I use Star San to sanitize my bottles. I’ve noticed a film on the glass now that I’ve reused the bottles a number of times. Just out of curiosity, I used a bottle brush to see if I could remove the film. I was able to get most of it off. Do I need to go through all my bottles and remove the film, or just not worry about it? I can’t detect have any off flavors in the beer.
Art
Film on the inside?
How do you clean them? I would think that the film comes from the cleaning process more than the starsan. A couple of days before bottling, I like to soak my bottles in OxyClean or PBW, making sure they’re visibly clean before soaking. A good rinse on bottling day and there should be no film. SS is the last product to touch the bottles before the beer.
The film is on the inside. Typically, all I do to clean my bottles is to rinse the bottle very well after I pour the beer, make sure there is no sediment, and then turn the bottle upside down to store. When I bottle again, I rinse the bottles again, and then give each bottle a shot of Star San with one of those spring loaded bottle squirters (forget the name of the apparatus), which coats the bottle thoroughly.
Oxyclean soak and scrub, rinse soak, running rinse, starsan submersion, onto bottling tree. This is what I do. No film
+1 - same
is the film on the inside of the bottle while there is still beer in it? like a small ring near the top/neck of the bottles?
i’ve never had any films on my bottles when cleaning them w/ StarSan… but it sounds like you get the film once you’ve bottled the beer. correct?
Had the same film using oxy clean…did lots of searching including this forum…apparently in some cases the film is a mineral deposit (oxy + water chemistry). The solution was to let the bottles sit in a solution of CLR (mineral deposit remover) and BAM! the film was gone. I had about 6 cases of bottles with this stupid film on and it took me full night but all are clean now. Just be sure to rinse in fresh water to get the CLR off the bottle (might give the DIPA a funny flavor ;) ).
Now I’m using PBW and not seeing the film either…not sure exactly why OC gave me film but am happy with the new path.
PBW has an additional ingredient that aides in rinsing. Supposedly mixing oxyclean and powdered TSP substitute is a poor mans PBW. If using hot water to rinse, followed by a starsan dunk, the film should not form.
Jon from Five Star also advised to always rinse with water that is the same temp or warmer than the PBW mix to avoid deposits.
+2 Exactly.
I’ve never seen any film. Do you have a bottle rinser? Essential piece of equipment.