"Filtering" sediment in cherry wine after fermentation

[David219]

I need help...again.

Even with using a straining bag to hold the fruit in my first attempt at fruit winemaking, there is an awful lot of fluffy sediment in my must.

I racked out of the primary bucket into a three gallon carboy when the SG reached 1.010. I had around 2.5 gallons at the start, planning for two gallons of finished wine. There was easily 3/4 gallon of very loose "sludge" at the bottom of the bucket. I poured it through a funnel into a one gallon container. Both are now under airlock completing fermentation.

The three gallon carboy contains slightly less than two gallons of liquid, with 2-3 inches of this fluffy sludge at the bottom. The gallon container only has about an inch of clear liquid at the top...the rest is fluff.

Will this sediment compact with time and allow me to siphon off a majority of relatively clear liquid? If not, I might only get a gallon out of this...which seems unusual for having started with 16# of fruit. Can this be filtered? Would cheesecloth, like from Bed, Bath, and Beyond, work? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!

 

[vacuumpumpman]

David -
Patience .patience and more patience

Yes it will compact down on its own - it can take up to 2 weeks for the majority of it to settle. That is why we keep transferring every 3 months to help clarify our wines.

I started a plum wine 1 week ago, using a concentrate - I still have 8'' of slurry in my 6 gallon carboy waiting to settle.

 

[David219]

Thanks, Steve...but how much volume do you end up losing with each transfer? Here's what these look like:

Will I end up with 2 gallons eventually, do you think?

 

[vacuumpumpman]

It will settle out alot more - given some more time -

How long has it been ?

Might be thinking about transferring the 6 gallon carboy to a smaller one if you have one ?

Yes you will definitely will end up with atleast 2 gallons if not more - in the end

 

[David219]

I pitched the yeast on 7/11 and racked from the primary bucket on 7/15, so it has been 4 days. The total volume of the two combined is around 2.5 gallons...easily a gallon or more is that fluffy sludge.

The carboy is actually a 3 gallon. My hope was to rack off the gross sediment into the three gallon carboy, let it blow off CO2 into what head space remained as it finished fermentation, then transfer again into 2 topped up one gallon containers, add KMeta, Super Kleer, and let things settle.

As I was vacuum transferring with my Allinone (thank you very much!), I noticed that after just a little over a gallon of the liquid was transferred, I was primarily pulling this fluffy sludge. I wasn't sure what to do at that point...I didn't want all that sludge in my carboy. That was the whole point of racking in the first place. And I wasn't sure exactly what I had in the rest of the bottom of the bucket, so I funneled it into the one gallon container to see what settled. Initially, the junk was floating on top, and a bit greater visible depth of clear wine was visible beneath. But on very slight agitation of the container, the fluff all fell to the bottom. At day 4 after transfer, this is what I've got.

 

[Wolfe]

I started a Cherry wine 24th June, 3 gallons worth. Transferred to gallon demi-johns after 5 days and there also seemed to be a lot of sediment, 3 inches on the bottom of each. It has started to compact down though. Maybe its just the nature of Cherries.

When I do a first rack probably late August I will let you know how much I lose. Mine is the exact same colour as yours so hopefully we are both on the right track

 

[Thig]

Don't lose it, put what's left in a tall skinny bottle like a 2 liter bottle and it will settle and compact some more.