Is there a cheap way to sterilise equipment for winemaking? The price of the steriliser bought in wine shops seems quite high and was wondering if there are alternatives (like baby bottle steriliser for example)?
Iodophore is fairly cheap. You could use common household bleach (2 oz / 5 gallons, let it dry fully). Or you could just make sure that your equipment is just really clean, maybe wash it with sodium percarbonate (ozyclean classic or something along that line...just make sure there are no blue crystals) and then use sodium meta on it to give the sensitive bacteria that is left on it a zap. I just use the metasulfite myself.
Sterilizing is not necessary in wine making. Sanitizing is. The cheapest sanitizer is Na-Metabisulphate. A couple of oz's is less than 2 dollars and you can mix several gallons with it. Use it to rinse all your equipment but do not throw the rinse away. For instance rinse your bottles and pour it back into the storage bottle. It is good for several months and then a new batch can be made up. Keep all equipment clean, wash it immediately after use, never let it dry dirty, and you will not have any problem.
You can use ammonia but do not use the sudsing type. Rinse very well.
You can use a chorine based bleach but be sure to rinse very well and then let the equipment dry before use. Even the slightest hint of chorine can ruin your wine. Do not use chorine on any equipment with porous surfaces.
Ray
Rob:
Which sanitizing agent do you find expensive? And how much are you paying???
As Ray said, Sodium Metabisulfite is cheap and a gallon or two will last quite a while (even if you're sloppy with it like I am).
Steve
Most of you guys stress _way_ too much about sterility of your equipment. You're _never_ going to achieve sterility anyway, so shoot for cleanliness and you'll be OK.
The 2 most important things are: (1) Topping up containers so that there is no headspace over the wine. (2) Maintaining adequate free SO2 in the wine.
That's it!
Tom S
I couldn't agree more, if sterility were required the human race that drank wine because the local water was tainted would have died out thousands of years ago. I'm pretty sure a goatskin bag iwould have been pretty tough to sterilize.
We had a local hospital do a pretty bad job of cleaning operating room instruments before sterilizing them and people got sick; it was a fiasco.
Joe
I agree
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