Q
I have a Portuguese floor corker that has started to break off small pieces of cork that will end up in my bottled wine. This is an older model of the corker. I am wondering if there is a way to adjust the corker to stop the shredding of the cork, or am I doing something wrong in prepping the corks. I normally spray the corks with either vodka or sulfite solution to make sure they are sanitized.
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Dale Ellis
Las Cruces, New Mexico
A
I hope I’m assuming correctly, but I’m imagining that you’ve got the smaller, lighter-weight red metal corker with adjustable spring-loaded bottle base and plastic jaws, sometimes called a “Portuguese” corker. These are decent corkers for a home winemaker with not much volume to bottle, but they can have their issues. Before I get into that, let’s talk about your corks.
Possible issues you may be having with the corks:
Possible issue with the corker:
In general, I’m not a huge fan of the “Portuguese floor corker” because the jaws are plastic and the action is just single-lever. It doesn’t allow for much wiggle room when dealing with uneven or different-sized cork and bottle configurations. A step up is a corker with brass jaws, (sometimes called an “Italian” corker, sounds like an excuse for an EU soccer match!), which I find to be a little bit more forgiving and longer-lasting than a model with plastic jaws. The brass jaws are extremely sturdy and do a great job of compressing the corks. When you’re bottling a lot of wine, having an easy-to-use corker can really save time and make the job so much easier. I hope either a jaw adjustment or jaw replacement helps! When in doubt, please do contact your friendly neighborhood winemaking supply store or the shop from which you purchased your corker.
Q
My question regards micro-oxidation (and unfortunately, too much oxidation) in my small 8–10-gallon (30–38-L) barrels. I like the concentration of flavors that I get by aging my Bordeaux-style blends in my small barrels. I usually age in the barrels for 18–24 months. But lately, I’ve been getting too much of a nail polish smell, which I guess is acetaldehyde. Do you have any suggestions? I find that if I don’t age in barrels, my reds come out weak, without much body. I can’t use large barrels because of space considerations and weight. I try to top off regularly but I am sometimes lax. The main advantage of storing in the barrel for so long seems to be the concentration of flavors. My wines that have been evaporating and then topped off, seem to be “thicker,” which I like. Is there a way to get this effect, but with a shorter time in the barrel?
Lee
Via Live Chat
A
Unfortunately, with a small barrel like that, you’re going to have a high ratio of oxygen:wine. If you think about a traditional-sized barrel, it’s about 59 gallons (225 L); there’s a lot of wine in there. Especially if your barrel is much smaller, the surface area-to-wine ratio is much bigger for your mini-barrel than for a traditional barrel. Your 8–10 gallons (30–38 L) are therefore going to see a lot more wood contact, and a lot more oxygen transfer, than would 59 gallons (225 L) in a traditional, bigger barrel. This same principle is why some winemakers like to use bigger puncheons (like 132 gallons/500 L) so their wine gets proportionately less wood and oxygen exposure. This is popular in Rhône varieties like Grenache, Syrah, and Mourvèdre.
I suggest you not use your barrel for as long as you’re talking about — you’re getting way too much oxygen there and as a result, like you say, too much acetaldehyde. First off, be sure you’ve got at least 25–30 ppm free SO2 in your wine to help keep the aldehydes down. But 18–24 months in a barrel that small is way too long. Try aging your wine in the barrel (and make sure the barrel is clean, wood can be a source of spoilage organisms if not clean) for maybe 9 to 12 months instead, and then move to a keg or carboy with some oak chips or beans to keep the aging going to a point you like.
If the wine is so big and tannic you feel like you need to have it aging for that long, maybe try doing some fining trials (egg whites are cheap and easy to use) to knock down the tannins so you can get good mouthfeel and tannin resolution without having to have the wine so oxidatively stored for so long. You may find you can bottle earlier, which will really help protect your wine better in the long run, and will allow it to age more gracefully too. To get some concentration up front why not try a saignée at harvest? Bleed off 1⁄4 of your juice right after you crush, to concentrate the skins in the must. Take the juice and then make a rosé!
Q
I have a kit viognier that has finished fermenting but has a funky smell I can’t identify. (I wish we had a computer-based smell-o-vision!) It’s not vinegar, but it’s persistent. Closest description I have is the smell of grapes when they are green and still on the vine. The taste is fine, and the weird nose goes away in the glass, but I’m hesitant to bottle it. Any ideas? It’s been sitting in its carboy with a solid bung (topped up) for about 8 weeks after the last ferment, and it hasn’t dropped any real sediment since its last racking.
Megan M
via Live Chat
A
Viognier can be a bit of an odd duck. Like Riesling, it can get some of those weird petrol/gas like aromas, and that’s just natural, from the grapes. Like Sauvignon Blanc, it can also get reductive, especially when aged in closed-off situations like you describe. It’s possible it needs a racking or that it even might benefit from a small copper sulfate addition. Always do bench trials here. That’s not the answer if no improvement is noted.
You also might want to try fining to help your Viognier drop its turbidity and fall bright, which can often clean up aromas too. If you don’t mind using animal proteins, one that has some nice effects in white wines and can really freshen up aromas is Gelarom from Laffort. I know it’s so hard to do bench trials when you do such small-scale winemaking, but if you’ve got the tools to measure out teeny amounts of liquids like micropipettes (and I wish all winemakers would invest in these, as well as a gram scale that measures to the 0.01), you can do fining trials in as little as 50 mL wine.
