Removing labels from glass

Judith Murphy <jamurphy [at] unm__edu> writes

>A patron of the library has a collection of several thousand beer
>bottles of many kinds, of which he can only display about a
>thousand.  The rest are mostly duplicates and he would like to know
>if there is a reasonably easy, quick way to get the intact labels
>off the bottles, which can then be recycled.

As a homebrewer who cleaned the labels off of hundreds of bottles
before moving to kegs, I can recommend a product called B-Bright.
Ingredients are sodium percarbonate, sodium carbonate, silicic acid,
and sodium salt. Label says one tablespoon/gallon of warm water, and
that it cleans with active oxygen. It doesn't contain any chlorine
or bisulfite.

I used to soak my bottles in it overnight and most, including some
of the modern ones applied with synthetic adhesives slid right off.
For long term preservation, you'd probably want to wash and rinse
the labels after removal.

The product can be found in most homebrew catalogs, and is
distributed by Crosby & Baker in Westport, MA 02790. Cost about $2
for 8oz which cleans a lot of bottles. I get mine at
http://www.ejwren.com/ in Syracuse.

    **** Moderator's comments: As of today, the above URL was
    broken,

There's another product offered by Williams Brewing
<URL:http://www.williamsbrewing.com> called Brewer's Edge Cleanser.
Haven't tried it though. "Brewer's Edge Cleanser is a dry
concentrated chlorine-based cleanser that features scrubbing agents
that lift deposits off soiled surfaces. It is unsurpassed for
removing paper labels and deposits from beer bottles (just soak in a
working solution for 24 hours). Unlike dilute bleach solutions,
which quickly attack and corrode stainless steel, Brewer's Edge has
been formulated with a metal protecting buffer chemical. This allows
contact with stainless steel for as long as 48 hours without
producing corrosion. One 16 oz. package is enough to make 32 to 64
gallons of working solution, with a chlorine level of 250 or 125
PPM. The most effective cleansing (and label removing) agent we
sell." 1 pound package A25 $5.90

Peter D. Verheyen
Philobiblon: Book Arts, Different By Design
Hand Binding, Conservation, and Project Websites
Fax: 612-632-3718


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 14:48
                 Distributed: Thursday, March 22, 2001
                       Message Id: cdl-14-48-003
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