Dilemma help solve

[pwrose]

Ok heres the situation

5 gallons of blackberry/elderberry (5 gallon carboy)
7 gallons of big red muscadine (5 gallon carboy)(2x 1 gallon carboys)
3+ gallons of Noble muscadine (5 gallon carboy)******
(#2)4+ gallons of Scuppernong (5 gallon carboy)******
(#1)3 gallons of Scuppernong (3 gallon carboy)******
(#3)3 gallons of Suppernong (3 gallon carboy)******
3 gallons of Watermelon (3 gallon carboy)

Heres the dilemma,
I need to rack the 3 different Scuppernongs and the Muscadines.
The Noble really needs to be in a 3 gallon carboy but I don't have another one to put it in. The 4 gallons of Scuppernong needs to be in a smaller carboy as well. Most I think would say mix all the Scuppernongs and put them in the 5 gallon carboys and put the noble in a 3 gallon carboy. But heres what you don't know,
The #1 scuppernong was made using no extra water and using wild yeast
The #2 scuppernong was made using no extra water and using EC-1118 yeast
The #3 scuppernong was made using extra water and wild yeast
They all started with an SG of 1.080-1.090 and an TA of .65-.70%. I thought like most probably would and was going to mix the Scuppernongs a get 10 gallons to put into 2x 5 gallon carboys. However I don't konw how well the three different ones will mix. The simplist thing I have is the Noble, it just needs to be racked and put into a 3 gallon carboy, but how do I come up with one of those without buying another one. (No extra money until the middle of November, even then I still have to pass it by the boss lady)

So how do I get a 3 gallon carboy freed up. Or what other options do you see that would work. The watermelon is still clearing as is the Blackberry/Elderberry.

 

[Tom]

looks like you should leave them and BUY more carboys.

 

[greyday]

You COULD top up the 3+ gallons of noble muscadine with the 2 1 gallon big red muscadines. No idea what effect that would have, but I bet it would still taste good. Then you have 2 open gallon containers; you can clear the remainder in a couple of glass litre bottles (like you get sparkling water in; you can also buy drilled bungs that will fit them, those really narrow ones). I have the leftover port I made in a 1l pellegrino bottle, works fine!

Or if you're ABSOLUTELY SURE fermentation has completed, I've reused screwtop bottles to store clearing wine, it's just a pain due to the size. If you have an empty magnum bottle, that would work better (you could also post a request on Craigslist for one)...

 

[pwrose]

looks like you should leave them and BUY more carboys.

Tom did ya miss this part, lol.
I wish I had the money and the space to buy a hundred of them but I don't, at least not yet. Next year is looking promising though!!!!!!

Greyday
That still dont solve the problem of the 4 gallons of Scuppernong that is in a 5 gallon carboy. How do I top that one off. Right now it still has an airlock from the first racking from the primary fermenter, so it has a good layer of gas to protect it until I rack it again and then thats gone.

 

[djrockinsteve]

I have at various tight times siphoned to a bucket, clean the carboy, then siphon back. Hate to do that but you do what ya gotta do.

 

[mmadmikes1]

I have at various tight times siphoned to a bucket, clean the carboy, then siphon back. Hate to do that but you do what ya gotta do.

Me too. If you can get A CAN OF co2 FROM SPORTING GOODS store fill bucket with co2. As you siphon in the cos will rise and protect wine. no splashing allowed.

 

[greyday]

Greyday
That still dont solve the problem of the 4 gallons of Scuppernong that is in a 5 gallon carboy. How do I top that one off. Right now it still has an airlock from the first racking from the primary fermenter, so it has a good layer of gas to protect it until I rack it again and then thats gone.

Are you using sorbate when you rack? If so then I'd probably do my earlier suggestion in combination with topping off the 4 with one of the ones in one of the threes, then simply use the two 1 gallons for the rest of that three. I'd use #3 because it has added water, which in a 20% increase in the larger won't make much of a difference, whereas losing a third of the no added water one would be less desirable for me.

If that made sense, sorry. I'm two glasses into the evening at this point...

 

[Sirs]

Pat the easiest thnig to do is like Steve said and just rack one off to a bucket but do it slowly as not to cause alot of inter mixing with oxygen one batch in bucket and you got others covered as far as mixing you can mix the 2 scupps done on wild together as the little extra water won't hurt that I know just mix and put in a five then you just need a gallon to put extra gallon in hopes that made sense

 

[pwrose]

I have plenty of buckets to rack them into just not the right carboys to fill correctly. The three scuppernongs are of such different makes I really hat to mix any of them. # 1 and # 3 were done on skins and # 2 was just straight juice. Then there is the yeast and the SG levels as well as the TA.
I don't think I want to mix the muscadines either, one was done with wild yeast on the skins and the other with RC-212 yeast and only a couple days on the skins. Both of those had some water mixed in but not that much.
I can rack them and put them all back into the carboys they come out of but then there is the CO2 isssue, I like the idea of adding CO2 but by the time I spend the money on that I could but a 3 gallon carboy. I do have about 12 one gallon jugs/carboys but only 1 bung left to fit them. I got the airlocks just no bungs, lol, go figure.
I am going to sleep on it and see if any other ideas come up. I might just end up mixing the Scuppernongs and putting them in the two 5 gallon carboys and putting the noble muscadine in a 3 gallon where it belongs. I will keep this updated as well as my blogs here so everyone knows what ends up happening.

