Did I "Degass" my sorbate?

[lodcomm]

Greetings Folks,

I am working with a 4 gallon batch of Marquette WIne that I harvested this past fall. I let my wife "bully" me into harvesting the grapes a bit early. The primary & Secondary went off fine, with the wine being a bit on the "Tart" side. I elected to sweeten the wine using a commercial Wine Conditioner/Sweetener. at the recommended 1 TBS/Liter (or whatever spoon it was). Anyhow, the resultant wine was pretty close to the sweetness I was looking for. I also added the equivalent of 4 Campden Tablets.



At this time I also added an "American Oak Medium Toast Spiral" to the carboy planning on just leaving it in for a week or so to add a mild oak touch. (I sanitized the spiral by soaking in campden solution as outlined in the instructions, and dropped her into the carboy. Put the airlock on.

After about 2 days, it appeared that the wine was "refermenting", foam showing up un surface, etc.. I pulled a sample and sure enough.. it was indeed "Recarbonated". I kept an eye on it and let the Oak Spiral "steep" for 2 weeks, racked the wine into another carboy and let it settle for a few days. It was still fairly carbonated.

Today (13th), I racked the wine through a #2 Filter on my Vino Mini Filter, added 1/2 tsp/Gal Potassium Sorbate to the blend, and then Proceeded to Vacuum Degas the wine. I used my vacuum pump an kept it under constant vacuum until the bubbles stopped:


Everything went as planned, until I got to thinking!

Since I added the Potassium Sorbate prior to Degassing, Did I actually "Degass" the potassium/sorbate solids right out of the wine as well? (sulfites too?)

Should I re-add the perscribed dose of PSorbate & Metabisulfide ?

Thanks in advance for your sage advice!

-t

 

[cmason1957]

Degassing can't remove solids and the particles are too small for the filter to remove them. I wonder if your potassium sorbate was old or good a bit wet prior to use, rendering it nearly useless. Perhaps what I would do is get new potassium sorbate and maybe potassium metabisulfite and add the recommended dosage of each.

 

[Rice_Guy]

* metabisulphite will form a soluble sulphite which further reacts to form the gas SO2 (sulphur dioxide). Since this is a gas and you are flushing CO2 with the vacuum you can remove a lot of it/ possibly most of it.
* sorbate is not very volatile therefore the molecule will stay in the wine. Craig notes that K sorbate in wine conditioner is wet and that sorbate breaks down with humidity. , , , , I have used this wine conditioner. ,, I have not seen a specification for how much sorbate is in it and wondered if is an over kill formula so there is enough even if you sweeten at 1/8 teaspoon. There ought to be an expiration date that gives a hint about the manufacturers experience on how long it is usable.

 

[lodcomm]

Thanks to everyone for the helpful information. I was pretty sure the Metabisulfide/(SO2) Gassed out along with the CO2.I was not sure if the same reaction would occur with the K Sorbate and as explained, it is low volatility and generally does not.

When I first added the conditioner, I added only the conditioner, and it was indeed a "Wet" solution, and due to the fact that the "Wet" KSorbate breaks down, that is the likely explanation for the restarted fermentation. (I also did some "Googling" on the conditioner product, and indeed came across a couple folks who experienced the Restarted fermentation after sweetening with this particular brand of Conditioner)

Yesterday, I added fresh (newly opened bottle) K Sorbate at the rate of 1/2 tsp per gallon. (After #2 Vino Filter, but prior to vacuum degas!).

I will go back and introduce the metabisulfide at the proper rate later today.

Thanks again to everyone for the great information.

-t