You could always try to blend in another wine to give the aroma a lift. Good matches for Viognier are other Rhône varieties like Roussanne or Marsanne; even Chardonnay can sometimes work as well. You guys and gals know I always say “Never blend a loser” . . . but sometimes even 1% of something else can really make a big positive impact. Good luck!
Q
I’ve read a lot about malolactic fermentation (MLF) and think I know the basic principles. What I do not understand is the constant recommendation to test for the end of MLF with a relatively expensive chromatography kit.
Obviously, if one is going to bottle within a few months after starting MLF, you want to confirm the end of MLF to avoid exploding bottles later.
However, and this is my question: if you are going to age your wine in a carboy for many months before bottling, won’t it be certain that MLF will be over after sitting in a carboy after six or eight months, and there is no need for testing?
Robert Outenreath
San Rafael, California
A
You are absolutely right that most wines, especially those that are inoculated and have favorable conditions, will go malolactic (ML) complete within six or eight months of harvest. Even if your area gets cold and your ML bacteria have to take a bit of a “long winter’s nap,” it’s likely they’ll wake up when the weather gets warmer and will tick your fermentation down to completion. This is especially true for big reds that age even longer, like Cabernets and Merlots.
There are two problems with just inoculating and assuming that your ML fermentation will be fine: 1) It’s possible conditions aren’t favorable and your MLF will stick, and 2) You want to know when MLF is complete so you can rack and start adding SO2 right away in order to protect your wine. I’ll tackle the second point first. Basically, when wine is undergoing an active primary or secondary (MLF) fermentation, it’s protected by the carbon dioxide gas being released by the microbes. When the ML fermentation goes complete, however, your wine becomes extremely vulnerable to oxygen and spoilage microbes that love an air environment, especially acetobacter, which eat ethanol and transform it into acetic acid, or vinegar. Because of this, commercial winemakers typically test for ML completion every two weeks. The hope is that you “catch” the wine when it becomes vulnerable and hit it with SO2 in order to deter acetobacter from gaining a foothold in your wine.
ML bacteria also need some specific micronutrients that can be present in grapes and wine but that aren’t always . . .
With regards to the first reason, it’s a good idea to keep track of what’s going on with your ML fermentation because it’s quite possible that either the bacteria are from a bad batch or conditions in your wine are not favorable for completion. If you have a “stuck” or not-happening ML fermentation, as I mentioned before, your wine is hanging out in an extremely vulnerable state.
As many of my readers know, there’s a laundry list of conditions that need to be met for ML bacteria to be content. ML bacteria are happiest under higher pH, lower alcohol, and higher temperature conditions. In general, this means that your pH should be above 3.2–3.3, temperature should be above 55–60 °F (13–16 °C), and the alcohol can’t be over 15%. ML bacteria also need some specific micronutrients that can be present in grapes and wine but that aren’t always, especially if they got eaten up early on by the yeast or by other ambient microbes that may have come in on the grapes. For these reasons it’s important to know what’s happening in the mysterious dark depths of your carboy or barrel. You don’t have to go as crazy as commercial winemakers, but I do recommend checking your ML fermentation at least once a month, especially if it’s been over two or three months since you inoculated and if you believe all of the above conditions are met.
Bottle Dating
Machine-made bottles portion
of
the Dating Key
HOME:
Bottle Dating: Machine-made bottles
Click here to move directly to the list of machine-made dating questions.
Machine-made Bottle Dating
As with mouth-blown bottles, more precise dating of a machine-made bottle can be done with some confidence by using one or more of the various diagnostic features outlined in the questions on this page. Unlike the first portions of the Dating key (Questions #1 through #3 on the main Bottle Dating page; #4 through #7 on the Mouth-blown bottles portion of the dating key), each question on this page is an independent dating tool for which the response is not predicated on the outcome of any of the other questions. Thus, these questions do not have to be viewed in order. The question numbers on this page continue where they left off on the mouth-blown bottle portion of the key.
Read through each of the questions to see which have pertinence to the bottle you wish to date. Hyperlink to other web pages that are suggested in each question for added information and then read the summary statement at the end of this page which will give some suggestions on where on this website a user could or should proceed to. Keep track of the specific diagnostic feature date ranges listed in each question you consult, and once to the end of the page, use that information to ascertain the likely production date range of your bottle. See dating examples #1, #4, & #5 on the Dating Examples page for guidance.
As explained previously above, be aware that the "earliest" date used in the questions is not absolute. There were some wide mouth, semi-automatic machine produced bottles (albeit a very low percentage) which had machine-made characteristics (minus a suction scar) than can date back as early as the mid-s.
Lets begin with Question #8
right below...
