Homebrewers Association | AHA Forum
General Category => Kegging and Bottling => Topic started by: twodogbrew69 on October 12, 2010, 01:09:03 PM
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I have a bunch of bottles and the labels are causing me a lot of trouble. I am looking for any and all suggestions! Thanks! ;D
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I soak mine overnight in PBW or Oxyclean and they usually fall right off when I pick them up.
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Ammonia solution also works well.
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Oxiclean soak has always worked for me. And I never do it overnight, either. The dishtub I use will fit about six bottles. I submerge/fill each bottle one at a time and by the time I've submerged/filled the sixth bottle, the label is about ready to come off of the first bottle. Just keep rolling from then on.
Note that there are a few brands (Weyerbacher, Blue Mountain, etc.) that require a small thermonuclear device to get the labels off - even after an overnight soak. For those, I've found that one of those "single edge razor window sticker scrapers" will take the label off and then the bottle goes back into the rotation to soak off the glue.
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Soak for a couple of hours in plain old hot water. Then I use the handle end of a spoon to scrape off any stubborn ones. Takes a bit of work but not too bad. You will occasionally encounter labels that are a royal pain in the butt and require copious amounts of labor to scrape them off. For these, learn what they are and just throw them away and don't try to deal with them. But the vast majority of labels come off very easy with a two hour soak in hot water.
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You will occasionally encounter labels that are a royal pain in the butt
I know what you mean...I tried for hours and hours to get a label off until I realized it was painted on :D
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I use the oxyclean in hot water overnight procedure. If this does not work, those bottles are returned for the deposit, as they are not worth the trouble.
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I agree with the hot water approach. Many labels have a temperature-sensitive adhesive.
Use a rectangular cooler and fill it up 3/4 of the way with hot water from the tap. Take a long racking cane or a long wooden spoon and stick the handle portion into the bottle and submerge the entire bottle upright. Fills it right up without burning your hands up. Also makes removing the bottles easier. Don't dump the hot water--you may need it to reheat the bottles to help complete the label removal process and/or do the bottle cleaning process.
For what it is worth, I've had variable results with Sam Adams bottles--some labels slide right off and others are better off being recycled due to the excessive effort required. I've had good results with Sierra Nevada bottles--their labels slide right off. YMMV.
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Hot water, maybe with a touch of dish soap.
The back of a table knife will help with stubborn labels, but there does come a point at which it's just not worth it.
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I use copper scrubbies to quickly remove any stubborn labels that have soaked but will not slide off. Previously used a knife until the realization struck me as to the danger involved. :-\
This has always been an issue/sore point with me. I've found that European beers have some of the hardest labels to remove. One would think it would improve recycling if labels were easy to remove.
And the "foiled" bottle necks. They almost always have to be laboriously scraped. When I was in "bottle" collecting mode foil on the bottle was an immediate disqualification for any beer purchase. >:(
I like a bottle that when the condensation forms you can slide the label around with your finger. ::)
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I used a hot soak for several hours to days in Straight-A solution (depending on when I got back to them). Most labels fell off in the bucket. I just had to wipe off the adhesive.
Leinenkugel bottles where the worst for me. Any bottles with metallic(like) parts in the label design always seemed to be a pain. Sometimes scraping the label a little before the soak helped on these.
Paul
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there does come a point at which it's just not worth it.
Ditto. The metal labels are the worst. In the recycle bin they go.
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For a while when I started brewing, I made my commercial beer purchases based on ease of label removal. If a label won't come off after an overnight soak in PBW, I just toss the bottle in the recycling bin.
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I use the oxyclean in hot water overnight procedure. If this does not work, those bottles are returned for the deposit, as they are not worth the trouble.
I do the same with either pbw or oxyclean, if they don't come off they go into the recycle bin.
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I use the oxyclean in hot water overnight procedure. If this does not work, those bottles are returned for the deposit, as they are not worth the trouble.
