Help!At the Clarifying Stage......lots of foam!!

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Schatzie

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Ok...I'm following my Friend's Brother-in-laws recipe. He makes a GREAT wine!!
6 can frozen 100%juice 5 lbs sugar water etc
everything went as he said....after fermentation my alcohol was at 15%.
He then told me to add 3 teaspoons of potassium sorbate and stir like crazy until bubbles disappear. Which I did... No bubbles, as far As i saw anymore.
I then should wait for 2 days and then add my biofine, 3 teaspoons and wait another week. Now its been 9 days and i have lots of foam on top of my wine . I took some wine and put in a glass and dropped 5 droplets and it started to clear. So i added some more biofine to the wine... Why do i still have bubbles>? i dont want to bother him anymore ...the wine taste good but its not clear and i fear about bottling and exploding wine bottles!!! help
Btw- 3 gal jug of wine and i sanitized everything!!
I am so new to this ...sorry about not using proper terms - I'm trying! Really
:?!
 
There are 2 main reasons for "why do I still have bubbles?"
1) You did not stir enough.
2) Your wine did not finish fermenting.

The only way you can truly tell if the wine is done fermenting is with a hydrometer.

The solution is the same: Wait till it is done fermenting, and then stir like crazy some more. You can tell if you have stirred enough by filling a sanitized bottle 1/2 full. Shake it with your thumb on the top sealing it. Does it puff when you remove your thumb?

My guess is by now, you don't have the risk of exploding bottles. That comes with fermentation after you bottle it. However, you might end up with fizzy wine of you do not degass enough.
 
is there anything i can do fix this now? should i stir more now? add more add more potassium sorbate?
 
"fixing" implies "broken".

I let time do my degassing. Unless you are in a hurry to bottle your wine, just let it sit. Stirring can do more harm (introduce oxygen) than good (get rid of CO2). By letting time do the work for you, you minimize the introduction of oxygen.
 
LOL, have a bit of patience. Wine doesn't play by rules of time. It can get done in a few days like the recipe says or it mite take months. A lot of it depends on the temperature you are making your wine in. If it is really warm, things tend to go faster. If it is cool or cold things can slow way way down. Most wines kind of like temps. around the mid 70's. Most places this time of year are cooler than that so things take longer to happen. In winemaking your times are usually figured in months for short times, not days. Longer times go to years. Have fun with it and good luck. Arne.
 
Degassing

LOL, have a bit of patience. Wine doesn't play by rules of time. It can get done in a few days like the recipe says or it mite take months. A lot of it depends on the temperature you are making your wine in. If it is really warm, things tend to go faster. If it is cool or cold things can slow way way down. Most wines kind of like temps. around the mid 70's. Most places this time of year are cooler than that so things take longer to happen. In winemaking your times are usually figured in months for short times, not days. Longer times go to years. Have fun with it and good luck. Arne.

My downstairs stays about 65 degrees during the winter. I took a large storage bucket and I've attached an aquarium heater to the side. I put a mark on the side of the bucket so I know how much water to put in when I have my primary fermenter/carboy in. I then set the heater to 75 degrees and put things in. It's seeming to work well at keeping the right temperature. Now if I can just get the degassing part done so I don't have effervescent wine! The winexpert kits state that if not bottling once its clear, you have to seal it and top it or transfer to smaller carboy. Will this additional time serve to degas it?
 
besides the great advice you have gotten, another thing to remember is don't go strictly by the recipe. Always use your hydrometer, use it to determine how much sugar to add. You should be bringing your sg higher than 1.090 and use your hydrometer to determine if fermentation is complete or if you have a stuck fermentation and never add sorbate to a wine that has not completed fermentation.
 
My downstairs stays about 65 degrees during the winter. I took a large storage bucket and I've attached an aquarium heater to the side. I put a mark on the side of the bucket so I know how much water to put in when I have my primary fermenter/carboy in. I then set the heater to 75 degrees and put things in. It's seeming to work well at keeping the right temperature. Now if I can just get the degassing part done so I don't have effervescent wine! The winexpert kits state that if not bottling once its clear, you have to seal it and top it or transfer to smaller carboy. Will this additional time serve to degas it?

Looks like your temp. is good. The wine will probably degas on its own. You just have to have some patience. Each time you rack it helps degass. If it was me, I would not seal the carboy, I would put an airlock on it. It will let the gas out as it degasses. Normally you have to get a lot of the gas out before it will clear. After it is clear, taste it and see how much gas is left. Sometimes not so much, sometimes quite abit. I know it is hard when you are starting out, but slow down. Wine takes time and things like degassing will normally happen on their own or you can make them happen and try to speed things up a bit. Here is another little hint when you get around to bottling. Put the last bottles worth in a container of some kind. Stick it in the refrigerator. That way you won't have to open a bottle in two days to see how it is going. Just take it out of the refrigerator and have a taste or two. Might make it a week or so before you have to pull a cork. Have fun with it, take your time and good luck. Arne.
 
Another beginner here. I don't know much about this style of wine, but foam or CO2 means it was probably still fermenting, though at 15% must have been a high alcohol yeast.

I'd rack it into another bucket or carboy and try to leave to foam in the original bucket. Take a hydrometer reading, wait a few days, then take another and see if it changed. If it didn't, you're ok to bottle.

Alternatively, If you're in a cold weather state, try cold stabilization. Get the wine down in a cold area, and let the cold precipitate out the lees. It'll leave a clearer wine, and the colder temp inhibits yeast. Then Sorbate and metabisulate the lot and it should be ok for bottling. If it is 15%, you probably don't have to worry about exploding bottles. But, if you're still worried, look into zorks. they would pop out before exploding. I've used them since I started 3 years ago, and they are nice and easy for a beginner to use.

I've found in three years, winemaking is a lot of doing things during fermentation, followed by a lot of waiting around and not doing anything. My first 2 5 gallon batches of wine were suprisingly good, even though I bottled them after only 6 months. By second batches I waited more than a year, and they are going to be great, as far as I can tell.
 
I am a newbee also lots of good info already. I will only say that I never sorbate till ready to bottle. I kmata after primary then into carboy for six months or so, racking once or twice or so during the six months. Then finishers and sorbate then backsweeten. My best half likes her wine sweet!
seems to work for me at the "Messay Closet Winery" haha
 

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