QUESTION #8: Is the bottle glass color:
A. Aqua (aquamarine or very pale green);
B. Essentially colorless (clear); or
C. A color other than colorless or aqua?
The color of the glass in a machine-made bottle can, to a limited
degree, be useful in dating. (As with all of the dating points on this
page, color must be considered in conjunction with other diagnostic
characteristics in arriving at a probable date or date range for any given
bottle - the "preponderance of evidence" concept.) With the increasing dominance of the
automatic bottle machine in the s and on, bottle shapes, sizes, and colors became more and
more standardized and uniform, i.e. much less variety. Glass making technology progressed so
that colorless (aka "clear") glass became much cheaper to produce and displaced aqua as the
dominant bottle glass color for containers where being able to see the products
natural color was an important consideration. An assortment of other colors were
still common - particularly
amber
and to some degree,
cobalt blue - but the range of common colors present in
machine-made bottles was restricted compared to bottles produced in the
19th century. See the
Bottle/Glass Colors page for more information on this fascinating
subject.
A. Bottle made of aqua glass - A machine-made bottle made of aqua glass - which is not a soda bottle or canning jar - is most likely to date from or prior to the s.
Click
on
Groves Chill Tonic
to view a picture of an aqua medicinal from the - era. (The
bottle pictured in Question #9 below with a plethora of bubbles in the glass
would be considered a particular deep shade of aqua.) The amount of
aqua glass bottles produced declines throughout this period so that by the
mid to late s the dominant colors for machine-made bottles (excluding
soda bottles and canning jars) is colorless or amber. Aqua
pretty much disappears by the early s as a bottle color with the
notable exception of soda bottles (and many canning jars) which continued to be produced in various
shades of aqua up until recent years (Miller & McNichol ,; empirical
observations). Royal Crown Cola, Dr. Pepper
(both a
greenish aqua), and
Coca-Cola ("Georgia Green") are familiar examples of late
era aqua bottles
(Toulouse ).
For more information on this color, click aqua to go to
its description on the Bottle Colors page.
B. Bottle is of largely colorless (aka "clear") glass Machine-made bottles with colorless glass can date from any time after , though there is a relatively reliable dating break possible based on the type of colorless glass. In the production of colorless glass numerous methods - mechanical, physical, and/or chemical - were used to decolorize glass (Tooley ). Decolorizing is in essence neutralizing the effects of the iron and carbonaceous impurities in the glass mix in order to obtain as colorless of glass as possible. The primary physical (masking) agents used in the first half of the 20th century were manganese dioxide, selenium, and arsenic. All potentially leave a very slight residual color to the glass that is usually visible when looking closely at the thickest portion of the base or sides. For more information click colorless glass to go to that section of the Bottle Colors page.
Manganese dioxide causes the glass to have a very slight lavender or amethyst tint which is amplified to varying degrees with exposure to sunlight (or artificial radiation). Manganese oxide was found to be difficult to work with - particularly in the open glass furnaces used for the Owens Automatic Bottle Machine - and was eventually overshadowed by selenium and arsenic for decolorizing (Miller & Pacey ). When selenium or arsenic (or a combination of the two) is used to decolorize glass, it often leaves a very faint "straw" cast to the thick glass portions which is not affected or intensified by sunlight. (Note: It has been thought for many years that selenium produced the "straw" cast to otherwise colorless - and almost exclusively - machine-made bottles. However, it is now thought to be a function of using arsenic - probably in tandem with selenium - as the decolorizer [Tooley ; Lockhart pers. comm. ].) The following dating refinements are possible with colorless machine-made bottles:
1. The large majority of machine-made bottles with a slight to moderate lavender or amethyst tint - indicating manganese oxide was used as the decolorizer - date between and the early s (top picture above right; click small amethyst wide-mouth bottle for a picture of this entire bottle) though some can date as late as the s. Machine-made soda bottles were generally not decolorized with manganese after (Lockhart a).
2. The large majority of machine-made bottles with a pale "straw" color tint (bottom picture above right) - indicating selenium and/or arsenic use as a decolorizer - will date no earlier than (Lockhart a & b). Based on empirical observations, one or both of these decolorizers are still in use today although after the s other decolorizing agents and glass producing processes were used resulting in less abundant "straw" tinted bottles.
C. Bottle made of some other color of
glass
If the bottle has
some other glass color no useful general dating information is possible. However,
some bottle-type specific dating refinement is possible based on specific glass
colors for both machine-made and mouth-blown bottles; see the
Bottle/Glass Colors and
Bottle Typing/Diagnostic Shapes pages for more information. Move to the other questions below for more dating opportunities.
QUESTION #9:
Are there "bubbles" present in the glass? If so, how
many and what size and shape?
"Bubbles" are air or gas filled cavities within the glass. The image to the left is a close-up of a bottle with bubbles in atypically high quantity for illustrative purposes. Bubbles are caused by an assortment of irregularities in the production process including a glass pot or tank that was too hot or not full enough, glass cut-off or shearing irregularities, and various gob feeder problems. In the glass making industry, small bubbles were referred to as "seeds" and larger bubbles as "blisters" (Tooley ). Similar to the color question above, the presence of bubbles in the glass can help some in pinning down the date of a machine bottle, but must be used in conjunction with other features to more confidently narrow down a date range as it is not conclusive by itself.
