using a dish washer to clean & sterilise bottles

I rinse the freshly drunk bottles with hot water, and store upside down in dish washer rack. When I'm ready to bottle, I run them through the dishwasher (no soap/detergent) with the heated drying turned on. The heat from drying zaps most nasties. I have been doing this for 5+ years with no problems. Since I started with mini kegs (thanks Dan L.) I only need a dozen or so bottles per batch so I soak the bottles in bleach water overnight and rinse with bottle washer until I can no longer smell the bleach. YMMV.

Les

On Mon, 16 May 2005 14:06:55 +0930, "Richard" said in alt.beer.home-brewing:

Sanitize, possibly. (70 degrees C? Probably good enough to kill most wild yeast.) Sterilize? No, for that you'd need about 315 C, which would probably crack the bottles. (I'm assuming you mean sterilized of all bacteria that could affect human beings. Sterilized of all life? Probably in the neighborhood of 1100 C. Remember, there's life at the 300 C sea vents.)

And a dishwasher most likely won't get water up into all the bottles, or into all of a bottle it gets some water into.

Clean and sanitize the bottles in a batch - soak them in cleaner (or rinse each one right after emptying it), then in sanitizer, then rinse one at a time. 25 bottles should take about 10 minutes to rinse, less if you have a jet washer. If you do, picking the bottles up and setting them down takes most of the time. The rinse is about 1 second.

I have just recently bought bottles and found that sanitizing them took forever!

Originally I was using a bleach so rinsing them out involved filling with cold water and giving a good shake then repeating. This I found seemed to be enough to get rid of the bleach smell.

I have since bought a sanitizing powder from my brew shop but have yet to use this. Would this need less of a rinse?

Also, I do have a couple of 'grolch' style bottles. Is it okay to sanitize these and then use them at a later date? I presume that they would stay sanitized since nothing extra can get into the bottle...

Thanks, Simon

The sanitizing powders sold for home brewing are much easier to rinse (some advertise "no rinse") than bleach.

If you haven't gotten one of the faucet mounted jet washers, definitely get that. It is a brass U shaped tube that has a garden hose thread. It may require an adapter from the hardware store to mount on a kitchen faucet. Mine cost ~$5. It saves lots of time. Rinsing is just a matter of pressing the upside down bottle onto the rinse tube and water shoots into the bottle and drains right out.

The adapter stays mounted to the faucet and the regular aerator screws into it when I'm not using the jet washer. That little adapter has proven handy for filling the aquarium, and my bottle washing bucket with a length of garden hose.

Takes a second or two to rinse a bottle. Especially good for rinsing the yeast out of just poured bottles of home brew.

I don't know that I'd trust a grolch style bottle to remain clean. In theory it should work. There's a good chance of a few droplets of water being left behind (or condensing in the bottle) and if there's any bacteria or mold, that and some traces of old yeast may be all they need. Water may stay between the cap and gasket and allow mold to flourish there as well.

If the bottle was perfectly dry, I don't see why it wouldn't work. (the caps look like they would seal with pressure or vacuum)

Richard wrote: > Would such a dish washing cycle be enough to sterilise the bottles? If this

It depends on YOUR dishwasher. If it's got a sanitize cycle, it's probably OK. If not, I wouldn't trust it. I've seen studies where a palte is innoculated from a dishwasher "sanitized" bottle and there was definitely cuture growth indicationg that the bottle had not been sanitized. It depends on how much risk you want to take to save a minimal amount of effort.

---------->Denny

Forget the dishwasher, notice it's called a dishwasher! Not a dishwasher and home brew bottle sanitizer. Forget "sterilize" think "sanitize". Les says " rinse the freshly drunk bottles..." this is the key to success". I use the dishwasher, I rinse the bottlles immediately after use, and set aside; before refilling I soak 2 min or more in iodophor, give a quick rinse (just 'cause), then stick the bottles upside down on the dishwasher spikes to dry. I have found two bad bottles in the last two years, because I've failed to follow my own advice. Some where between "rinse after use" and "refilling",l eyeball the bottles and make sure there is no debris in the bottom!!!

Good luck and worry not,

Avery

Brew on brother! SW US desert

The problem with relying on a dishwasher to clean/sanitize your bottles is two-fold:

1. The design of beer bottles, with the narrow neck flaring out into the main body, prevent a good stream of water from making it to all parts of the bottle. Thus, many portions of the bottle receive no benefit and remain uncleaned by the hot water.
2. The heated drying cycle of the dishwasher does not provide near enough heat to properly sanitize the bottles either.

Using a 5 gallon bucket of Iodophor, I can sanitize 2 cases of 12 oz bottles in less than an hour. This includes time for them to drip dry. That's about how long a dishwasher cycle, with a heated dry, takes, and I KNOW that every portion of the bottle was coated with a proper sanitizer.

I have a newer dishwasher with a sanitize cycle, and the salesman wondered why I was similing at the "sanitize the baby bottles" line he was feeding us. I've run all my bottles through it for the last 3 years and have not had a single problem. Even though I take the lazy way, I use Cascade or whatever in the 1st cup, and use 1-Step or similar in the 2nd stage. I've even put the brew-ware tools in there, and have removed the top rack for buckets, etc.

do not use regular bleach in a dishwasher it dissolves the rubber components of the system somehow coca cola and pepsi do the same thing. here is a helpful hint. if your windshield wipers are old and squeak, then pour a used cola on the windshield in a good rain. good rain duz not mean drizzle. it will dissolve the rubber AND people drink this stuff?

the only addituive to use in a dishwasher is washing soda. never more than 30 percent.

a superior clean when you need the bottles to be clean

wow if you were in canada, you could run as a politician. say little, speak lots. reminds me of the guy who hooked up his dishwasher to the cold water pipe and was pissed off it took 15 hours for the sani cycle to work.

and life does not beg> > Would such a dish washing cycle be enough to sterilise the bottles? > If this

hint number 627 your transfer hose lay it on the top rack of your dishwasher stick a small funnel into it, and point it up, best cleaning ya got works? damn right it works

cascade? i use electrosol

does it matter well if i tell you to run naked through the woods would ya do it?

if yes provide the GPS position and time and i will applaud you going by, while the cops dogs are chasing you.

i like you clean the bottle immediate, since the brewers yeast sets like concrete. bottom rack is best for cleaning then ya wash it again before you use it again. simplicity. you can pull up your pants anytime. ignore the dry cycle a waste of time

my personal routine is to store the bottles in the oven. until my batch is ready to go.