Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
Here's a pic.
Broad Run Cellars 2015 Fall Crush
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Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
I pitched CH16 about a week and a half ago. Very little activity in the carboy, but I am seeing a few tiny bubbles. Fingers are crossed, and I've got a little Don Ho playing down there 24/7 to encourage things. 
I've got the brew belt on it, keeping it around 72 degrees.
Yesterday, I racked and stabilized the Syrah. It was getting a bit of a yeasty taste to it. Hopefully, the racking will take care of that.
I've got the brew belt on it, keeping it around 72 degrees.Yesterday, I racked and stabilized the Syrah. It was getting a bit of a yeasty taste to it. Hopefully, the racking will take care of that.
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I have found that the yeasty taste will fade over time.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
Well, it's been a little over a month. Very little, if any, progress noted on the chromatography. I'm leaning toward 'very little'. Even though my eyes might be seeing things optimistically, I think the wine is tasting a little less harsh than I recall. I'm going to let it sit a little longer. But it's been over 2 months already and I'm starting to get nervous about not having any sulfite on the wine.
I thought danger was your middle name??????
Have you run another chromatography test?
As long as you don't have any white film starting to form on the wines surface your good.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
My middle name, yes. Not my first name.
Just ran another chroma on Sunday.
Brew belt is on, and temp around 72. Patience is what is needed, I guess.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
OK, I bought this little number about a month ago:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NL0BVAY/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20
For the cost of a new probe on my pHep 5, I could buy 3 of these. So I thought 'why not give this a try'. Calibration was easy and I then went on to measure my 3 2015 wines. As expected, the Cab came in acidic, with a pH of 3.25. They Syrah and Petite Sirah were 3.97 and 3.91. So now I have a decision to make: try to reduce the Cab's acidity by cold stabilizing, or simply blend it away with the Syrah and PS. A 60/30/10 Cab/Syrah/PS would mathematically get me to around 3.53. So I'm thinking about that - subject to bench trials, of course.
Back to that little meter though: I'm pretty impressed with how quickly it locked in to a measurement. After measuring each wine, I rinsed it with distilled water and tested it again in each of my calibration solutions. It locked right in, +/- 0.01. So I'm pretty happy so far.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NL0BVAY/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20
For the cost of a new probe on my pHep 5, I could buy 3 of these. So I thought 'why not give this a try'. Calibration was easy and I then went on to measure my 3 2015 wines. As expected, the Cab came in acidic, with a pH of 3.25. They Syrah and Petite Sirah were 3.97 and 3.91. So now I have a decision to make: try to reduce the Cab's acidity by cold stabilizing, or simply blend it away with the Syrah and PS. A 60/30/10 Cab/Syrah/PS would mathematically get me to around 3.53. So I'm thinking about that - subject to bench trials, of course.
Back to that little meter though: I'm pretty impressed with how quickly it locked in to a measurement. After measuring each wine, I rinsed it with distilled water and tested it again in each of my calibration solutions. It locked right in, +/- 0.01. So I'm pretty happy so far.
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Well, not exactly. Because the pH scale is logarithmic, you cannot take the simple weighted average of the pH's. Instead, you should exponentiate the negative of each number, then take an average, then take the negative logarithm to find the average pH. To convince yourself of this, consider what you would get if you took a 50/50 mixture of concentrated hydrochloric acid (2.0) and water (7.0). The resultant pH would certainly not be 4.5! Instead, it is 2.3.
I went ahead and did the proper average for you, and find that your 60/30/10 blend would get you to 3.42.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
I was hoping I could just skip to the end and get the answer. Thanks for providing that.
(I did read your entire explanation though - it was just over my head)
Although a fun exercise to do on paper also an impossible one to accurately try and figure out as there is no easy way to know or calculate the buffering capacity of a wine due to various amounts of potassium levels in each wine.
Blend it via bench trial if you wish or blend it all and let er roll.
Blend it via bench trial if you wish or blend it all and let er roll.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
OK, back on Jan 16th, I added about 4g of potassium carbonate to a 1 gallon jug of the cabernet. It's been sitting in the garage since then. Last night, I racked it out of that container and brought it back to the comfort of the winery. I will test the pH tonight, but comparing the untreated wine in the 6 gallon carboy to the 1 gallon treated sample, I have two VERY different wines. The latter is much smoother, with less acidity and more fruit - at less than 5 months of age, it's already a pretty darn good Cabernet. I think this was successful and after testing the pH tonight, will likely treat the remaining 6 gallons and move it to the garage for a few weeks.
What will be interesting to see is if MLF kicks off in the 1 gallon sample, now that the acid appears to have been reduced.
What will be interesting to see is if MLF kicks off in the 1 gallon sample, now that the acid appears to have been reduced.
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Can you detect any off tastes at all or salt?
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
I have a couple red wines from the Fall that the pH after fermentation were down close to 3.1 and they are not budging on MLF. So I may try this as well soon.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
I haven't adjusted that or the Syrah yet. Both have completed MLF and have been stabilized. I'll probably do some bench trials with a little Tartaric Acid added in a few months and go from there.
Boatboy24
No longer a newbie, but still clueless.
Syrah and PS were 0.55 prior to fermentation. I added TA to get me halfway to 0.65, but haven't measured since.
Cabernet was 0.65 prior to fermentation. Did not adjust.
TA was measured by looking for the color change and not by pH, so I may have been off.
I did a canned blackberry wine as an experiment and had higher Ph and low TA prior to fermentation, did the same thing you did, adjusted half way.
Few weeks later, post fermentation, ran the Ph and TA and was surprised that my halfway adjustment and the fermentation process had taken me all of the way to where I wanted to be. Lot to be said for taking it slow................