Some authors - most notably Jones & Sullivan () - believe that "the number and size of bubbles has absolutely no connection with the age of the glass." This appears quite true of mouth-blown bottles, though empirical evidence suggests some dating trends with regards to machine-made bottles. More specifically, there appears to have been an increase in the homogeneity and uniformity of glass as the technological advances of the machine era proceeded. However, this feature is still a tenuous one since there are many early machine-made bottles with few or no bubbles. Conversely, machine-made bottles after the s which have numerous and/or large bubbles exist but are rare (Girade ; Lockhart pers. comm. ). See the Bottle Body Characteristics & Mold Seams for more information on bubbles.
As a general rule of thumb, earlier machine-made bottles and jars (i.e., to [mid-s for wide mouth ware] through the s) will have more and larger bubbles than later machine-made bottles (early s and later) when bubbles in the glass became a much rarer occurrence due to ever more refined glassmaking technology. Larger bubbles (~1/8" and larger) and/or numerous bubbles of all sizes are more prevalent in bottles manufactured during the early machine period - s (wide mouth ware) to early s. The absence of bubbles or presence of only a very few small "seed" bubbles (less than a pin-head in size) or very narrow "V" shaped bubbles, denotes a bottle that is more likely to date from or after the s. (The "V" shaped bubbles are discussed on the Bottle Body Characteristics & Mold Seams page.)
If one takes a look at glass bottles found in supermarkets today they would be hard pressed to find even one bubble in all the bottles looked at combined as technology has all but eradicated this flaw in glassmaking.
QUESTION #10: Does the bottle have the following statement embossed on its side or on the base?
FEDERAL LAW FORBIDS SALE OR REUSE OF THIS BOTTLE
In the U.S., National Prohibition was repealed in late and was subsequently followed by the passage of Federal laws prohibiting the reuse or sale of used liquor bottles. This requirement was intended to discourage the re-use of bottles by bootleggers and moonshiners, though the biggest discouragement to that illicit activity was that liquor was now legally available. On January 1st, all liquor sold in the United States was required to be in bottles that had the above statement embossed in the glass (Busch ). The statement was not required on wine or beer bottles, the latter category which was - and to some degree still is - bottled in re-useable bottles.
If your bottle has this statement embossed in the glass, it is a machine-made liquor bottle that dates between and the mid-s. This inscription is found only on machine-made bottles, with the rare exception of some Mexican-made (for the U. S. market) bottle being mouth-blown during that era.
In , the law requiring this statement was repealed. Be aware however that for some years after , liquor could still be found in bottles with this phrase since not all liquor producers switched immediately to new bottles due to the expense of new molds or to deplete an existing supply of bottles (Ferraro ) Click liquor bottle to view a picture of the base of a liquor bottle which has the reuse prohibition embossing though was made well after (10 years) the regulations requiring the statement were eliminated. The linked bottle was made by the Thatcher Glass Manufacturing Company (Elmira, NY.) and has a date code for . The company used the stylized "TMC" mark from to (Toulouse ; Giarde ; Whitten ).
If your machine-made bottle does not have this phrase embossed in the glass it is probably either not a spirits or liquor bottle, made outside the era the statement was required, or the bottle was originally sold outside the U.S. If you know the bottle is a U. S. made/sold spirits bottle (i.e. distinctly a spirits bottle in shape or design or it has other conclusive features like brand embossing or labeling) it could date prior to , though is more likely to be a post- product. A pre- date is possible since some spirits - particularly whiskey and brandy - were available to a limited degree by prescription through pharmacists to be used "for medicinal purposes only." Most pre-Prohibition (pre-) liquor/spirits bottles exhibit mouth-blown manufacturing characteristics, i.e., they are uncommonly machine-made. This is because Prohibition occurred individually in most states between and , with National Prohibition finally passed in and effective in early . This time span was the peak changeover from hand to automated bottle production methods. Visit the liquor bottle section of the Bottle Typing/Diagnostic Shapes page for more information on spirits bottles.
NOTE: Some references and many people believe that there are liquor bottles embossed with FEDERAL LAW PROHIBITS SALE OR RE-USE OF THIS BOTTLE, i.e., PROHIBITS instead of the word FORBIDS (Ferraro ). No PROHIBITS bottles have ever been observed by the author or other consultants to this website and it is believed to be a myth, though the author would welcome conclusive proof (an image) that PROHIBITS was indeed used in this context.
QUESTION #11: Does the bottle base have similar markings to those on the bottle pictured below?
Bottles with the highlighted mark in the image date between and the mid-s (with some limited use of this mark until at least ).
The "Diamond O-I" makers mark of the Owens-Illinois Glass Co. is shown in the picture within the white box (click to enlarge). This mark is also called the "Saturn" mark by some due to its stylized resemblance. (Note: The "O" in the Diamond O-I marking is actually a vertically elongated oval, although referred to here as an "O" for simplicity.) This makers mark is very common on bottles made during the - to mid-s period as the company was (and still is) a dominant force in the bottle production world at that time (Toulouse ; Lockhart d).
For more Bottle Corking Machineinformation, please contact us. We will provide professional answers.
