What's The Solution For The Bottle Tree Rinser?

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Bottle Rinser For Wine MakingKraus folks:
Could you tell me what solution should go into the bottle tree rinser — could I use campden tables?
Rick F.
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Hello Rick,
The Bottle Tree Rinser/Sulphatizer is designed to be used with a sulfite solution. What this means is that you can use either Campden Tablets, Sodium Metabisulfite or Potassium Metabisulfite with water to make the sanitizing solution that goes into the bottle rinser’s reservoir.
The dosage is pretty straight-forward. You use either 16 Campden Tablets or one teaspoon of either Potassium or Sodium Metabisulfite per gallon of water. Go ahead an mix up a gallon of it in a gallon glass carboy or similar. You’ll need to refill the reservoir as the process goes on.
The bottle rinser works by spraying the solution up into the wine bottles. You put the wine bottle over the nozzle and pump it up or down to cause a spray into the bottle. You then put the wine bottle on one of the bottle tree pegs to drain.
This spray action does two things: it rinses the wine bottle out, getting rid of box dust and the like; it also causes the sulfites in the water solution to release as a gas within the wine bottle. This sulfite gas lingers within the wine bottle, sanitizing it over the course of the next few minutes.
Ideally, the sulfite gas from the sodium metabisulfite, etc. would still be in the wine bottle as it is being filled with wine. This would keep contamination down to an absolute minimum. With this in mind, one of my wine making tips is that the wine bottles be filled and corked within a half-hour or so of being sprayed.
Happy Wine Making,
Customer Service
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Ed Kraus is a 3rd generation home brewer/winemaker and has been an owner of E. C. Kraus since 1999. He has been helping individuals make better wine and beer for over 25 years.

0 thoughts on “What's The Solution For The Bottle Tree Rinser?”

  2. I use only a premixed StarSan Solution for years with no failure in this rinser. I also dip the corks in the rinser when bottling.

  4. You mention 1 teaspoon of of sulphite per gal of water. This does not seem high enough to sanitize bottles. The labels states "2 oz per Gallon." Did I miss somethng? A teaspoon weight is about 0.30 oz. Thanks Jim

  5. Gordon, ChrisA: We recommend using sulfites with the bottle rinser. We really do not have any information on the effectiveness of using other cleaner/sanitizer with this unit.

  6. The containers of sodium metabisulfite we offer list a dosage of 1 teaspoon per gallon. This is more than sufficient to sanitize wine bottles. If you prefer to us 2 teaspoons, there is absolutely nothing wrong with doing so.

  7. I first rinse the bottle with water to get dust etc. out. Then use a solution of 2 Tablespoons per gallon of
    metabisulfite and rinse again. Am I wrong to rinse? If I don’t rinse do I need to use 1/8 teaspoon of metabisulfite to carboy just before bottling?

  8. Wouldn’t the B-Brite cleaner that you sell be sufficient for cleaning and sanitizing the bottles as it states on the label

  9. Bob regardless, you should be adding 1/16 teaspoon per gallon of wine before bottling. As to the second rinsing, this should not be necessary.

  10. Walt, the B-Brite cleaner is fine for sanitizing the bottles, but they really need to be soaking in the solution to give enough contact time not just sprayed into the bottles.

  11. I used the Bottle tree rinser with sulfites like it said and one of the metal ball ruster so bad that I only got to use it twice