Bulk aging

I am new to wine making. I have muddled through primary and currently my apple wine is in the secondary fermenter, albeit a little sooner than it should have been. Made a few missteps, but i hope this will be a decent batch.

I have read a lot about the wine making process, which has brought both clarity and confusion.... I wanted to get some feedback on bulk aging and topping off.

i got into this on the cheap. bought 2 7 gallon fermonster fermenters. Like i said above, i made some mistakes. As you can guess, as i racked from primary to secondary, i lost volume, in addition to the original head space i left in the primary fermenter. now i am facing a bulk aging issue where i am needing to probably mitigate at least 1.5 gallons once SG <1.000. i have purchased some glass marbles to help displace the wine- but now i am at a point where i would be using a ridiculous amount of glass marbles..... Once fully fermented ABV should be around 13.5-14% (i know too high, another misstep by a newbie)

I plan on clarifying the wine using sparkloid and adding campden tablets as i airlock the wine for bulk aging. i could top off with water, but that would dilute the flavor. is it a good idea or bad idea to add the potassium sorbate and sweetener (planning on using apple juice) to the wine at this point? My thought is it would sweeten the wine as i plan on doing anyways and take care of the headspace issue. But would the sorbate also stop what ever happens durring the aging process?

alternatively, i could do the "correct" thing and buy a 5 gallon carboy and sweeten before bottling, but i dont have much room for storing a lot of carboys (which is something i will need to address as i pursue this hobby).

On a similar note any thoughts on adding cinnamon sticks to the bulk aging wine? I had two sitcks in the primary fermenter, but the cinnamon flavor is non existent when i tasted the young wine after racking to secondary, but i know it could be hiding in there.

As always, i appreciate the input and advice from all.

Your best option is to get that 5 gal carboy. I know that storage is an issue, but wouldn't a carboy replace one of your 7 gal fermenters?


Your ABVs are at an acceptable level. There are many wines that are that strong. If you do feel that the wine is too strong, you could dilute the wine by topping off with water. Just remember that you will be affecting the PH level and also thinning out the flavor of the wine.

My recommendation is not worry about the ABV level and get a similar store bought wine and top off with that. Try not to go cheap on the "top off" wine. Just be sure that the "top off" wine tastes good.

JohnT. Much appreciated. I didnt think about using a similar store bought wine, and made no consideration towards impact to the PH.

Re: alcohol content will have to wait and see

read something about fruit wines being better at a lower ABV, which is certainly a matter of taste but looking forward to seeing my opinion.

@Glen ,You could consider adding some apple juice to your fermenting vessel right now before AF is over, which would accomplish two things which are giving you concern.

1. By using an apple juice with a SG lower than 1.100, you would effectively bring your final ABV down a bit (you can use Fermcalc to help figure out the math)

and

2. Decide what volume to add which will allow you to use the vessels you already have on hand, I presume that 1.5 - 2 gallons would accomplish this task. You'd have more wine, and it wouldn't be watered down, and apple juice is cheaper than wine.

Just a thought

Johnd. that is another interesting idea. would there be an SG level reading where i wouldnt want to do this? The yeast i am using is ICV-D21 (Alcohol tolerant to 16%) and i used fermaid o 1/2 prior to pitching yeast, 1/2 added after transfer to secondary fermenter (another noted misstep)

Glen said:

Johnd. that is another interesting idea. would there be an SG level reading where i wouldnt want to do this? The yeast i am using is ICV-D21 (Alcohol tolerant to 16%) and i used fermaid o 1/2 prior to pitching yeast, 1/2 added after transfer to secondary fermenter (another noted misstep)

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You'd want to add your AJ while you still have good fermentation going on. As I said, if you add AJ with a lower SG, since you're adding roughly 2 gallons of AJ to 4.5 gallons of fermenting wine, it'll drop your final ABV down.

Some quick numbers I ran on Fermcalc would look like this:

Add 2 gallons AJ @ SG 1.070 to your currently fermenting 4.5 gallon, 14% ABV wine, would yield 6.5 gallons of wine (before rackings), with a final ABV of 12.77%, if the batch got down to .995.

You would have effectively increased your volume, without diluting the wine, and lowered the ABV from 14% to 12.77% in one move.

Regarding topping off - What was your original ration of pounds of fruit to gallons? And did you measure based on the juice or the raw poundage of apples (Before mashing/juicing). With apples there is a lot of potential waste from coring and even the pulp (Which is what probably generated your large amount of lees.
Downsizing the carboy is of course the straightforward simple method but don't forget that in a large batch even a quart of water isn't just going to destroy the wine taste. And if you are concerned about the ABV that dilution will help reduce that a little.
As far as pH you can bump that up if needed with a little acid blend or a specific acid since they are sold separately or a blend.
Most recipes are made to accommodate some topping off without loss of taste or quality.

The AJ addition is of course a no-dilution way to go once you get the numbers where you want them - Kudos to JohnD on that. Just check the contents of that AJ - some have stabilizers/preservatives that could stop or slow the fermentation.)

thanks for the math and the referenced fermcalc app. very cool app and it will come in handy.

I didnt use apples, just apple juice. and to be honest, i only did apple juice because it was on sale for a dollar. My recipe is below:

704 fl oz apple juice
24 fl oz apple juice concentrate
24 fl oz water
4 lbs brown sugar (+ 32 fl oz water)
4 lbs white sugar (+ 32 fl oz water)
2 cinnamon sticks in primary - will remove after racking
1 packet of Fermaid O
1 packet of ICV-D21
Pectic Enzyme to volume

initial sg 1.1

titrated acid after adjustment about 0.65%

Ambient room temp 70-74 F

Didnt have much sediment (although i thought it looked a little funny with black streaks) maybe a quarter of an inch. i left a lot of wine behind because of siphon operator inexperience (me).

I'll test the acid of the AJ, adjust close to .65%, top if off and hope for the best.

Glen, If I was adding that juice, think I would start it and get it fermenting good before I added it. Just use the same yeast. Reason for that is some juices have preservatives that don't play well with the yeasts. You are toward the end of your main ferment and the yeasts might be getting tired. Might be hard to get the new juice started fermenting with the old yeast. Just a thought.
Arne.

Arne, I wish I could but I'm limited on fermentation vessels. I added straight to the secondary. About 1hr later really picked up activity with yeast

@Glen , how much AJ did you decide to add? What was the starting SG of the AJ that you added?

Added 1.5 gallon (192 fl oz). Sg of AJ was only 1.03.

Glen said:

Added 1.5 gallon (192 fl oz). Sg of AJ was only 1.03.

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That should work out pretty nicely, blending 4.5 gallons of 14% liquid with 1.5 gallons of 4.6% liquid (assumed FG of .995) will get you 6 gallons of 11.65% liquid.

When i rack from secondary to a bulk aging vessel, is it OK to add K meta, sparkeloid and k sorbate at the same time?

I never add sorbate, until very soon before bottling. I never add clearing agents until I have to. Generally 3-6 months after start of bulk aging. Most wines will clear on their own in that time and I don't have to add anything extra. I only add k meta and let time be my friend.

Glen said:

When i rack from secondary to a bulk aging vessel, is it OK to add K meta, sparkeloid and k sorbate at the same time?

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Yes, it is okay! Assuming you're wine is reasonable degassed and you stir in each agent it is okay to add them after secondary - at the start of bulk aging. All the kits I've done and many, if not most, of the recopies I've used for fruit/country wine have instructions to add sorbate and stir, add k-meta and sir and finally clearing agent(s) and stir. It is often referred to as the stabilization phase which is done coming out of secondary.