Dark spots in the bottom of my bottles?

[Ryan]

Ok. So I was planning on bottling a blonde ale this weekend but hit a snag. Yesterday I start washing bottles out like I always do, overnight soak in oxiclean. This morning I go to start rinsing out bottles and did something I don't normally do, I looked in the bottom of the bottle. This is where I saw some dark spots. Now I have never really looked before, so I don't know if these spots have always been there or if this is new. So I got out a bottle brush and started to scrub out the bottles. This didn't really help as about 70% of my bottles still had dark spots in the bottom of the bottles.

Should I do a bleach bath now, or should I just sanitize with star san and call it a day?

 

[hamiltont]

Try using a bottle brush & oxi in a test bottle. When I get bottles that have grunge in the bottom I rinse with very hot water. Soak with oxi or a little dry automatic dishwasher soap and then spin the brush around on the bottom of the bottle, both directions. I put a curve in the brush wire so it spins around easier. Then rinse and take a look. If it's clean then I give it a shot of Star-San and let that sit for a while. I always Star-San my bottles again before using them. I use a tank sprayer set on a fan spray to apply the Star-San starting outside the bottle then slowly inserting the nozzle into the bottle. Sanitizes the lip and runs down the inside of the bottle.

 

[QueenCityALER]

It could be a bit of tenacious mold hanging around. I had the same problem with a very few of my bottles, and hit it with a bleach/water solution and scrubbed and it came up. Now after you finish a bottle you need to clean it immediately, so the yeast and leftover fluids don't have time to cake on and mold. I spray out my bottles immediately after consumption and spray a bleach/water solution in them for storage. Buy or save a spray bottle and put a cap full of bleach in it and top up with water, and give each cleaned bottle 3-4 sprays with this solution, and put up for storage. This little bit of bleach sanitizer does wonders to keep mold and other baddies from growing in your bottles during storage, waiting to be filled with homebrew! Have fun and good luck!!

 

[Yooper]

I've always held the bottles up to the light and looked in them before considering them clean. I actually had enough bottles, though, that I could just recycle any that were too icky to clean easily.

It sounds like mold. A bleach/water soak will take care of that. Just rinse very, very, very well. As others have said, if you clean the bottle after emptying it by rinsing well with hot water and draining upside down, then you don't have to work so hard on bottling day.

 

[Tonedef131]

Clip the loop on the end of a bottle brush off and hook it up to a drill.

 

[weirdboy]

Yeah it's almost definitely mold. I always have some like that every time I clean bottles because even though I'm very anal retentive about rinsing out my bottles after I drink the contents, my wife and friends are not. And sometimes my friends will give me a case of bottles that have been through the ringer, so to speak.

My steps to cleaning bottles are:

1. Soak inside & out in hot water + oxiclean for a couple of hours
2. Remove labels, scrub off remaining bits of adhesive/paper
3. Empty 3/4 of the solution inside, cover with hand, and shake vigorously
4. Pour out contents
5. Hold against a light and look into the bottle to check for any remaining junk.

If the soak doesn't do the trick (it usually does), I use a jet washer to blast hot water in there for a bit. If the jet washer doesn't work, I use a bottle brush. I've only ever had to use the bottle brush twice. I suppose if that didn't work I would just throw the damn bottle away.

 

[Magefire]

I cleaned a bunch of gifted bottles yesterday. I soaked them for a day or so. Scrubbed with the brush. Then brought out the secret weapon, my powerwasher 1450psi usually removes any tough gunk from the inside. Just be really careful.