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Most efficient way to clean bottles?

Stercomancy

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I just acquired 48 bottles for my first homebrew. What's the best way to clean them? I'll obviously StarSan them before I bottle. Is that enough?
 
No. Sanitation and cleaning are two different things. You can't sanitize a bottle that isn't clean, i.e. free of debris. When I pour a homebrewed beer from a bottle, I immediately rinse the bottle 2-3 times with a bit of water and drain it upside down. That prevents anything from growing in them. Those bottles are put in a location with other "trusted" bottles. Sometimes I get bottles returned to me that have cat hair all over the outside, have tons of grey hair gunk and build-up inside, etc. Those filthy ones get a soak in hot PBW for an hour followed by a thorough scrubbing with a brush until a look inside with a bright light in the background shows no debris. Some are too hard to clean and get thrown away. The cleaned ones get put into storage with my "trusted" bottles. A few days before bottling I take these bottles that are now known to be clean and I rinse them 3 times with hot water, inside and out, to remove and PBW residues, dust, or anything else that might have gotten in there despite my careful storage. I drain and dry them upside down. Then on bottling day, a few hours before bottling, I do a StarSan rinse on them.

If the bottles you just acquired are new and unused, then a quick rinse with a hot, soapy solution (preferably PBW or ABW) followed by thorough rinsing should be enough to clean them. Then use StarStan shortly  before bottling.

--GF
 
Understand that Star San is a sanitizing solution and not a cleaner. You clean first then sanitize with the Star San. That's what GigaFemto means when he says; Sanitation and cleaning are two different things. You can't sanitize a bottle that isn't clean
 
Step one: throw bottles in the trash
Step two: buy a kegerator :p

seriously, they make jet washing attachments that hook onto like a hose thread, I used to attach that to my washing machines hot water outlet. followed that with a quick brushing in pbw water, followed by a quick rinse with the jet rinser, followed by sanitizing via a bottle sanitizer thing. then drying on a bottle tree.

there's also the "fastwasher" may be good for rinsing/sanitizing, not sure i'd trust it for legitimate washing.
 
I received a 'fastwasher' as a gift and agree that it is only good for rinsing and sanitizing.  Not enough power to loosen dried on dirt, proteins, and other nasties inside.  Better off with a soak in an alkaline washer then rinse and sanitize using the fastwasher.
 
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