Cheers! Prost! Kanpai! All Your Chemical Container Needs Fulfilled

[holmburgers]

People are always asking about solutions for keeping chemicals and how to get the most life out of their processing solutions.

From cheap wine bags to marbles in your bottles to canned air to nitrogen to juice containers... the list goes on. The wisest and simplest advice is to move your solutions into progressively smaller bottles and always fill them to the top.

It occured to me that I have a steady stream of lab grade brown amber bottles always cycling through my home... BEER.

Now, it's not that steady of a stream, I don't want anybody to worry about me afterall...

But after a weekend like this last one, which saw many a good friend come over to imbibe and make merry, I probably put a life time supply of chem-bottles in the recycling bin.

The key is to get the labels off, and this is most easily accomplished by soaking them in hot soapy water and later scraping it with a butter knife, followed up by a scotch-brite pad.

There's a wide variety of brown bottles in your liquor store and in all different sizes. If you're adventurous, you can pick your beverages based on the bottles they come in; so it's a win-win for the adventurous and the utility-minded. Alternatively, for you tee-totallers out there, the same logic can be applied to your grocery store.

My question is: What's a recommended source for corks?

Also, what are your favorite "craft" beers?

Cheers!

 

[zsas]

I use mineral water 750ml bottles and seal em with a wine bottle vacuum sealer, $10 easy solution

 

[Photo Engineer]

Grolsch bottles are very nice! They come with caps that can be locked down.

Also, you cannot buy beer, you can only rent it.

PE

 

[holmburgers]

Ahh yeah, Grolsch bottles are very nice; good call.

And to think, I thought I only rented a home...

As for corks, I'm definitely thinking of rubber stoppers, not actual cork.

 

[jeffreyg]

Rubber stoppers and corks are available from Carolina Science. http://www.carolina.com

http:www.jeffreyglasser.com/

 

[anikin]

How about caps that are designed to work with those bottles? There is also a crimping tool listed on the same page:

http://www.amazon.com/Beer-Bottle-Caps-Absorbing-Homebrew/dp/B000Q64T8M/ref=pd_sim_misc_2

My only concern would be with beer consumers in your household. Developer has the right color after all...

 

[holmburgers]

Thanks Jeffrey!

Capping would be a questionable practice I fear, for the very reason you state about confusing it for the real deal, and also since you'd have to recap it every time or suffer a poor seal.

No one in my househould will mistake the two, but I can see the danger. I store all my chemicals in a big rubbermaid tub under my darkroom sink, and label them judiciously.

 

[Rick A]

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

Find one of these at your local wine and spirits shop. When i was younger, we bought one quart bottles of beer. Back then they came in reclosable brown bottles.

 

[holmburgers]

My issue with that is simply that I might have 10 bottles of solution at any given time, and I can't afford enough of those dedicated wine-stoppers to cap 'em all. Beer bottles and cheap bottle stoppers seem like a life-time solution for less than $15.

But, I do think it's an elegant solution.

 

[Rick A]

Last time I looked,Porters Camera still sells the one gallon bladder dispenser boxes for cheap. Might be worth contacting them.

 

[holmburgers]

http://www.homebrewit.com/beer-bottles.php

This place has a variety of cool bottles; including amber Grolsch bottles as well as amber plastic P.E.T. bottles. Will check out Porters too, thanks.

Does anyone have an empty bottle of beer and a pair of calipers handy? Having trouble finding the inside diameter via the interwebs...

 

[jeffreyg]

The corks and rubber stoppers come in an assortment of sizes. they are tapered so an exact measurement isn't necessary.

 

[jk0592]

I would favor plastic bottles over glass, the prospect of dropping and glass, wether full of liquid or not, in the darkroom is not pleasant.

 

[holmburgers]

Glass is better for the chemicals, though I'm sure plastic is certainly good enough for 99% of situations. I'm not that clumsy I guess... and they'll be no more than 36 oz. bottles.

 

[Buje]

Went to an evening concert at the art museum in Akron, OH. They had Bud Light in 16 oz amber PET bottles with screw caps. You don't have to drink the beer, just save the bottles. I'm still looking for a retail source of these fine storage bottles. hic!

