first of many questions

Winemaking Talk - Winemaking Forum

Help Support Winemaking Talk - Winemaking Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

ed9362

Junior
Joined
Mar 4, 2018
Messages
1
Reaction score
0
hi guys,
i am from Melbourne Australia and have been brewing beer and distilling spirits for a while.

recently my inlaws bought a new house which had some wine grapes growing.
i had a spare fermenter so i picked a few kilos of the grapes, squashed them up and added a wine yeast.
my must has fermented out in a few days and now is ready for secondary fermentation.
my question is do i need to add more campden tablets to the secondary ferment.

i was thinking that i might add another tablet wait a few days and then add a small amount of sugar and some more yeast. does this sound right?
 
Camden tablet would be good. I always measure the free SO2 in mine and add powdered sulfites instead of tablets, but they work well too.

No need to add more sugar/yeast. You'd only add more sugar if you wanted higher alcohol than you have now. More yeast you likely never would need. There will be live ones in that wine for many months that would start consuming any more sugar if you did add it. If you were to add sugar in secondary, you'd likely get foam shooting out the top of the carboy a day or so later.
 
hi guys,
i am from Melbourne Australia and have been brewing beer and distilling spirits for a while.

recently my inlaws bought a new house which had some wine grapes growing.
i had a spare fermenter so i picked a few kilos of the grapes, squashed them up and added a wine yeast.
my must has fermented out in a few days and now is ready for secondary fermentation.
my question is do i need to add more campden tablets to the secondary ferment.

i was thinking that i might add another tablet wait a few days and then add a small amount of sugar and some more yeast. does this sound right?

Hello and welcome!!

The typical process would look like this:

Ferment until dry or near dry (SG 1.000, or BRIX 2-5)
Move free run wine out of fermentation vessel and into a carboy type vessel, press skins, add press juice (or not), airlock
Rack off of the gross lees, into a new vessel, 3 days after pressing
Add Malolactic bacteria and nutrients, then top up and airlock until MLF is complete.

No sulfite at all needed during the above process.

When you refer to secondary fermentation, it could mean two things. First is the time after transferring to a carboy near the end of fermentation, which many call “secondary” fermentation, though it’s nothing more than the completion of alcoholic fermentation, just in a new vessel.
Secondary fermentation could also refer to malolactic fermentation. Which of the two are you referring to?
 
When you refer to secondary fermentation, it could mean two things. First is the time after transferring to a carboy near the end of fermentation, which many call “secondary” fermentation, though it’s nothing more than the completion of alcoholic fermentation, just in a new vessel.
Secondary fermentation could also refer to malolactic fermentation. Which of the two are you referring to?[/QUOTE]

You are correct John, In the kit world secondary is transfering to a carboy but the true definition of secondary is MLF.
 
You are correct John, In the kit world secondary is transfering to a carboy but the true definition of secondary is MLF.

Yep, it’s sometimes difficult to answer questions like that til you know which stage of the game the OP is referring to, but for the moment, no sulfite needed for either, so we’ll have to see what he says.....
 
Back
Top