The various Owens-Illinois markings provide an opportunity to also identify which plant made the bottle and in what year. Specifically for the pictured export beer bottle, the script Duraglas marking and the stippling (molded "roughness") around the outside edge of the base were both used first in , so this bottle can date no earlier than that. The "1" to the right of Diamond O-I mark is the year code and in this case obviously can not be earlier than (i.e., not ) because of the Duraglas embossing and stippling. In the early s, realizing that single digit date codes were repeating (e.g., "0" could be or ), caused the company to add a period after the single digit on some bottle types - primarily soda bottles (not beer bottles) - from about that time to the mid-s. At that point two digit year codes (e.g., "46" for ) were used on most bottles types; in particular, beer, soda and milk bottles. Unfortunately, the use of the one and two digit date codes was inconsistently used by different plants and mold makers so this is not a certain rule for dating.
For example, the illustrated bottle was highly likely to have been made in since one made in would likely have a date code of "51." The "20" to the left of the Diamond O-I mark is the code for the Oakland, CA. plant* which began operations in and is still in operation today - so knowing the factory is of no use in pinning down the manufacturing date. Similarly, the bottle is paper labeled as having been used by the Columbia Brewing Inc. (Tacoma, WA.) who did business under that name from to when it became the Heidelberg Brewing Co. (Van Wieren ). Once again though, this bit of information does not help pin down the date. The clincher for the date is the heavier (thicker) glass that this particular bottle was made with identifying it as having been made just prior to the wartime reduction in the amount of glass used for many bottle types as a conservation effort during WWII. This bottle is also an example of how even with the relatively ample amount of information Owens-Illinois bottle bases provide, one may still need to rely on more than one piece of data (e.g., plant codes, brewery dates of operation/business) to ensure a reliable manufacturing date determination (Toulouse ; Lockhart d; Phil Perry, O-I engineer pers. comm. ; Lockhart pers. comm. ,). (More on this bottle is found on the Beer & Ale Bottles Typology page.)
Between and about the Owens-Illinois Glass Co. changed the Diamond O-I marking to a simpler "I in an O" mark (same basic mark minus the elongated diamond) although the time of this change varied through the noted period depending on the specific plant, mold life, and possibly bottle type. The base image to the right is of this newer mark on a bottle made at plant #21 (Portland, OR.) in - the first year of operation for the Portland plant (Toulouse ; Girade ; Lockhart d)*. Date codes with this later mark (still in use today) are variable with both single and double digit codes (like in the image) observed, though recently made beer bottles (s and later) seem to consistently have two digit codes (empirical observations).
For a discussion of the Duraglas marking - shown on the amber beer bottle base above - see Question #17 below. Also consult the two part article by Bill Lockhart and Russ Hoenig (retired senior engineer for the Owens-Illinois Glass Co.) - located at the links below - for more information on the history and marks of the Owens-Illinois Glass Company. That company's marks are probably the most commonly encountered U. S. makers marks on bottles made in the 20th century (Lockhart & Hoenig t & u).
Owens-Illinois Glass Company Part 1 - History.
Owens-Illinois Glass Company Part 2 - Logos & Codes.
When present, bottle makers marks can be an excellent tool for helping with the dating of historic bottles. Since there were so many different makers markings on both mouth-blown and machine-made bottles, they are not covered in this key. Makers marks are discussed more on the Bottle & Glass Maker's Markings page.
QUESTION #12: Does the bottle have a finish (lip) that was:
A. Sealed with
a cork;
B. Sealed with an externally threaded screw cap; or
C. Sealed with some other type closure?
The cork finish versus screw-thread finish can be helpful in dating machine-made bottles but only allows for a moderately accurate dating break which to a large degree is bottle type specific. Cork is still commonly used for sealing bottles containing wine and champagne, occasional liquor/spirits bottles, and rarely some specialty food product bottles.
The utility here for dating is that certain types of bottles made the transition from cork accepting to screw-thread finishes during the mid-s through the s; see illustrations to the right. The bottle types that made the switch during this era are the majority of medicinals, food, and ink bottles; most liquor/spirits bottles; and some non-alcoholic, non-carbonated beverage bottles. (If the type bottle you have is in doubt as to its likely use, visit the Bottle Typing/Diagnostic Shapes page for identification information.)
External screw-threads were first used during the mid-19th century though almost exclusively on canning jars including the famous Mason's "" jar. By the s and early s external screw-threads were being used occasionally on mouth-blown liquor/spirits bottles & flasks, some commercial food bottles, ink bottles, and other bottle types more rarely. The use of screw threads was still limited by the lack of precision in hand production processes. These older external screw thread bottles would likely have keyed out as mouth-blown in Question #2 because of the ground lip surface present on most mouth-blown external screw-thread bottles.
External screw threads became more common as fully automatic bottle machines dominated over hand production methods, since machines produced much more uniform and precise finish dimensions allowing for standardized caps. External screw-threads came to dominate closure types by the Depression (s), except on soda and beer bottles. For more information go to the Types of Bottle Closures page and/or the Types of Bottle Finishes page, both of which provide much more information on this complex subject including the distinctly different types of screw threads.
A. Cork style finish - The bottle you have has a finish that accepted a cork as the closure and is not a soda, beer, wine/champagne, or liquor bottle. Cork closure, machine-made medicinals, food, inks, and some non-alcoholic beverage bottles usually date prior to the early s, though there are numerous exceptions.
B. External ("screw") thread finish - The bottle you have has external screw threads - which are usually either continuous or non-continuous or variations on these themes. Most all types of machine-made bottles with external screw threads date from the late s or after, though some types - like catsup bottles - were commonly screw-threaded from the beginning of machine manufacture in the early s.