 

[Sirs]

ok the #1 &#3 of scupps could be put together in the 5 gallon the noble is in after their racked inot a bucket together clean the 3 gallon carboys and rack noble into one of them then go from there

 

[Deezil]

Run a bench trial.

3 parts of #1, 4 parts #2, 3 parts #3.... You say you dont know what they'll taste like mixed together - this will give you an idea.

If you like it, rack all 3 #'s into a 10+ gallon bucket and stir gently to mix thoroughly, clean one of the 3-gallon carboys, then rack the noble to the clean 3-gallon. Then clean the two now-empty 5-gallon carboys, and rack your 10 gallons of mixed scuppernong into those 5-gallons.

This would also leave you with an empty 3-gallon carboy.

 

[Julie]

Take the #1 and #2 Scupp and mix them into a 5g carboy. The only difference is the fact that one is wild yeast and the other is 1118, I don't believe you would notice that much of a difference in taste.

Did you add any water to the noble? If not you can and it will not effect the taste, Noble is strong enough in flavor that it actually could use to be diluted some.

 

[UglyBhamGuy]

Take the #1 and #2 Scupp and mix them into a 5g carboy.

And VIOLA, you will have a 2 three gallon carboys empty (one for the 3 + gallon Noble and another for something else.)
And if there is extra left over from the racking...

 

[Deezil]

Take the #1 and #2 Scupp and mix them into a 5g carboy.

How does one fit 7 gallons into a 5 gallon container?

 

[ffemt128]

If a train leaves San Francisco traveling at 120 miles an hour and a train leaves Philly traveling at 105 miles per hour which one will reach North Dakota first?

This reminds me of those nasty word problems from high school. Transfer into buckets, use the carboys you have in the mean time pick up some bungs for the 1 gallon jugs and go from there.

 

[pwrose]

The only thing that would make this better is to have you all in one room with plenty to drink and treat you like a jury. You can't leave until everyone agrees to the same thing, and all the drinks are gone.
I would just have to be a fly on the wall for that. lol

I think what I will do is mix some like Deezil said and see how it taste. I will also taste each one separatley and see if any one taste that much different. I think between the 3 different ones total I should have pretty close to 10 gallons after racking. There is only one of them that has a ton of sediment, so I expect to loose a good bit with that one.

Plan of attack
3x 5 gallon buckets
Rack each one into separate buckets and test
Mix and taste again
Come to a conclusion hopefully. Why do things so simple have to be so complicated sometimes.

 

[Julie]

How does one fit 7 gallons into a 5 gallon container?

that is what he has now, not what he will have once he racks, the rest can go in smaller jugs for topping up.

 

[pwrose]

Well here is how it all turned out.
Racked all three into different 5 gallon buckets.
#1 measured the following
SG .996
TA .90%
pH 3.2
#2 measured the following
SG .994
TA .80%
pH 3.4
#3 measured the following and was really gassy
SG .996
TA 1.00%
pH 3.2

So I tasted all three and could not taste a difference in any of them really. # 2 didn't seem to taste as acidic which would stand to reason since it was the lowest TA of the three. But that could have been in my head as well.
So all three were combined into an 18 gallon tote and there turned out to be right at 9 gallons. I added enough water to bring it up to 10 gallons and in hopes that it would help with the acid levels, then put them into 2x 5 gallon carboys.

The Nobel muscadine was racked from the 5 gallon carboy into a 3 gallon carboy and I only measure the SG on this one because I ran out of TA test solution. The SG on this one was .992.

I haven't racked the Big Red yet but needed to take a break so I will get back to that one in a little while.

If the water that I added to the 10 gallons doesn't help the acid levels come down what is another way to get the acid levels in check?

 

[Julie]

Well here is how it all turned out.
Racked all three into different 5 gallon buckets.
#1 measured the following
SG .996
TA .90%
pH 3.2
#2 measured the following
SG .994
TA .80%
pH 3.4
#3 measured the following and was really gassy
SG .996
TA 1.00%
pH 3.2

So I tasted all three and could not taste a difference in any of them really. # 2 didn't seem to taste as acidic which would stand to reason since it was the lowest TA of the three. But that could have been in my head as well.
So all three were combined into an 18 gallon tote and there turned out to be right at 9 gallons. I added enough water to bring it up to 10 gallons and in hopes that it would help with the acid levels, then put them into 2x 5 gallon carboys.

The Nobel muscadine was racked from the 5 gallon carboy into a 3 gallon carboy and I only measure the SG on this one because I ran out of TA test solution. The SG on this one was .992.

I haven't racked the Big Red yet but needed to take a break so I will get back to that one in a little while.

If the water that I added to the 10 gallons doesn't help the acid levels come down what is another way to get the acid levels in check?

For future reference, i would make a water wine and use that when adding water to a wine that has already fermented dry, this will prevent lowering your ABV. The water should lower the acid level but if not cold stabilizing will lower it.

 

[ffemt128]

You could also add sodium bicarbonate which will lower the acid.