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Bplewniak

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I want to start out and mention I'm very new to kit making and currently have 3 kits at different stages.

My question:
In commercial wine making for high end wines, is water added to the juice?

I first started a non premium kit with 12l of juice and followed the instructions to make a 6 gallon batch. I thought this was a lot of water. I then started an eclipse kit and only had about 1.5 liters of water to add.

What happens if you do not add any water to the juice? I feel I should have produce a 5 gallon batch instead of 6 for the 12l juice kit I first started. If the premium kits sell themselves on providing more juice for a total 6 gallon batch, could we just make a 12l juice kit to 5 gallons to create a higher end product?
 
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They remove water to make it easier/lighter to ship. You have to add the water back in to bring it back to normal sugar levels. The higher kits have less water removed, the cheaper kits have more water removed.. The quality of grapes is as you would expect higher with the higher end kits and lower with the lower end kits. The less water removed the closer to "commercial" wine you get (for the most part).
 
Just to add to what Mike said, if you short the water on a kit, the resulting wine will probably be higher in alcohol as well as have a higher acidity. Whether it results in a higher end product is up to your taste.
 
I appreciate the insight. That makes sense regarding the high concentrate vrs pure juice.
 
Check the sg of the 12 liter juice without adding water, its probly well over 1.5sg, so concentrated that you wouldnt be able to ferment it to dry. If your using ec1118 the abv tolerance is 18%. So if your sg is higher than 18% potential alchohal the yeast may die before finishing the sugar. You dont have to add all of the water to get to 23 liters, but you need to use your hydrometer to make sure your in the ballpark for the yeast to have a fighting chance to survive until the juice ferments dry, 1.11 is about the highest id ever go. As you add more water the sg will come down, a good starting point for most reds is about 1.100sg and you want to try and finish around .990
 
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I want to start out and mention I'm very new to kit making and currently have 3 kits at different stages.

My question:
In commercial wine making for high end wines, is water added to the juice?

I first started a non premium kit with 12l of juice and followed the instructions to make a 6 gallon batch. I thought this was a lot of water. I then started an eclipse kit and only had about 1.5 liters of water to add.

What happens if you do not add any water to the juice? I feel I should have produce a 5 gallon batch instead of 6 for the 12l juice kit I first started. If the premium kits sell themselves on providing more juice for a total 6 gallon batch, could we just make a 12l juice kit to 5 gallons to create a higher end product?

No one has directly answered the question you posed. It is rare, but not unheard of, for commercial wineries to add water. The only time they would is when the starting sugar content (Brix) is so high that the resultant wine would be too high in ABV for the winemaker's desired product. This essentially only happens in hot climates. (This seems unrelated to your situation, however.)

In addition to the other answers above, I will note that making a low-end (12 L) kit to a finished volume of 5 gallons is a not-uncommon "tweak." I have never done it myself, but lots of people on this board have experience with this.
 

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