Used bottles?

[H.S. Wine]

Greetings, I'm new here. Do most of you use upcycled commercial wine bottles for bottling your wine? If so, how consistent are the openings of the bottles? Do you need to have a bunch of different cork sizes? Thanks

 

[Khristyjeff]

Welcome to WMT.
I use a combination of upcycled bottles and new ones. The standard 750ml bottles have the same size openings, so you can use the same corks. I just bought some mini 375ml bottles and they will use the same corks. You just need to make sure the used bottles aren't designed for screw caps--they don't work with corks.

 

[crushday]

Good evening, @H.S. Wine and welcome to the forum.

I do use recycled commercial bottles and I don’t find any variance in the size of the necks and therefore don’t have a habit of using difference sized corks. I use #9 for both red and white wine - always.

Tell me more about your bottling. What are you using to insert the corks in the bottles?

 

[Sailor323]

I have hundreds of wine bottles, most of which I got from restaurants that saved them for me. While there is a bit of variation in neck size it's not enough to be concerned about. I do find that screw cap bottles have a somewhat larger neck size than corked bottles. I use a floor corker with #9 corks exclusively and have experienced no problems.

 

[Scooter68]

There is a variance in the opening sizes but if you are planning on using cork or man-made cork type closures you should be fine with either an number 8 or a number 9 cork. If you want to go wild and use the commercially available glass corks, then you will need to get bottles that are very consistent in opening sizes. Unless you are really into a big investment in wine making I would personally avoid the glass cork option, unless you just happen to run across a bunch of bottles in the recycling bin that have their original glass stoppers. Should that happen, consider yourself very fortunate, Glass stoppers are great BUT they don't tolerate much variance in opening size.

Bottom line - If you plan to keep / age your wine for more than a couple of years probably a number 9 cork is best, otherwise number 8s will work fine.
(Your results may vary as well as others may have different views on this - that's the way we hobby wine makers are.)

 

[Werner]

Hi. Screw cap bottles are more common where I stay...I use them for my wine - just use a bit of plumbers thread tape and tighten them nicely. No leakages yet but obviously it is for early consumption and...

 

[Werner]

... sorry...keep them up-right...

 

[DizzyIzzy]

Greetings, I'm new here. Do most of you use upcycled commercial wine bottles for bottling your wine? If so, how consistent are the openings of the bottles? Do you need to have a bunch of different cork sizes? Thanks

I have been re-using wine bottles since I started winemaking, and a #9 cork seems to work real well................................DizzyIzzy

 

[DizzyIzzy]

... sorry...keep them up-right...

The "Normocorks" do not need to be kept upright....................................DizzyIzzy

 

[H.S. Wine]

Thanks for all the great info ladies and gents. To answer crushday, I'm not currently bottling. I have a 4-tap setup at home for my cider and when I need to take it to-go, I either bring a PET growler or the entire corny keg. Seems like a sturdy corker and some #9 corks are in my future. Now I just need to figure out where to get some good grape juice...