HELP

[fraser1970]

this is my first time making wine. I followed the instructions and left the wine in the primary fermenter for two weeks. it was looking good as far as fermenting. Im about to transfer the wine into carboy, but i checked the potential alcohol is at zero. Do i need to waste the wine and start over?

 

[grapeman]

My guess is you are reading the hydrometer wrong and the specific gravity is 1.000 or less. Double check it. If the potential alcohol says 0, that means it is dry or finished fermenting. Don't dump it out, just learn to read the test instrument correctly. Good lucj and welcome.

 

[Goodfella]

Yeah.... It is finished dry. Your hydrometer started out saying your must had potenticial for 11-15% ABV.(most likely).But now that the wine has become that, The hydrometer is sinking to the 0% level.


It's all good.

 

[ASAI]

this is my first time making wine. I followed the instructions and left the wine in the primary fermenter for two weeks. it was looking good as far as fermenting. Im about to transfer the wine into carboy, but i checked the potential alcohol is at zero. Do i need to waste the wine and start over?

To add briefly to what Appleman posted. Potential Alcohol is only relative before fermentation. The specific gravity is a indicator of alcohol content. When the wine ferments the gravity goes down as the sugar is convert to alcohol. There are several calculations to compute the estimated alcohol from the difference between starting SG and final SG.

One is % Alcohol by Volume = Start SG-Final SG/.00736

 

[ASAI]

BTW Welcome to the forum and to wine making.

 

[fraser1970]

THANK YOU! yes its sinking to the ZERO line. So im ok to transfer it to the carboy than???

 

[Goodfella]

Yes... your good to go.

 

[ASAI]

THANK YOU! yes its sinking to the ZERO line. So im ok to transfer it to the carboy than???

Need more info and more accurate reading before advising on racking to carboy. Depending on which kit, I would expect SG to be below 1.00 nearer to .995 depending on temp. Most kit instructions say to check for 2 days in a row and verify a stable SG reading before proceding to stabilizing and clarifying.

 

[andy123]

Regardless of which kit i'm confident 2 weeks in the primary is plenty.rack to a clean carboy leaving lees behind,top up as necessary and give it some more weeks as kit advises before degassing and stabilizing.

 

[ASAI]

Regardless of which kit i'm confident 2 weeks in the primary is plenty.rack to a clean carboy leaving lees behind,top up as necessary and give it some more weeks as kit advises before degassing and stabilizing.

Which Kit Can Make a difference. While I agree with your advice in general; my assuption from the context was this was a RJ Spangols kit. They do not reccomend racking to glass for secondary, just leaving in primary plastic bucket for primary and secondary then racking for stabilizing and clearing.
I go ahead and rack Spagnols kits to secondary glass around 1.002; but, that is just my way of sneaking a little out of the box.