Juice pail sugar problems

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Alexb413

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Hey everyone new to the forum and appreciate any help or insight anyone has into this

So I recently bought a 6 gal cab sauv juice pail from my local store. However the juice pail was probably 2.5 - 3 weeks old at this point. They're fresh juice shipment comes in mid May and I bought mine early June

When I got home and tested with my hydrometer I was hitting 1.040...so after consulting an online calculator I was told to add roughly 5 lbs of sugar to bring it up to 1.092. I added 85% of the 5lbs and only hit 1.070. I then recalculated and it said to add roughly 2 lbs to get from 1.070 to 1.092. (And just as a side note I added sugar by boiling it in some of my juice each time not just dumping it in. I even let it sit for 1 hr with stirring every 15min to allow it to settle.) so I then only hit 1.084 before I had to add another 8oz of sugar again using the methods described above. Long story short I eventually got to 1.090 @ 80 degrees (which is roughly 1.092/3 when correcting for temp). I then decided to test again in the AM before I pitched the yeast just to allow settling and cooling and get a final reading.

So I checked it and got 1.070 this morning. Took a ton of readings and even stirred the bottom trying to check if any sugar feel out of solution. Nothing.....not sure what could explain any of this but would love to hear anybody's insight or prior expirience with this type of problem. Thanks!

*also as a side not I spoke with the salesperson and these pails have nothing added to them, yeast, sulfites, or otherwise...just a pail of juice
 
I'm afraid you may have been fermenting and didn't realize it.

And/or it stalled at the sg you recorded.
 
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Here's what I would do just to see if your actually fermenting.

Rack into a carboy, airlock and see if you quickly start getting bubbles. Do not turn your back on it for long and be ready to go back into pail if it really starts taking off (bubbling in the air lock). Notice if the bubbles get more aggressive or just stay steady.
 
for better or worse I made the quick executive decision this AM to just pitch the yeast anyway and see what happens. It's probably hour four right now and its bubbling quite a bit
 
I agree with Dave. The bucket was probably in mid-fermentation when you took the first reading. It likely started out somewhere around SG 1.090-1.095. When you consulted the online calculator, it gave you the amount of sugar to add to fresh juice (i.e. juice that had not been fermenting) so with the 6 to 7 pounds or so of sugar that you added, you effectively chaptalized the wine to something to the equivalent of well over ISG 1.140. If you could find a yeast that could tolerate that, you would end up with a very "hot" (meaning 'high alcohol') wine. When you dissolved the sugar in boiling wine, you probably boiled off all of alcohol in the solvent, but it would have little effect on the overall alcohol.

The wine seems to be fermenting so my suggestion is to leave it alone for now. You will likely experience a "stuck fermentation" somewhere down the road when the alcohol becomes too much for the yeast to handle. See where the SG is at that point. I expect you will have a fairly "sweet" wine that you may want to make into a Port (dessert) wine. There are some other measures you can take then but I would suggest seeing where this all leads before trying anything else.
 
Sorry but I am agreeing with others, that bucket was fermenting. SG of any juice bucket I got was like Rocky said, around 1.090
 
..... The wine seems to be fermenting so my suggestion is to leave it alone for now. You will likely experience a "stuck fermentation" somewhere down the road when the alcohol becomes too much for the yeast to handle. See where the SG is at that point. I expect you will have a fairly "sweet" wine that you may want to make into a Port (dessert) wine. There are some other measures you can take then but I would suggest seeing where this all leads before trying anything else.

He may be OK if he used a yeast with a high alcohol tolerance.
 

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