 

[Valerie]

I second the Groelsch..... my darkroom looks like a brewery. And we had a great time getting them!

 

[ntenny]

Glass is better for the chemicals, though I'm sure plastic is certainly good enough for 99% of situations. I'm not that clumsy I guess... and they'll be no more than 36 oz. bottles.

You don't use developer by the jeroboam?

On a related note, I use Mason jars for some of my chemistry. For small-volume concentrates, the half-pint size works well---somewhere I picked up the habit of calling them "Georgia wineglasses". They're fairly cheap, they come with lids that seal, and they have wide mouths that are easy to get a syringe into.

-NT

 

[SkipA]

Your local homebrew wine and beer supply store will have a variety of tapered rubber stoppers. You'll be able to find a fit for any bottle you have. Be sure to buy the solid ones, and not the drilled ones.

The flip top Grolsch bottles really are nice. Also, I like the Fullers 1845 and ESB bottles. They are 500 ml, and very heavy glass. They aren't flip top though. You'll need the rubber stopper.

For half gallon sized brown glass of nice heavy weight, use brew pub growlers.

Many beers are sold in 22 ounce bottles. Those work great too.

WIne and champagne bottles come in 750ml and 1 liter size.

It's easy to get a variety of different sized brown bottles at your local liquor or grocery store.

 

[Ronald Moravec]

Golsch Beer comes in a nice dark bottle with reusable well sealed top.

I probably have the spelling off as I have not bought any in a while. It is very good european beer. I was prejudiced against beer for most of my life, then I found it was not beer I did not like, it was American beer I did not like. Still we don`t drink much, buying a six pack or two for the holiday guests.

They make a nice drink that comes in a square bottle imported from Scotland. Now that is good stuff.

Or just call up Specialty Bottle Co. and they will send you whatever size and quantity you want. Get the caps with cone seals inside and clean the bottle lip before sealing up. Buy twice the caps as bottles as that are what gets lost and breaks. They will send sample bottles and caps. Best $200 I ever spent for my darkroom. Second was a water filter and air filter.

 

[holmburgers]

I noticed a good number of rubber stoppers at my local hardware store. Any reason to believe that these wouldn't be appropriate for various chemicals? I bet they'd be great, but figured I'd ask.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Some types of rubber stoppers are contaminated by or swell in the presence of some organic chemicals and some even swell or deform in the presence of alkali.

PE

 

[Whiteymorange]

At the liquor stores around here (New England) many craft breweries are now selling "growlers" of ale- 1/2 gallon brown glass bottles with seriously good beer inside! After living in England a while as a young man I found getting used to American "fizzy" beer on my return a chore- became a wino instead. The ales I found sold in growlers are much more like beer pulled from the barrel- a good head and lots of taste, but fewer burps per pint. On telling papagene at the last beach party that there was a $1.50 deposit on the bottle, he said that he would gladly pay that for such a good darkroom container! I don't return many.

New favorite: Dirty Penny Ale, from the Burnside Brewing Company of East Hartford, CT. They say they were the first brewery in America- many time sold and out of business for decades. Like all such claims, this should be taken with a ... well, a glass of ale.

 

[Nicholas Lindan]

Plastic vodka jugs. Thick PET plastic. No need to clean them before first use. Non-slip grip. The pour spout is calibrated to 10ml/second - close enough for HCA and the like.

 

[holmburgers]

Mmm.. growlers :sidways: Yeah, beer containers are so cheap compared to dedicated "darkroom" or chemical containers. We have a local brewery here that does growlers, and I've yet to think I had a night (and the next morning...) to devoted to 1/2 a gallon of beer; especially good beer!

Had no idea about the flow rate of liquor containers, that's very interesting.

Cheers!

 

[Mustafa Umut Sarac]

Chris ,

Collect money and visit Belgium. Best beer is there. They say Duval - devil - is the best beer you can buy and it is famous in USA and will no problem to buy it from a US distributor.