A couple of Newb concerns

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johnvh

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We are new to the forum and this is our first post. We have recently started our first batch of wine from a kit. The kit is a WineExpert brand of Pinot Noir. Our primary fermentation was done in the bucket for 1 week as per the instructions. The temperature has been kept between 18-22 degrees Celsius. We had a few degree swing as our wine making is in the basement and in the winter it is obviously colder up in Canada. When we were starting our batch, the temperature was only 16.5 degrees Celsius in the basement . We ended up using a belt style carboy heater for a few hours to get the temperature up to 24 degrees celsius so that we could add the yeast. We were able to remove the heater as the natural heat of the fermentation seemed to maintain the temperature on it's own. We were able to leave the heater off for most of the week.

At seven days we checked the SG and it was 1.00. We then did our first rack into the carboy. It went pretty well except for the fact that the rigid siphon line with the cap on the end in the bucket shifted a couple of times while racking stirring up some sediment. I think we ended up with a little more sediment in our secondary fermentation than we would like.

I have 2 concerns:

My first concern is the water we use. We have a saltwater aquarium so we have an RO unit for our aquarium water. Tap water is a big NO NO for marine aquariums, so in my infinite wisdom I thought it would be perfect for making wine. I am afraid that I might have made a mistake; we used RO water in our primary fermentation. I hope I have not ruined our first attempt.

My second concern is the headspace in the carboy. The kit instructions say not to top up which seems to go against a lot of the advice I see. Please see attached picture.

carboy.JPG
 
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Welcome! I'll try to answer your concerns. I am not to familiar with the RO but I do know your wine fermented. So it must have had the required nutrients. So relax. As far as the sediment goes it's ok going into your 2ndary as a matter of fact your just trying to get them off most of them a lil transfer of lees helps to make a complete fermentation. Headspace is not crucial at this stage of the game as long as your still having active fermentation. You can do a lil check by giving the carboy a lil shake and if the airlock bubbles it's ok but also I wouldn't go to long with that much headspace. Rack into a smaller carboy as soon as you can hope I put your mind at ease again welcome and enjoy
 
I think you're okay, but I worry about your temperature. At those temps it may take longer to ferment, so make sure that you go by the SG and not just the number of days in the instructions. I HIGHLY recommend that when you get to the end of secondary fermentation that you heat the wine to 23-24 degrees. That will make degassing much much easier. If you try to degas it at 18-20 degrees it will be very difficult to get the CO2 to release and completely degas.

Enjoy.
 
RO (or Reverse Osmosis) water will be just fine. I've always used it (including when I ran a Ferment on Premises).

Since that's probably a 23 litre carboy, I would double check the measuring line on your primary fermenter. I haven't used that style of plastic carboy, so I'm not sure how close it is to 23 litres.

[Reminder...23 litres is the same as 5 Imperial gallons which is the same as 6 US gallons.]

Steve
 
Thanks for the replies. We thought we followed the proper levels on the primary bucket that came with kit. We will be using the cord heater to bring it up to temp before we degas. It is our only carboy so I guess we'll top off with comparable wine to the kit when we perform the next rack after degassing for the final ferment. I will basing my steps by the SG readings throughout the rest of the process
 
The head space should be okay until you finish secondary fermentation and degas. Then you will want to deal with the excess head space. You can top off with a commercial Pinot or you can sanitize some aquarium safe glass decorating rocks and add them to your carboy. They will displace the wine causing it to rise. Just add enough to get the wine to the neck of the carboy. If you have a glass carboy be careful and add the stones slowly. There have been reports of people cracking glass carboys by adding too many too fast.

One thing I'm wondering is if you left too much wine behind in the primary. You want to take all of the wine you can out of the primary even if that means that you pick up some of the sediment. A little bit of the sediment getting into the carboy is not going to hurt anything. It will settle back out again in the carboy.

Also you might be interested in a thread I started a year ago in the Kit Winemaking section of this forum. Just do a search on "A Tale of Three Pinots". I started three different WE Pinot kits at the same time a Vintners Reserve, Select and an Eclipse and did a taste test on them a year later.

Welcome to the madness of winemaking.
 
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If your kit comes with an fpack that'll take up some of the headspace. If there is one, depending on how much is in it, you might not need to top up with anything.
 
Looks like you are doing fine. Also, a cooler ferment on a Pinot Noir can only do good things, no worries there.

One reason the kit manufacturers tell you not to top up yet is because you will be doing some more work on the wine (yes it is wine now!). Adding clarifying stuff, stirring and degassing etc. Once you do that, top off with some low dollar Pinot and let it sit.

BTW, one carboy seems like it can asexually reproduce and you will have 8 or 10 in in your wine closet no time!
 
Beat me to me editing my post. I was just going to add to my post about if it didn't have an fpack. I'd hold off until last to top up. Like doc said add all your clarifiers and degas per the instructions first. Then after the carboy is ready for bulk aging then add some Pinot to top up.
 

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