A few questions for a newbie to winemaking

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jcaudill

jcaudill

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Hello,

I'm new to the winemaking world but I've been making beer for years so that is the world I'm familiar with.

I've picked up an RJ kit (23 liter yield) for my first attempt, and I have a 60 liter Speidel plastic fermenter.

Looking through the instructions there is talk about transferring the wine to a second carboy off the lees. Is that a strictly necessary step? It sounds like it is with the need to degass but I just wanted to making sure. I have a 6 gallon carboy as well I can transfer into. But just want to make sure that's a step I need to take or if there's a way to accomplish this in a single tank.

Also one other question I have is about the water. For homebrewing, I run my city water through a pretty hefty chloramine filter to strip out the chloramines the city adds. Is that something I should do for wine as well?

Thanks in advance!
 
In general, if the water you use is good enough to drink, it would be good enough to make wine. So using your city water that has been run through de-chlorination should be even better. On the other hand, I feel it is better to error on the side of caution so I use spring water from a store like Sam's Club.

I am not familiar with your type of fermenter. Can it be made air tight? If so, I suppose you could do the entire process in it but I would still rack off the gross lees when SG is at or below 1.020 or so. You could go from the fermenter to the carboy and then back to the fermenter, assuming it is air tight. Otherwise, I would keep it in the carboy.
 
The reasons it is recommended to rack to a carboy include: (1) getting the wine off the gross lees, and (2) minimizing air contact to reduce the oxidation of the wine. Strictly necessary? No, I suppose not, but highly desirable.
 
Follow the instructions to the letter, you can add extra time, but do the steps as they are written. After a few kits, you can start figuring out what the results of tinkering are.

And YES. You need to get the wine off the rotting fruit pulp. After all, fermenting is only controlling the rot!
 
jcaudill,

My house gets it's water from a well that has hard water. That water is softened by a water softener in the garage that uses salt as a catylist to remove the hardness. I became concerned about using my tap water about a month ago after I read an article on the WineMaker magazine website that said you should never use treated water in wine. Since then, I've made a Munton's Canadian Larger brew and used bottled spring water instead of my tap water. Walmart sells spring water for $0.69 a gallon so using it doesn't drive up the cost of making a wine kit that much. With the higher end kits, you only need 2 gallons or so. Plus spring water has minerals according to what I've read that is beneficial to yeast production.

Ron
 
jcaudill said:
I've picked up an RJ kit (23 liter yield) for my first attempt, and I have a 60 liter Speidel plastic fermenter.

... if there's a way to accomplish this in a single tank.
Click to expand...

In theory, it is possible to accomplish it all in a single tank. However, that requires some ability to remove the sediment from the bottom. Either a bottom drain (conical fermenter), or a pump.

However, 37 liters of air space over 23 liters of wine in the 60 liter fermenter is too much. So, you will need to transfer to your 6 gallon carboy after about a week or so.
 
rustbucket said:
jcaudill,

My house gets it's water from a well that has hard water. That water is softened by a water softener in the garage that uses salt as a catylist to remove the hardness. I became concerned about using my tap water about a month ago after I read an article on the WineMaker magazine website that said you should never use treated water in wine. Since then, I've made a Munton's Canadian Larger brew and used bottled spring water instead of my tap water. Walmart sells spring water for $0.69 a gallon so using it doesn't drive up the cost of making a wine kit that much. With the higher end kits, you only need 2 gallons or so. Plus spring water has minerals according to what I've read that is beneficial to yeast production.

Ron
Click to expand...

Just to clarify,,,, The hardness in the water is removed by the resin in the softener. The salt comes into play during the backwashing (recharge) cycle of the softener unit. It's purpose is to release the hardness minerals from the resin and flush them away. While there may be some residual NaCl left after the backwash, it'd be minimal and not noticeable. However as I have the same situation, I will agree that the minimal expense of a few gallons of spring or purified water for our hobby is well worth it! Just don't use distilled water for fermentation. The yeasties need oxygen to do their thing!!!
 
Floandgary said:
Just to clarify,,,, The hardness in the water is removed by the resin in the softener. The salt comes into play during the backwashing (recharge) cycle of the softener unit. It's purpose is to release the hardness minerals from the resin and flush them away. While there may be some residual NaCl left after the backwash, it'd be minimal and not noticeable.
Click to expand...

Just to further clarify, the way the resin softens the water is that it absorbs the calcium and magnesium in the hard water, by exchanging them for sodium (Na). So, the softened water now has more sodium and less calcium/magnesium.

In the recharge process, the calcium/magnesium that the resin absorbed is replaced by the sodium of the NaCl in the recharge cycle.

Note: A glass of Diet Pepsi will have more sodium than a glass of softened water. The Yeast would prefer the Calcium and Magnesium to the Sodium.
 
jcaudill said:
Hello,

I'm new to the winemaking world but I've been making beer for years so that is the world I'm familiar with.

I've picked up an RJ kit (23 liter yield) for my first attempt, and I have a 60 liter Speidel plastic fermenter.

Looking through the instructions there is talk about transferring the wine to a second carboy off the lees. Is that a strictly necessary step? It sounds like it is with the need to degass but I just wanted to making sure. I have a 6 gallon carboy as well I can transfer into. But just want to make sure that's a step I need to take or if there's a way to accomplish this in a single tank.

Also one other question I have is about the water. For homebrewing, I run my city water through a pretty hefty chloramine filter to strip out the chloramines the city adds. Is that something I should do for wine as well?

Thanks in advance!
Click to expand...

I would strongly recommend that you ferment in your 60L and then rack off the lees to your 6g carboy, per the instructions.
 
Thanks to everyone who took the time to reply! Winemaking is definitely a different animal than brewing beer. I'll use mineral water to be safe, and rack it off. Fortunately transferring to another vessel is pretty easy via the spout on the Speidel!
 

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