?! Really?!?! I'm having a hard time with this...I need a HomeBrew!!!

This is what I posted a little bit back:

My thinking is that we're bottling with open bottling buckets, in the open air; racking in open air; pitching in open air...not in a glove box. To assume that not a single foreign cell will end up in the batch is folly -- they're floating down from the great aether all the time.

So the hypothesis went as follows: Provided one uses reasonable capping practices/cap handling/storage, the probability of a cap to add significantly to the chance of contamination is very low (much lower, in fact, when compared to bottling in the open, etc); the chance for an acid sanitizer to impact the integrity of any cap, whether it be oxygen or not, is potentially higher. Therefore, sanitizing caps may be a "more harm than good" proposition.

This is just my logic. It might be flawed. Hell, it's probably flawed.

 

[Medo]

Ahoy hoy,
Interesting thread. I myself boil my caps for 5 minutes at the same time im boiling the corn sugar water up for the carbonation. Now, I dont use oxy caps. I have about 16,000 (yes virginia, thats 16 thousand) caps. They were over run from a pepsi factory. I will never have to buy bottlecaps again in my lifetime. The only ones i dont boil were a few hundred that were so old they still had cork for the gasket material instead of the modern rubber/plastic they use now. And those cork jobs worked just as good as the new ones. I just rinsed them in iodophor. Since I have so many caps in some good size boxes, I always assume they need a good boiling.
I have a good assortment, so I can even seperate what i bottle by the type of cap. But it was the best deal on any brewing paraphenalia Ill probably ever get. I ran out of caps once in the clutch, and the home brew store failed me in my time of cap need. That will NEVER, NEVER happen again....between all those caps, all the bottles I have and my kegs....
But I ramble......

 

[Aspera]

I've steamed, boiled and sanitized with all kinds of stuff, and tried using a variety of caps straight from the bag. I haven't noticed any difference one way or the other. I am told that even ultra-large breweries bottling highly unstable light lagers don't sanitize their caps. Right now, my rule is not to bother unless I plan on aging over 1 year. Then, I use an iodophor, followed by an air dry. I *do* notice a difference between oxygen absorbing and regular caps. Also, I always store all my full bottles upright.

 

[boydak]

I'm old school and still boil them. I think there are lots of short cuts we could take in the whole process (beer is pretty tough) but why risk it?

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

IMO, flyangler touched on a big issue...the length of time it will take for many contamination problems to become evident in the beer. Most people will finish the whole batch before it will show...so they never even know that they actually had a contamination issue.

I think the other issue...regarding the acid affecting the O2 absorbing ability of the cap...is a non-issue. You're using the caps immediately after you sanitize them...they're not getting 'ruined'. Even if they reduced the O2 absorbing ability by say, 20% (which I doubt), you still have 80% more than a non-O2-barrier cap (which many people use without issues) and you have guarded against contamination. Seems like an easy decision esp since it's such a simple step.

So imo, if you're gonna drink the whole batch soon it probably won't matter...even if you DID use contaminated caps. I don't think the O2 barrier really matters there either. So...no gain by sanitizing...but no gain from O2 caps either. If you're gonna store it for a while...you benefit from the O2 caps...but you prob should sanitize the caps as well. Easy decision for me...but I won't get any heartburn if anyone else decides to not do it. A very large percentage of the time it prob won't matter.

 

[Homercidal]

I just dip in starsan right before I start filling bottles. Then they sit on the bottles until I start capping. It's so fast and easy (I already have Starsan in a bucket from sanitizing the bottling bucket) that I can't imagine why you wouldn't.

You could compare this to dry hopping and say that if you can dry hop with out worry, then you can cap without sanitizing, but if there was a reasonable way to sanitize your hops before dry hopping, I bet many here would choose to do it.

And I have a barleywine that should be bottled soon, should I buy some O2 caps for it??

 

[giligson]

If you sanitize your bottles it doesn't make sense not to sanitize your caps.

But I still don't get why people who bottle condition their beers use oxygen absorbing caps - the yeast will eat up the oxygen just as well.

 

[HenryHill]

If you sanitize your bottles it doesn't make sense not to sanitize your caps.

But I still don't get why people who bottle condition their beers use oxygen absorbing caps - the yeast will eat up the oxygen just as well.

Heh. Good point.



If you sanitize everything that comes into contact with the beer post boil, and don't sanitize the caps, what is the point of doing all the other items, if you leave out the one of the two that are in contact the longest?

While true that there is a CO2 blanket above the fluid level of the beer, after the secondary carbonation fermentation, there isn't before that time. If the bottles are filled from a keg of beer that is already carbonated, it still only makes logical sense to give the caps at least a dip or spray of starsan, as you undoubtedly have that out and in use anyway.

Not sanitizing caps may not be considered lazy, if it is merely an aversion to something that is logical, it is more likely neurotic.

 

[zman]

+10 on this. It really is not any more effort to soak them for say a minute. I put mine in a colander and swish them around in my Star San solution. 60 seconds for piece of mind...priceless

 

[boodyrischous]

There was another thread that discussed O2 absorbing caps. The word from the manufacturer was that they only become activated when they get wet, and it takes a while to fully activate. So sanitizing them and then bottling will not harm their ability to absorb O2 (unless you sanitize too many and re-use them another time and then they will just function as normal caps). It seems like no trouble to sanitize them, and it doesn't diminish their effectiveness, so why not?

 

[mastin1]

Here is a new twist on sanitizing caps (no pun intended). I have always sanitized everything I could including caps. I have though, almost talked myself out of sanitizing the caps. Every time I soak the caps in sanitizer, brown spots that look like rust appear in my sanitizer. I have done a lot of experimenting to try to figure this out and my only conclusion is that when combining the caps, sanitizer and my city water a chemical (or rust) is drawn out of the water. This does not occur with sanitizing anything else.
Has anyone else experienced this?

 

[boodyrischous]

I have experienced that, but lately I noticed that it was only on caps that were extra. Caps we sanitized and then had to dry and use again developed the brown spots. Our solution was just to pop in a handful and replenish as you bottle, so they don't sit in the solution for as long, and we don't sanitize unneeded caps.

 

[JimGossett]

I've been brewing and bottling for 34 years. I've never sanitized my caps and I have never, ever, had even one bottle go bad.

 

[dark_avenger]

Can't say I'd even thought of sanitizing my caps...

Never had an issue but as a lot of people have said if you have it out already for the 60 seconds longer it takes why not....

 

[tezcatlipoca]

Hahaha, wow. I just found this thread, after years of brewing and bottling. Last night, I finally thought about it. Why am I not sanitizing caps when I do everything else? I guess at the beginning they were in a sealed bag, so it doesn't seem to matter. Guess I'll start taking the effort to sanitize caps before bottling. Just if you're curious, I've had just one infection recently and that had swing tops infected too, so I think that was from not thoroughly cleaning my beer gun. The 'recently' is anything after some decent experience was gained.