I do the same with either pbw or oxyclean, if they don't come off they go into the recycle bin.
At $0.10 a bottle, you don't expend much extra time or energy if the label does not come off.
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I usually soak the bottles in warm water containing caustic soda. Liquid Plumber add to warm water works very well. Commercial
Breweries use a caustic solution to remove labels. Just wear dish washing gloves as caustic ( sodium or potassium hydroxide) will cause skin irritation or burns in high concentration. just rinse well after soaking overnight and sanitize and you are done.
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I usually soak the bottles in warm water containing caustic soda. Liquid Plumber add to warm water works very well. Commercial
Breweries use a caustic solution to remove labels. Just wear dish washing gloves as caustic ( sodium or potassium hydroxide) will cause skin irritation or burns in high concentration. just rinse well after soaking overnight and sanitize and you are done.
I have plenty of sodium hydroxide. Does it eat the labels or just the adhesive?
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Hot PBW in a cooler.. soak an hour, lables fall off... most of them.
The ones that do not, I take the plastic square that came with my pizza stone for cleaning it and scrap the label off.
My alternate method is to soak as above and take a green scrubbie to the label. (some foil labels require this).
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I use hot water and a big scoop of oxyclean, and most labels are off in an hour.
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I use the hot water coming out of my immersion chiller for soaking bottles. If the labels don't come off easily after a soak, they go in the recycle bin. By the way, don't use water at those temps for cleaning a carboy...
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I'm cheap so I soak the bottles in warm, slightly soapy water using dish detergent. After an hour I take a butter knife or a paint scraper and take the labels off. Then the bottles go back in the solution for 10 minutes or so. I get the remaining labels off with a green kitchen scrubby.
So all you need is the detergent, a bucket, a paint scraper, a green scrubby and some time.
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I usually use PBW and hot water. It will take off most labels after a soak. If they still don't come off then a scrub pad is in order.
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Hot water & B-Brite does it for me. My local microbrewer uses an amount & type of adhesive that's obviously designed to withstand a nuclear attack (I've tried everything). I've given up trying on these, and turn them is for deposit.
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Ammonia & hot water
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I have been looking at all the suggestions and I have found that putting my bottles in the sink with some dawn dish washing liquid and as hot a water as I can stand and a putty knife works just fine. Fill them up with the hot soapy water and let them sit for about 5 minuets than just peal with a 4" putty knife. Use a scrubby to clean off the rest of the glue and rinse with hot water. It takes me about 15 minuets to clean a case of bottles and I have yet to find a label that won't come off easy. And being as we are on the subject of bottle cleaning try sanitizing in the oven rather than bleach or Starsan. Once they are clean just get them wet and stack them in the oven, mine will hold about 4 cases. Set the oven on 275 and let them set for about an hour and a half. Let cool and bingo sanitized bottles ready for bottling and I have never had a bottle crack or brake doing this. ;D
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I use hot water and a big scoop of oxyclean, and most labels are off in an hour.
This is what I do. If the labels don't come off after an overnight soak, they get returned for deposit or recycled if not from in state.
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goo be gone or some such petroleum based solvent for those that don't come off with some form of water. This is more of a glue remover than a paper remover,
or just recycle them
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Ammonia & hot water
+1
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I keg....... ;D
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I keg....... ;D
Ok, I'd like a 6-pack ;D
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I keg....... ;D
I gift beer to friends and enter competitions, and even though most of it goes into kegs, you still have to use some bottles.
I just bottled 5 gallons. It takes about 1:45 these days, and I can get into a little grove doing it. I used to hate it, but now have a zen thing going when I bottle. Similar to shoveling snow these days.
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I keg....... ;D
Ok, I'd like a 6-pack ;D
Take a number..... I have trouble keeping up. Brewing 10 more gallons tomorrow....
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Not into Kegs yet a six pack is just to hard to carry that way. ::)