sterilization of beer bottles

[bujjiammulu]

Personally, I firstly give them a go in the dishwasher to remove any muck and label remains, then they get soaked about 15 at a time in a fermentation bin filled with a strong hot water/ Sterilizer mix for about an hour then a good scrub with a bottle brush, then rinsed three or four times with cold water. You could invest in a bottle tree which holds about 80 bottles upside down to drain. Germs fall down so they should stay clean for quite a while.

[Halite]

My system is a lot less labour intensive than that. They get rinsed straight after being poured. Then when a few build up they get a wash in hot soapy water in the sink, rinse with cold water and then put away until bottling day. On bottling day they get a quick go in the dishwater and then there ready to go.

[Wolfy]

To 'sterilize' your beer bottles, you'd need to do much more than that; an autoclave, immersing them in water and boiling water for at least 15mins over a 3 day period, or putting them in the oven at a high
temperature. Lucky we do not need laboratory type conditions and we only need to 'sanitise' beer bottles before using them and that is much easier to do with hot water and chemicals.

Before anything can be sanitized it needs to be cleaned well, and for bottles using heat alone is not so easy, I also don't see the point of having to rinse sanitiser, which defeats the purpose since you may introduce bugs from your water.

I always make sure I rinse bottles immediately after use to remove any crud/yeast from the bottom.
Then they get cleaned, by soaking in hot water and sodium percarbonate and washing with a bottle-brush.
Then I disinfect them with an acidified bleach solution - this solution is rinsed in hot water if I plan to use them immediately, else they are left to air dry.
Then prior to use, I use a no rinse sanitizer (usually StarSan).

[mickhew]

I wash the bottles in hot sopay water, and rinse, shortly after the beer has been poured. the store until bottling time. I then spray Starsan into each bottle, from a garden sprayer (about 5 squirts) leave for a minute, then empty them, no rinse. Takes 20 minutes to do 40 bottles. Very easy, and the quickest method I have found.

[kay-jay]

my technique is a bit slack!

basically i rinse after pouring a beer leaving an inch of water in to loosen any deposits. leave until needed then pour out the water immerse in a sanitiser solution for 10 mins rinse by putting about a 3rd of a bottle of water in shaking, pouring out and repeat twice.

and tthats it!

KJ

[GrandMalt]

Hmmm...maybe I need to be a bit more thorough as well as I certainly don't clean in such detail!

My technique has been to rinse out immediately to get rid of any yeast and crud, then fill with tap water (tap water here in Egypt is incredibly heavily chlorinated) and scrub with a bottle brush. Rinse, then drain. They then get stored in the box they originally came in (I bought bottled beers in cardboard crates to generate bottles and boxes) until bottling day. When it's time to bottle I bake them in the oven for 1.5 hours at 180 degrees C. The bottles go into the oven the previous night when it's turned off, so they warm slowly, and then they are left in the oven overnight to cool down again.

If I'm keeping the bottles for a while I cap them with tin foil to stop any nasties getting inside.

[loftyambitions]

We're just starting out on this and looking for some help.

Using a fudge of what we've read on here this has been our process.

1) Soak bottles in thin bleach for a few days to remove labels and kill stuff initially
2) Rinse with water and scrub with bottle brush

We are now going to have to steralise them before we bottle on Saturday and are basically looking for tips to help make sure that the bottles are sterile. If it helps matters, we are doing 40 bottles at a time.

Thanks

LoftyAmbitions

[Wolfy]

We are now going to have to steralise them before we bottle on Saturday and are basically looking for tips to help make sure that the bottles are sterile. If it helps matters, we are doing 40 bottles at a time.

Best tip is to clean first, then sanitize with a no-rinse sanitizer like StarSan just prior to use.
(Sterilization is not required for beer bottles, but they do need to be sanitized).

There is nothing wrong with what you've outlined, however while I find acidified bleach useful for disinfecting, I prefer to use other products to clean.

[One over the eight]

Does anyone have any tips on rinsing.

I'm on a water meter, and rinsing 40 bottles can get a bit expensive.

Also does this Starsan come ready mixed ?

[boingy]

Does anyone have any tips on rinsing.

I'm on a water meter, and rinsing 40 bottles can get a bit expensive.

Have you ever worked out exactly how much the water costs?

We currently pay about £1.40 per cubic metre, which is 1000 litres. If I used 1 litre of water to rinse each bottle it would cost about 6 pence for 40 bottles...

[One over the eight]

Does anyone have any tips on rinsing.

I'm on a water meter, and rinsing 40 bottles can get a bit expensive.

Have you ever worked out exactly how much the water costs?

We currently pay about £1.40 per cubic metre, which is 1000 litres. If I used 1 litre of water to rinse each bottle it would cost about 6 pence for 40 bottles...

I've got a feeling we pay more than that, i remember our last bill meant me needing coronary care

Adn of course the family blamed my beer making, not the three showers a day the 15v yr old has, and the two hour daily shower the wife needs because she's a woman.

[Beard]

I've never gone to any particular trouble with my bottles. I rinse the bottles right after use, then put them in the dishwasher (neck down, on the bottom rack). The dishwasher then runs on its hottest setting, and the bottles come out sparkling clean and extremely hot to the touch. To be honest I've never bothered with anything more than this, and I've not had a problem yet. Not sure if there's a bit of luck involved with that!

[Bayerd]

Beard, if it works, it works...

I rinse my bottles as I empty them, then soak them in a thin bleach solution and rinse before dropping the brew into them. Never had a problem so far.....

[bungle666]

stick about 40L of water and the appropriate amount of bleach in the bath, chuck 40 bottles in and swill them round a bit, mix up another 20L bucket of bleach/water and use to fill the bottles with said solution keeping them in the bath. wait 20-30 mins then empty bottles and bath, rinse bottles 2-3 and bingo, clean and sterilised bottles with minimum effort. although next time im going to mix up a couple of campden tabs in a 20L bucket of water and do a final rinse and reuse with that to make sure all the bleach is gone!!

B..