Degas Wine

[mikev63]

Do I need to degas my KIT wine if I age the wine in the glass carboy for 6 - 12 months?

If I do need to...Would you recommend a vacuum pump? If so, will it implode my glass carboy and break?

Thanks for your help.

 

[JordanPond]

Do I need to degas my KIT wine if I age the wine in the glass carboy for 6 - 12 months?

If I do need to...Would you recommend a vacuum pump? If so, will it implode my glass carboy and break?

Thanks for your help.

Degassing is recommended even if you are going to bulk age. Removing the disolved gas will help the wine clear. The gas left in the wine actually helps the yeast and other solids remain suspended prevent them from falling to the botton. The wine will degas to an extent naturally but you leave the possibility of leaving some gas. The first kit I made I did not fully degas and the wine retains some aspect of fizziness. I think it hides some of the natural flavor of the wine.

Lots of members on the sites have adopted the use of vacume pumps for degasing and racking wine from one carboy to another. Glass carboys are needed for this. Better Bottles and other plastic carboys colapse under a slight vacum. Carboys without cracks and defects should be safe as long as you don't apply too much of a vacum. People seem to recommend not exceeding a vacum of 22 psi (I know psi is not the correct unit of measure). I love my vacume pump.

 

[Rocky]

Greg, good answer to Mike's post.

Yes, it is not "PSI" (pounds per square inch), it is "in. Hg" (inches of mercury).

 

[mikev63]

Do you guys recommend any vacuum pumps? Are there any under $100.00?

 

[UBB]

Do you guys recommend any vacuum pumps? Are there any under $100.00?

The All in One Win PUmp that is sold on this site is awesome. I just recently got mine and used to rack 15 gallons. Was super easy and no mess. IMO if your budget allows, it's worth the $$.

 

[JordanPond]

I have an Invacare aspirator pump that I found on e-bay used. Then I had to pick up extra things for racking and degasing which took extra legwork and expense. I have not had any experience with the All in One vacuum pump but read from people on this forum that love it. If you can find a supplier that provides a one stop shopping experience I'd do it. The All in One may be such a product but can not confirm as I not used it.

I love doing DIY projects but some times it is great to pull something out of the box and start using.

 

[robie]

If you don't degas:
Kit wine just will never degas completely on its own
The wine will never properly clear.
The wine will taste bitter from the CO2.

Yes, a vacuum pump is the very best way to degas. Much more thorough than with a drill stirrer. It will also make racking simpler. If you go with the setup at All-In-One vacuum pumps, it will also make bottling a much less messy and much easier task.

 

[captainl]

I am drinking a bottle of luna rosa that was bulk aged for 10 months or so. It still has a slight carbonation, although better than the ones I didn't age as long. I am using a vacu-vin now (the thing that sucks air out of a wine bottles). My two recent kits are a lot better as far as I can tell. Not too much work. But a pump sure would be nice for racking though.

 

[charitytut]

I am drinking a bottle of luna rosa that was bulk aged for 10 months or so. It still has a slight carbonation, although better than the ones I didn't age as long. I am using a vacu-vin now (the thing that sucks air out of a wine bottles). My two recent kits are a lot better as far as I can tell. Not too much work. But a pump sure would be nice for racking though.

Yfggho ? M

 

[derunner]

Mike,

If you get a drill mounted stir rod, make sure your drill will spin fast enough. I was getting no degassing action and was giving up on the rod. Then I checked my drill and it had 2 rpm settings. one at 0-450, and one at 0-1500. I had been using on the low setting and was very frustrated at lack of degassing. At the high setting all i have to do is pulse it in either direction to pull out gas. In a carboy it is very difficult to use at high speed without an eruption, so my next attempt will be to transfer to the bucket and use there.

I have since bought the allinone wine pump and that pulls out an amazing amount of gas when splash racking in a vacuum. the vacuum keeps minimual oxygen from getting into your wine while splash racing. I'll get about 4 inches of foam in the carboy as it pulls out the co2 the first time.

 

[Tom_S]

I've found that after a year of bulk aging my wines have very little if any CO2 left in them. But I always make wine from juice and have never made wine from a kit, so I don't know how much of a difference there is. But if there is any CO2 left in the wine, usually some stirring with a drill mounted whip is enough to get rid of it. Or if it's a batch of wine that I filter, the filtering process usually removes any residual CO2 after aging.

 

[wineforfun]

I have just made a couple of 1 and 2gal. batches of Dragon Blood and other juice -based wine. However, I didn't "degas" either one that I know of. Neither recipe speaks of degassing. I will be tasting them for the first time this weekend.
What exactly is degassing and is it always necessary on every type of wine and recipe?