C. Other closure/finish type - There are a lot of finish styles that accepted crown caps, lightening stoppers, or other types of closures which do not resemble either of the choices here. If your bottle does not fit "A" or "B" above, you will need to visit other site pages like Bottle Finishes & Closures and/or Bottle Typing/Diagnostic Shapes for more information.
QUESTION #13: Does the bottle have what appears to be a painted or enameled label, lettering, and/or decoration?
Applied color labeling or lettering (also known as ACL or pyroglazing) was a common way of permanently labeling or owner marking a bottle without the use of fragile paper labels. It was most common by far on soda and milk bottles, but can occasionally be found on other types of bottles. The ACL process is explained on the Bottle Body Characteristics & Mold Seams page. See the image to the right for an example of a simple two "color" (black and white) ACL soda bottle.
An ACL soda or milk bottle typically dates no earlier than (possibly when Owens-Illinois Glass Co. was experimenting with the process [Hoenig pers. comm. 2/]) when the ACL process was first adopted for commercial use in the United States (Girade ), with almost complete acceptance by bottle makers (and users) by the early s (Lockhart pers. comm. ). Many beverage and some other types of bottles are still produced today with ACL's (e.g., Corona™ Beer) providing no termination date for this feature.
The following recent article - available only on this website - is highly recommended for those wanting to know just about everything about ACL's:
Lockhart, Bill and Bob Brown (with contributions by Chris Weide and Russ Hoenig). . The Glamorous Applied Color Labels. Historic Glass Bottle Identification & Information Website, E-published September . A comprehensive article on the history, processes and use of ACL labeling beginning in the early s. This article is available on this site at: http://www.sha.org/bottle/pdffiles/ACLArticle.pdf
(Note: It should be pointed out that embossed milk and
soda bottles continued to be made well after similar ACL versions were
dominating the market, with embossed milk bottles made into the s and soda
bottles into the s and later [empirical observations]).
QUESTION #14: Does the bottle have a shallowly incised circle on the base that is (usually) between 1/3" to 3/4" (10-18mm) in diameter?
A valve or ejection mark on the base of a bottle is a definitive indication of machine-made manufacture by a press-and-blow type machine (Miller & Morin ). This mark was formed by machines that utilized a push-rod valve to eject the partially expanded parison out of the one-piece blank mold (the "press" part of the process) to be grasped by "transfer tongs" when shifting the parison to the second blow mold (the "blow" part of the machine process) (Tooley ). To view illustrations of how press-and-blow machines operated and how the valve/ejection mark was formed, click on the following links which are of the Lynch Milk Bottle machine cycle: press-and-blow machine cycle - stages 1-3; press-and-blow machine cycle - stages 4-7.
A valve mark is usually perfectly round and roughly 1/2" inch (12-14 mm) in diameter though can occasionally be a bit smaller (10-12 mm) or larger (up to at least 24 mm). The circle is incised or sharply indented into the surface of the glass and can be distinctly felt by running ones fingernail over the mark. On somewhat rare occasions (by a few different glass companies) the valve rod had a mold number incised in it which would emboss the base of the bottle with this number when ejecting the parison; these numbers will always be centered in within the ejection mark (Lockhart pers. comm. ; empirical observations).
Valve marks are almost exclusively found on wide mouth machine-made hollow ware - food bottles & jars, milk bottles, and canning/fruit jars. These are all types of bottles generally made by press-and-blow machines. Toulouse (b) noted that this mark is "...most often found on wide mouth foods of the s and s and even later, and on many milk containers." The mark is indeed most commonly observed on wide mouth milk bottles and food jars made between the early s through the s, and occasionally after that. It is also very common on canning jars, including many that were produced by semi-automatic press-and-blow machines possibly as early as (Birmingham ; Leybourne ). The milk bottle pictured above is covered on the Bottle Dating Examples page. The square milk bottle base pictured dates from the mid to late s and is discussed at this link: Blake-Hart patent milk bottle.
Valve marks are very unusual on narrow necked/mouth (bore)
bottle types though there are some exceptions as valve marks are occasionally
seen on early (s) machine-made beer and soda bottles. At least one manufacturer (Cumberland
Glass Manufacturing Company, Bridgeton, NJ) invented and used a type of
semi-automatic press-and-blow machine in which did produce narrow neck
bottles that most likely resulted in a valve mark on the base of the
bottles produced in the early s (Lockhart pers. comm. ;
Peters pers. comm. ). Thus, the presence of a valve mark on a soda or beer bottles
would indicate a narrow manufacture date in the early s.
QUESTION #15: Does the bottle have a narrow mouth (bore/finish) or does it have a wide mouth (bore/finish)?
