Best No Rinse Steriliser to use with Bottle Blast Rinser

[arturobandini]

As it says in the subject I am investing in a bottle tree and bottle rinser having become bored/tired of doing my festive brew marathon of bottling. I bottle in excess of 200 bottles every Christmas season and look to get them all fermented and bottled in a month. This involves a pretty hectic spate of bottle sterilising and I am moving on from Chlorine based sterilisers to no-rinse sterilisers for use with a bottle tree and bottle rinser.

I have read Star San is much favoured but I’ve also read many stories of how foamy it gets especially when used with a bottle rinse blaster atop a bottle tree. My bottles are very clean when it comes to the bottling (previous bad experiences has lead me to give them a thorough wash after each bottle is poured) and I intend to soak in hot water beforehand so no worries on that score. What does bother me is that I wouldn’t wish to wait for hours as foam settles in between each bottle rinse blast of Star San or indeed for the foam to slowly drip down the bottles as they rest on the bottle tree.

Can anybody advise on a product that would suit this purpose? I have seen Five Star Saniclean as well as IO Star which claim to be low foaming and may be more suitable for this purpose. I know Malt Miller used to stock peracetic acid but I am quite scared of using something that strong in the home, plus I don’t trust myself using it with a bottle rinser having no goggles, strong rubber gloves or hazmat suit.

All help gratefully received as always.

Cheers

[BeerEagle]

Embrace the Foam.

If there's any left when you're bottling, the beer will push it out of the bottle. Any chemical left will get munched up by the yeast.

And it's not THAT foamy.

[stevetk189]

I StarSan my bottles, the time saving (not to mention water saving not rinsng) is incredible. As said above it's really not all that foamy, although I can't speak from experience of using a bottle rinser gadget. And, yep the foam will just be pushed out as the bottle fills with any leftovers breaking down into a yeast nutrient which I suppose can only help the priming.

With regard to the last bit re priming I have noticed that since using StarSan the priming of my bottles has speeded up. I can crack open a three day bottled sampler and get a decent hiss of co2 by day 5 it's pretty close to suppable - although a couple of weeks is much better of course

[barney]

Starsan, the bottle rinser does generate foam in the supply reservoir, you should be able to rinse 40 bottles before it starts to overflow, I know I can. Ten minutes rest while you have a brew and you can start again with another batch.

\three quick blasts are enough, you dont need pumping for half an hour.

[Cully]

I use videne in mine, no foam and wont burn yer benches, best jumper etc.

[orlando]

I've adopted a method I learned about on here. Great credit to whoever it was. After I have poured a beer like you I rinse out thoroughly but I immediately spray starsan into it using a hand held indoor plant sprayer and place a plastic cap on it. When I come to bottle again I just spin the botle to get the star san in it coating the inner surfaces and then take the cap off and invert on the tree. I've recycled about 3 or 4 times to date with no problems at all. Got the plastic caps off ebay for very little money. It really is the most time saving measure I've employed. I would certainly concur with the other views, embrace the foam it is actually intentional so it sticks to surfaces and continues to be effective.

[barry44]

@orlando, how much star san do you put in?

I was spraying some in to my bottles tonight until my bottle pump broke and i was spraying 5 sprays into each bottle as a fine mist.

Do you reckon that is sufficient?

[LeeH]

I use star san with the bottle tree pump thing on top. It does not make masses of foam, and if it did i would still use it.

I bulk mix it with ionised water.

[orlando]

@orlando, how much star san do you put in?

I was spraying some in to my bottles tonight until my bottle pump broke and i was spraying 5 sprays into each bottle as a fine mist.

Do you reckon that is sufficient?

About the same as you describe. The important thing is to coat every surface. You can alter the width of the spray on most of these bottles so I have mine set so that it sprays fairly wide.

[barry44]

@orlando, just a quick one.

Do you not 'clean' the bottle other than a rinse?

[orlando]

No, at least for a few "cycles". If you look at the bottles with a bright light behind you can see what the internal walls of the bottle are like. If the yeast starts to stick to the side of the bottle it's time to have a proper clean. What's critical for me is what was the beer like that came out. As long as it is "perfect" then a rinse and spray with starsan should mean a similar result next time round. It is NOT possible to never clean a bottle again, just a delaying tactic.

[Kev888]

Yes starsan and (I believe) videne are just sanitisers; starsan will penetrate crud given time but its not really a cleaner. Rinsing with hot water 'immediately' after use (before anything dries on) is a good way to stop sugary organic crud building up but eventually you may have to soak it in a cleaner for a bit - I tend to do this every so often anyway, even if I can't see anything, just to keep ahead of it.

As has been mentioned, don't fear the foam from starsan. But if it gets annoying, saniclean is very similar (slightly different dilution rate) but less foaming - I use this to run through my pumps, which can generate a lot of foam.

Cheers
kev

[LeeH]

I use star san in my tree with no problems.

[Aleman]

I use a Bottle blast rinser (the sort you connect to a mains tap to clean bottles) connected to a reservoir and driven by a flojet pump, for sanitising bottles. . . .I've not used Starsan in it yet, but I do not think it will be suitable considering the effect I get when using videne (Videne is not a no foam sanitiser ).

You might get away with one of those concertina type sprayers though

[arturobandini]

D'oh...Starsan and bottle blast rinser on delivery to my house...might be a foamy winter brewing marathon.