WineXpert Making Sense of Kit Instructions

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QuiQuog

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I've not been in this hobby for very long, my experience is limited to a Welches white grape juice test run batch, then a WE Cab, and a gallon of Joe's Ancient Orange Mead. The WE kit I did seemed to be pretty straight forward if I remember correctly, it's been a few years since I did it.But now I've started a Winexpert Lodi Old Vines Zin premuim kit with skins and the instructions don't seem to make as much sense to me. They're a little vague in some areas.



My main concern right now is that the instructions don't say what size container to use after the secondary fermentation step. It goes from the ferment bucket into a 6 gallon carboy, but then no further instructions on size after that. I'm trying to peice together clues of omission or clues from further steps, but it shouldn't be this hard.



These are the instructions for the kit I have

http://www.winexpert.com/pdfs/Eclipse Grapeskins - Feb 2013.pdf



On step 3 it says to rack and you should have about a liter of space left in your carboy. I have to assume that this is a 6 gallon carboy because a 5 gallon one is too small to contain it all, let alone degas. I racked into my bucket to degas so as to prevent a OC2 volcano, then racked it back into the 6 gal carboy. Additionally, you have to add oak cubes, so 6 gallon. but why don't they say this?



Step 4 doesn't say anything about which size to use either, but it says to not top up and that the wine will not oxidize during this step. Again, I have too much wine to fit in the 5 gallon, so it appears as if they want you to keep it in the 6 gallon carboy. I plan on racking again in 3 months and bulk aging for a year, so I topped off a 5 gallon carboy to 1/2" from the bung and put the remainder in a wine bottle with a winesaver suction cap for the purpose of topping off later, the rest went down the drain :( It wasn't much, but it's still a shame.



Am I missing something? Am I doing it right? I don't want to leave this wine with so much air in the vessel for bulk aging, or even the 28 days it says to clear. Did I screw up something earlier that left me with too much wine at this point? How would you interpret these instructions?
 
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In the past the wine kits always had you rack to the 6 gal. and top up. Over the last few years some of the kits now tell you not to top because it won't be in carboy long enough to oxidize. All the kits, if they're for 6 gal/23 liters have you racking into that size container.
Like you, if I'm doing the secondary racking where you're adding clearing agents and/or degassing I rack to my bucket 1st then back to clean carboy.
I would leave the head space if making the kit and bottling on the day specified. However if planning on bulk aging for any amount of time later, I would either top up( if it's not much) with either water or similar wine.Otherwise I rack down to a 5 gal and have 1 or 2 misc. sizes for extra.
I've purchased some number 2 bungs and also have a few 1/2 gal wine bottles on hand so if I rack down to 5gal I can put the excess in appropriate bottles. The number 2 bungs fit beer bottles/wine bottles.
I think you did fine the way you did it ( no errors in racking, you always end with less than you started because of the gross lees).
 
I actually go to secondary in a 6.5 gal, which provides the head space for degassing, and then rack to 6 for stabilization. I top up with a bottle or two of the closest thing I can find at the liquor store to what I'm making.
 
We usually rack it in 6 gallon carboys. If we end up with too much head space we buy a similar bottle of wine to top off with or we add sanitized glass marbles/decorative stones to the carboy to displace enough wine to raise the level to where it needs to be. Sometimes we still end up racking to a 5 gallon on the last racking before bulk aging and saving any left over in bottles with rubber vac-u-vend stoppers so we can pump most of the air out. If you go the glass marbles/decorative rock route be sure that they are food safe. Your LHBS may care them. Pet stores that have aquarium decorations are another good source. Be careful when you added them if you have a glass carboy. There have been reports of marbles hitting hard enough to crack them.


Sent from my iPad using Wine Making
 
I top off with wine I have made, a lot less expensive [emoji41]
 

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