During the mid-s, semi-automatic machines began to be used for the production of bottles and jars. The first production bottles known to have been made on semi-automatic machines were wide mouth Vaseline bottles made by the C. L. Flaccus Glass Co. in (Lockhart et al. d, Lockhart ). (*See linked article below [Lockhart ] for more information on the early machines that made Vaseline bottles.) For the first decade or so of use (i.e. up to about ) semi-automatic machines were useful almost exclusively for the production of wide mouth bottles and jars (picture to the left) due to the limitations of the press-and-blow machines in use at that time. Because of this, non-Owens machine-made bottles (see "General Machine-made Diagnostic Features" point #5 at the beginning of this page) with narrow necks- like the medicinal bottles pictured below right - will essentially always date after and virtually always after . This also largely holds true for narrow-mouth bottles made by the Owens machines which did not really begin to dominate bottle production until about - (Toulouse ; Miller & Sullivan ; Jones & Sullivan ; Boow ; Miller & McNichol ; Lockhart pers. comm. ).
A review of Illinois Glass Company catalogs from the early s shows that wide mouth bottles - certainly made by semi-automatic "Machine Made" methods - first appear in the catalog and were not present in catalogs before that time. Since the Illinois Glass Company was one of the largest bottle producers of the time it is reasonable to assume that the semi-automatic machines producing wide mouth bottles/jars became common throughout most of the glass industry about that same time. This allows for a high probability begin date of around to for most wide mouth, machine-made bottles and jars (Illinois Glass Company , , ). Click on the following links to see all of the pages from the Illinois Glass Company catalog that show their machine-made items: pages 278-279; pages 280-281; pages 282-283; pages 284-285; pages 286-287. The types of bottles illustrated on these pages would be considered typical of the earliest machine-made bottles in the U. S., i.e., from the late s to around . Most other types of bottles still would have been mouth-blown during this same era. To summarize:
Wide mouth (bore) bottles and jars with machine-made characteristics can date from as early as the mid-s, but primarily date after about . These bottles/jars are primarily food bottles and canning/fruit jars. A wide-mouth machine-made canning jar is pictured above left.
Narrow mouth machine-made bottles - regardless of the type machine they were produced on ( e.g., blow-and-blow semi-automatic machines, Owens Automatic Bottle Machine) - will essentially always date after with very few dating earlier than . The picture to the right shows a narrow mouth machine-made bottle (left bottle) that was produced by the Owens machine and likely dates between and the early s.
See the Machine-made bottle section of the Glassmaking & Glassmakers page for more information on machine-made manufacturing via press-and-blow (and other) machines.
Lockhart, Bill. . A Tour Through Time in Vaseline Jars. Historic Glass Bottle Identification & Information Website, E-published August . Another exclusive article published here only; this one on the fascinating history and bottles of yet another well know product (Vaseline) that is still in production today. This article is available at this link: http://www.sha.org/bottle/pdffiles/Vaseline.pdfIt was very uncommon until the early 20th century for the capacity or volume of the contents of a bottle to be noted in the embossing or on the label (or closure sometimes). The image to the right shows a very late mouth-blown druggist bottle ( to early s) from Spokane, WA. that has the volume capacity ("12 oz.") embossed on the shoulder. The origin of volume designations is explained in an article by Bill Lockhart dealing with El Paso, TX. soda bottlers published in The Artifact in ; part of which is quoted below. (Note: This article was also re-published in Bottles and Extras in (Lockhart a) and available at this link: A Tale of Two Machines and A Revolution in Soft Drink Bottling.)
On March 3, , Congress passed H. R. , generally known as the Gould Amendment to the Pure Food and Drug Act of . Although the Pure Food and Drug Act demanded a great deal of labeling information, it did not require the inclusion of volume specification. The Gould Amendment corrected that oversight when it stated that the "quantity of the contents be . . . plainly and conspicuously marked on the outside of the package in terms of weight, measure, or numerical count" but continued to explain that "reasonable variations shall be permitted." Although the law went into effect immediately, it clarified that "no penalty of fine, imprisonment, or confiscation shall be enforced for any violation of its provisions as to domestic products prepared or foreign products imported prior to eighteen months after its passage" (U. S. :732). In other words, the industry actually had a grace period in required compliance until September 3, .
In order to be in compliance with the Gould Amendment, soda bottlers in El Paso (along with those in the rest of the U. S.) had to include volume information on their containers by no later than September . All bottles bearing volume data can therefore be dated as no earlier than and probably not until . Thus far, I have found no datable, mouth-blown, El Paso soda bottles containing volume information. However, a few machine-made bottles from both the Magnolia Coca-Cola Bottling Co. and the Empire Bottling Works, El Paso’s two largest bottlers at that time, contain no volume information. This suggests that they were produced prior to the Gould Amendment or at least no later than . All other machine-made bottles that I have examined, filled by El Paso bottlers, bore volume information. (Lockhart , )
Given this information, it appears that the majority of machine-made (and some mouth-blown items like pictured above) beverage, food, and medicinal bottles with embossed (or labeled) specific capacity or volume information likely date from or later. This information is of no use for bottles without volume embossing with no label still present or for bottles that did not hold a beverage, food, or medicinal product, all of which were regulated by the Pure Food and Drug Act of .
One notable exception to the above is that many earlier machine-made liquor/spirits and milk bottles had volume notations embossed in the glass (e.g., "QUART," "FULL QUART," "ONE PINT," etc.) or on the label as early as -, though the large majority of machine-made bottles with capacity information date from the law or after. Click "FULL PINT" embossed flask to see an example of an relatively early () machine-made liquor flask that is embossed with FULL PINT on the shoulder. Volume notation on liquor bottles was apparently a marketing issue and seems to be related to the rise of mail-order liquor which is briefly discussed under the Tall, slender bodied, straight neck spirits cylinders (late 19th & 20th century) section on the Liquor & Spirits Bottles page. The use of volume notations on earlier milk bottles was likely associated with the demands for more cleanliness, reliability, and predictability of the product once home delivery began to be popular in the early s (though reportedly began in ). See the milk bottle section of the typology pages for more information.
