Bottle washing hacks

[Paul7189]

I hated it so much I just can now. Cans are about £0.20 each (440ml) and I dunk them in starsan, empty, fill and seal. They come in boxes of 24 and can be stacked so don’t take up as much room. They stay fresh for longer and most importantly…. they look cool

 

[sifty]

I actually don't mind bottles. Here's my routine:

- rinse immediately after use, collect a batch
- soak bottles in sink of hot water/bottle wash
- wash bottles with bottle brush in battery drill
- rinse with hot water, then again with avvinator
- leave to drain in fast racks in the sun
- place bit of foil over top, stack in boxes

Bottling:

- remove foil and rinse with starsan in avvinator
- stack on bottle tree next to bottling bucket
- fill and cap

 

[RoomWithABrew]

@sifty

Plenty of bottles here if you ever get up this far!

 

[The Furnace Green Brewer]

Where did you get those bottle trays?
They are awesome!!!!!!!

I think I got one from Brew2bottle, I use the 5L party kegs with a hand pump or CO2 tap, which work well for me I will only bottle pale ales, not much room, but I am woking on that.

Cheers

 

[Braufather]

I hated it so much I just can now. Cans are about £0.20 each (440ml) and I dunk them in starsan, empty, fill and seal. They come in boxes of 24 and can be stacked so don’t take up as much room. They stay fresh for longer and most importantly…. they look cool

What canning Equipment do you have?

 

[Paul7189]

What canning Equipment do you have?

I went for this in the end. Didn’t require any adjustments and worked out the box.

https://www.thehomebrewery.co.uk/br...MIpJGg2rjo9gIVRuztCh1BHAtxEAQYASABEgLkCvD_BwE

 

[Braufather]

I went for this in the end. Didn’t require any adjustments and worked out the box.

https://www.thehomebrewery.co.uk/br...MIpJGg2rjo9gIVRuztCh1BHAtxEAQYASABEgLkCvD_BwE

Not bad price, what do you use to fill them, a bottle gun?

 

[Tess Tickle's Brewery]

So, it can’t just be me that thinks the bottle washing/sterilising part of brewing is tedious…Theres just so much faffing about and never enough space for bottles!
Currently wash the bottles in Chemsan Foaming No rinse sanatisecaps rocking about on top of the bottles! r and then rinse out with water. A bit belt a braces I know but a bit anal about it .
A bottle tree will speed things up but just wondering how other members go about it.
cheers

My method is to put them in the dishwasher on a sanitise program (65C) with a milton tablet for extra assurance. Then I bottle while they're still hot with some carbonation drops. The fermentation starts before I've even finished capping, you can see the caps rocking about on top!

 

[Paul7189]

Not bad price, what do you use to fill them, a bottle gun?

It’s from Europe so you have to add VAT onto the price so it’s a bit more than that. I just use a bottle gun and it works perfectly. Because cans are so light and there’s not a lot of material they cool down quickly when filling. Purge each can for 5-6 seconds then set your beer around 0°C and you get a very small amount of foam. Then you cap the can on the foam and it pushes any remaining oxygen out to help preserve the beer.

 

[Braufather]

Not sure when I’ll step up but really like the idea of canning.

 

[damienair]

Like a lot here I don’t mind bottling day. As I drink a beer, I rinse out the bottle with water and use a bottle brush to give them a clean, rinse and turn upside down to drain. I them store them out in my garage on a shelf. On bottling day I take in 40-42 bottles and give them a quick blast of Chemsan from a bottle washer and drain on a bottle tree. I then set everything else up, batch prime the beer etc. The bottles are then ready to go. It really only takes 10-15 minutes. I like having bottles.

 

[Tanglefoot]

Seems I'm in a minority using VPW !
I mix up a batch in one FV , with another of clean water to rinse. Put bottles through about half dozen at a time letting them soak for a few minutes before rinsing.
Then sit them on a bottle tree till ready to fill.
Now a committed kegger so only have a few bottles to fill each batch but good to have a few for swaps and giveaways to friends.
There is a certain satisfaction in popping a cap but trumped by ease and convenience of packaging and serving from a keg

 

[pilgrimhudd]

Rinse after drinking from them, dry and store. On bottling day in batches they get dunked in a big bucket of Fred n' flo (milton) then rinsed, dried on bottling tree, and sprayed with starsan before bottling.

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

Move to corny kegs, made my life so much easier - love it - washing once every 35 pints is simple compared to bottling.

^^^ THIS

 

[Little Rock Brewing]

I bottle and TBH really enjoy it. Also at the last count, if I moved to kegs I'd need 18 of them as that's the amount of different brews I've got in storage!

 

[AnimatedGIF]

I bottle and TBH really enjoy it. Also at the last count, if I moved to kegs I'd need 18 of them as that's the amount of different brews I've got in storage!

That's a lot of beer in storage!

 

[Little Rock Brewing]

Yeah about 500 bottles! Need to have a party!

 

[Harbey]

Yeah about 500 bottles! Need to have a party!

Let's have a forum meet round yours!

 

[Little Rock Brewing]

Let's have a forum meet round yours!

A bit of a journey but why not!

 

[Harbey]

As others have mentioned, kegging really is a game changer but does mean quite an investment. I certainly lost my brewing mojo somewhat due to the drawn out bottling day and my brother has pretty much thrown the towel in for the same reason. The great thing about kegging is it not only means transferring from FV to serving vessel takes a fraction of time but the beer is better or more consistent as you can really control the amount of carbonation. But that's not the focus of this thread.

Back to bottling, if you're doing lots of scrubbing, dishwashering, chemicaling or other long process, why not try a couple of bottles where you just give a good rinse after pouring the previous brew(use hit water if you want to be really careful) and then sanitise just before bottling? Worse that can happen is you get something over carbed (doubt you'll get a bottle bomb). I've never had an issue and it does save ages.