Recent content by the_crane

Hi Obelix, I'm from Sydney. I did my first vintage of Shiraz last year and came out with 200l. I'm happy the way it came out and got a good, honest feedback from my friends whom i shared it with. I didn't use a commercial yeast and did it old school and it came out fine. I crushed some Merlot...

Photos from bottling Here are some photos of bottling day

So nearly 5 months after pressing I have bottled my Shiraz. I blended the 3 demijohns as I was getting different ph readings from each butvit finally came out at 4.3. Not ideal for a red but I'm happy with the taste. I purchased a Buon Vino filter to polish it and it certainly brought out a...

Hello all, I racked my shiraz for the last time and placed it into three 54 litre demijohns to age for 3 months. Before the wine went in I gave it a dose of Campdon tablets. They were crushed and mixed with water and poured into each demijohn before the wine. I checked in on the wine the other...

Residue on top of wine I checked in on my wine today and noticed this white looking residue on top of the wine. Would it be from the Campdon tablets? When I added it to each bottle I crushed them and mixed it with water to dissolve it. This mixture went into the demijohn before the wine went in.

Aging I did my final rack on Sunday and surprised to see a small amount of fines at the bottom of each demijohn. I doses each clean demijohn with campdon tablets, 1 per 5 litres. I plan to rest the wine for 3 months before bottling.

I have added nothing up to this point.

I did my first rack today and lost about 20 litres of lees. I tried to blend the three 60 litre carboys to mix up the wine a bit as the last one had more sediment than the rest. This was the last one to be filled from my tank. They are now under air lock and I'll check next week if there is more...

I transferred my wine into the carboys on Sunday. I pressed the pomace twice sampling the taste each time. Before going into the carboys I blended all of the juice and pressing together. I thought it tasted pretty darn good. I'll rack it off in a couple of weeks before transferring it into...

Nearly there My hydro reading is at 1.005 sG to day so I'm planning to press on Sunday. Once the wine settles I will look at testing the pH and TA now that primary fermentation has finished.

I sampled and tested my Shiraz today doing my usual test but this time I had a hydrometer. My sample gave me a SG of 1.020 which after calculations with temp of 22.7C gives me a Brix of 5.2%. Interesting comparing todays hydro reading against the refractometer conversion. My pH is increasing...

Thank you for all of the great advice. I ran the conversion calcs and have attached how my testing is going. The must is still fermenting and dropping sugars but my pH and TA has increased since two days ago. The TA is fine at 0.7 but my pH should be below 3.5 for a red, correct?? I tasted the...

Is it too late to add a yeast to the must?

Thanks for the link.

Yes, I didn't add any yeast as I have never seen any of my family members do this step in past seasons. The must still smells fruity and I can hear the must fermenting. I'm tracking daily the Brix levels but I will locate the conversion spreadsheet. Thanks