Cellar Craft Fast ferment on skins, oak; need advice

[FABulousWines]

I pitched the yeast on my CC Showcase Argentine Malbec just 5 days ago. The SG this evening is .998. Going by the instructions, I should be racking over to the carboy, but I'd really like to give it some more time on the skins and the French oak. I've snapped the lid down and put on the airlock. Question is, how long can I safely risk oxidation with this set up? One day, two, ??? My gut tells me no more than one day, but I really just don't know. Any and all advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[dangerdave]

Did you put the skins and/or oak into a bag or just dump them in the must? If they were in a bag, you could remove the bag, rack the wine to a secondary carboy and dump the skins and oak in, then let it finish up that way. If the skins and oak are mixed in the must, I'm not sure what is the best direction to go.

I personally think the fear of oxyidization is overrated. If it were me, I'd let it go dry in the primary if it's already gone that far towards dry (I've had this happen before). I'd let it sit there for three more days, then proceed to secondary until day 20 (as the instructions say).

But---mind you---that is me. This is a rather expensive kit, so you'll have to make that call yourself. The safe thing to do would be to rack to secondary now...but that's why they call me "Danger".

 

[SouthernChemist]

If you have under an airlock, and fermentation is not complete, it will not undergo oxidation, which takes longer than a day to occur. Some people will intentionally ferment to dryness in the primary to maximize the extraction time. A few more days probably will not hurt anything.

 

[FABulousWines]

Update. The SG settled down at .996 so I racked off to carboy last evening and topped off with some commercial malbec. There are absolutely no signs of fermentation at this point. It has had 7 days on the skins, so I guess that will have to be good enough. I'll check SG again tomorrow and if it hasn't moved I'll add the K meta and cubes.

I saw in another post where Wade recommends locking down the lid at around 1.020 when oaking with skins. I think that is what I will do next time.

 

[rjb222]

The longer you can expose the wine to the skins during the first 14 days the better the wine will be. Not exposing long enough is more of a problem than oxidation over the long term of the wine. When the skin kits first started coming online I used to pull my skin bags after 6 or 7 days. I also used t squeeze them against the side of the fermenter quite hard. This made a wine that was hard to clear and it never seemed to fully develop either always was a bit acidic. Although I have no scientific proof of any reason for this I personally believe there is a chemical change that happens where the skins need to be in the must for to happen. I now punch down every day until fermentation slows then slosh each day until day 14 I hen take my sq to make certain where the sg is and proceed accordingly to the clearing stage wine my sg is in a final place 3 days in a row. I start checking my sg by leaving a hydrometer floating in the primary so all I have to do is lift the lid and look on day 12. I do this only with red skin kits that are pf a superior quality IE EP or Winery series.

 

[FABulousWines]

Too late for this batch, but I am learning. Next batch I will be a little more diligent as to the fermentation temperature and ensuring the wine gets enough time on the skins. Thanks!