Question #17: Does all or a portion of the bottle base have a textured pattern, i.e., stippling or knurling?
The bases of mid to late 20th century, machine-made bottles very commonly have a textured effect covering all or a portion of the base - see the image to the left. There were several practical reasons for this feature: the bottles would have a reduced base surface contact decreasing drag on the conveyor belts moving them within the factory and by purchasers/users; to hide product related sediment; to hide the suction scar (primarily on Owens Automatic Bottle Machine products); and for at least one specific machine operational reason (Phil Perry, engineer with the Owens-Illinois Glass Co., pers. comm. ). The noted conveyor belt utility would only involve the stippling on the resting surface of the bottle base - like that on the beer bottle base below where the stippling pattern is just on the outside base edge where contact would occur. A major practical reason for the stippling on the base was provided by Steve Presley, Brewmaster Anheuser-Busch, Inc. (retired) and currently brewing program instructor at the UC Davis, as follows: "Stippling is also applied to minimize the amount of contact between the very hot bottle bottom as it comes from the forming machine and transitions onto the annealing lehr conveyor. Without the stippling the thermal shock that would occur with full base contact on the conveyor would create stresses that can cause the bottle to burst, or reduce its overall tensile strength." (Pers. comm. 12/).
Various stippling patterns were also added to bottle bases for largely esthetic reasons, such as the green soda bottle base to the left. None of the stippling - given the indented nature of the base center and lack of stippling on the resting surface - would have come in contact with the conveyor belt.
Stippling is shown on both the bottle bases in the images and was typically produced by hand punching the base plate of the bottle mold. Knurling was machine impressed on the base plate. Practically speaking for the purposes of this website, the difference between the two is unimportant and the precise "look" of these base designs varies quite a bit over time, with different bottle types and between bottle makers. Click knurled base to see such as defined by a Owens-Illinois engineer (Phil Perry, pers. comm. ) on a bottle that is date coded most likely for . (The above and linked photos courtesy of Carol Serr.) Other types of base perimeter stippling resembles small crescents - (((((((( - which is very common on modern beer bottles. Another design commonly seen on the base perimeter of late 20th century and modern wine bottles is like this: ( )( )( )( )( ).
Knurling or stippling was first used on glass insulators in , specifically by the Hemingray Glass Company (a subsidiary of Owens-Illinois Glass Co. by that time). This feature is called a "corrugated base" by insulator collectors (Bill Meier, pers. comm. ).
It is not precisely certain when this feature first was used on bottles although it likely first appeared in on bottles produced by the Owens-Illinois Glass Co. when they began using their proprietary "Duraglas" bottle making process (Toulouse ). Both of the pictured bottle bases note such with the script Duraglas on the base. This likely terminus post quem is supported by date codes noted by the author and others on bottles made by that company (Lockhart d; empirical observations). So if one has a machine-made bottle with a stippled base one can be quite certain that it dates from or later.
QUESTION#18: Does the bottle have any type of glass/bottle makers markings embossed on the base (typically) or body (occasionally)?
Machine-made (and often mouth-blown) bottles will very frequently have embossing on the base (image to the right and the most common location), heel, and/or body which identifies the actual manufacturer of the bottle. Be aware that many times the embossing on a bottle base is not a manufacturers or "makers mark" but instead is either related to the product the bottle contained, the user of the bottle, or is for internal manufacturer related tracking (e.g., mold or catalog designations) of little use in dating or typology.
When present, however, makers marks - in hand with answers to the other questions noted prior - will often allow for a distinct narrowing of the date range in which a given bottles was likely produced. For example, the mark to the right inside the white box is the ubiquitous marking used by the Owens-Illinois Glass Company from or until the mid to late s (ending time dependent on the bottle type and/or production factory). This bottle actually dates from as discussed in Question #11 above. As one can see, when present makers marks can be one of the best dating tools of all!
To assist with this endeavor please consult the Bottle & Glass Makers Markings page which contains links to scores of articles posted on this website which were largely produced by members of the Bottle Research Group (BRG). These articles deal with specific makers markings and the history of the companies behind those markings. This will be a "work-in-progress" over the coming years as scores more BRG articles (including revisions and updates of past articles) are planned to be "e-published" via this website on an array of other bottle makers.
In order to make full use of this comprehensive information, however, one has to know what mark or marks were used by what glass or bottle manufacturing company. If not known and the marking is either a clearly identifiable alphabetical letter or letters (like A. B. Co. for the American Bottle Company) or a distinct logo or symbol, a user must first determine the origin of that makers marking. This can be done by using the appropriate "Makers Markings Logo Table" to ascertain which mark/marks were used by what company.
Once a makers marking is identified one can go to the Bottle & Glass Makers Markings page (link below) to (hopefully) find the glass makers article that pertains to the mark, if an article does exist for that particular maker.
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