Improving my Wine

[Julie]

......
BTW, If the fresh grapes you are using are (in any way) related to concord, then all bet are off. Go with a kit! ROTFLMAO!!!!

JohnT, that is not nice! There are a lot of people who like to make wine from concord, straight or blended with various fruits. Just because you have certain standards that you live by does not mean that the whole world needs to live by those standards as well.

Please be considerate of others feelings when posting derogatory remarks.

 

[JohnT]

JohnT, that is not nice! There are a lot of people who like to make wine from concord, straight or blended with various fruits. Just because you have certain standards that you live by does not mean that the whole world needs to live by those standards as well.

Please be considerate of others feelings when posting derogatory remarks.

Julie,

That was the furthest from my mind. Most of those who know me (runningwolf, back me up on this), know that this is just an inside joke and that I hate the flavor of concord grapes. I know that others like them, and I am not judging them (at least that was not my intent).

Sorry, do not want to offend.

(can I leave the corner now?)

 

[Julie]

Julie,

That was the furthest from my mind. Most of those who know me (runningwolf, back me up on this), know that this is just an inside joke and that I hate the flavor of concord grapes. I know that others like them, and I am not judging them (at least that was not my intent).

Sorry, do not want to offend.

(can I leave the corner now?)

lol, yes you can. I know what you mean but there are a lot on here who do not and I just don't want to give any winemaker a bad impression of winemakingtalk or you.

 

[JohnT]

lol, yes you can. I know what you mean but there are a lot on here who do not and I just don't want to give any winemaker a bad impression of winemakingtalk or you.

Yea, I see what you mean..

It takes a long time for people to find out that I am an opinionated jerk.. LOL.

 

[grapeman]

PH is the measurement of the strength of acid, TA is the measurement of the percent of weight of acid.

TA affects the taste of wine and PH affects the stability of wine.

I guess it really would be sort of a percent of weight of acidity, and when expressed in % would be that. With that said, it is usually measured in grams per Liter or xg/L that is why a TA of .8% can also be expressed as 8g/L .. The whole thing is really oversimplified so the average person can sort of understand it, but you can read whole chapters in books discussing it. Total Acitity and Tartaric Acidity while sometimes close, can be very different at other times. I'm sure Mike could probably explai it a whole lot better. All I know is that if I have a wine with greater than 10g/L or 1.0% TA, it is gonna taste tart and would need some residual sugar to balance it out better.

 

[ibglowin]

Here is a pretty decent explanation on the difference between pH and TA:

Why are pH and Titratable Acidity [TA] not "proportional"?


The question asks why it is that wines or musts with different TA’s can have the same pH and vice versa.

In a must or wine there are both free and bound, hydrogen particles.

pH is a measurement of how many free positively charged hydrogens are around.

When measuring TA, you add sodium hydroxide to the must. What happens is, you deal with the free hydrogens, those responsible for the pH. But even as you do and as you continue to add more sodium hydroxide, you actually start to unhook bound hydrogens and make them free.

Only when you have added sufficient sodium hydroxide to unhook all accessible hydrogens is your measurement of TA complete.

Since the proportions of free and bound hydrogens varies greatly according to grape varietal, ripeness, growing conditions and so on, so does the relationship between pH and TA.

 

[Turock]

We have proven to ourselves time after time that it is PH that affects flavor. We used to measure TA, but over many years we gave it up and started working more with PH. Now, we are working with cold weather grapes and fruit--not Calif grapes. Our wines improved dramatically, especially our Niagara, by controlling the PH. We ran some bench tests, years ago, to prove to ourselves how different PH levels affected flavor. That really opened our eyes.

I don't care what John says--LOL We LOVE concord and have made some fabulous blends with it that are a real hit. I like wines that taste like the fruit they are made from. Don't care for wines that taste like "wine."

 

[JohnT]

We have proven to ourselves time after time that it is PH that affects flavor. We used to measure TA, but over many years we gave it up and started working more with PH. Now, we are working with cold weather grapes and fruit--not Calif grapes. Our wines improved dramatically, especially our Niagara, by controlling the PH. We ran some bench tests, years ago, to prove to ourselves how different PH levels affected flavor. That really opened our eyes.

I don't care what John says--LOL We LOVE concord and have made some fabulous blends with it that are a real hit. I like wines that taste like the fruit they are made from. Don't care for wines that taste like "wine."

So, what I said is valid.

The measure of free electrons, ph, measures the intensity or strength of acid content. Ta measres how much acid is present (or weight) of acid in g/l.

Different acids have different strengths.

Although ph measurement is prefered, the beginner can get by with a ta test.

 

[Turock]

John--I was directing this to what Julie had said, which was that TA affects flavor more than PH. I disagree with that---PH affects the flavor much more.

 

[ibglowin]

pH is NOT a measurement of free electrons!

Like I posted above: pH is a measurement of how many free positively charged hydrogens are around. A positively charged ion is a Proton. In our case we are interested in measuring H+.

If you are using pH as your only method to adjust a wine, you are making a huge mistake IMHO. A wine having a TA of 6.6 g/l can have a pH of anywhere from 3.15 to 3.96. THAT IS A HUGE DIFFERENCE!

This is why you can't use just one or the other really but you must use BOTH!

Here is an excellent Primer on the differences between pH and TA in Wine

So, what I said is valid.

The measure of free electrons, ph, measures the intensity or strength of acid content. Ta measres how much acid is present (or weight) of acid in g/l.

Different acids have different strengths.

Although ph measurement is prefered, the beginner can get by with a ta test.

 

[winemaker_3352]

I'm thinking Norton, maybe Chardonel and possibly a little something else.

Personally for the first time going with grapes - i would suggest chardonel.

If harvested right - it pretty much makes itself.

Norton can be hard to get right - it tends to have high TA and high PH if not harvested or grown properly.

I think around here they harvest norton almost in november.

 

[Julie]

John--I was directing this to what Julie had said, which was that TA affects flavor more than PH. I disagree with that---PH affects the flavor much more.

Hey, don't be pickin on me! LOL, just teasing.


I am really finding this thread very interesting and very informative.

 

[Turock]

ibglowin---PH is the most important reading you can take because it affects the wine so much. Especially because it has a powerful affect on the efficiency of sulphur dioxide, prevention of oxidation and bacterial infection.

TA is not a measure of total acid,but the acid that's available to ract with sodium hydroxide. TA varies according to varietal,growing conditions,ripeness,etc. I'm not interested as to WHICH acids a fruit will give me--I'm interested in the POWER of those acids. I can modify them thru PH control. TA and PH have no direct relationship. The best you can say is that a high TA is associated with lower PH and vice versa. So what you say is true--a high TA wine can have a varied PH. That's why you want to measure the PH in order to control the power of the acid. This is what will make a better tasting wine, rather than adjusting the TA and ignoring PH. PH tells you more because it tells you the power of the acids present--TA does not and is too variable to be of much use because you can't tell which acids are present.

 

[ibglowin]

I agree that pH is important but you can't just ignore TA and make your wine based solely on a pH reading IMHO.

Case in point was this years Petit Verdot from California grapes. If you recall it was a pretty bad harvest with a cooler than normal Summer and late season rains that compounded things even more.

Initial numbers on this must was pH of 4.07 and TA of 5.7 and a Brix of 27.5. I added 2.5L of acidulated water and retested the must. The results now were pH 4.03, TA 4.5 and Brix of 25.0. I added more Tartaric and retested the must to find a pH of 3.98 and a TA of 6.5

If I only focused on pH and kept adding acid until I got the pH down to ~3.6 I have no doubt that the TA would have gone well over 10.0 and I would have had an undrinkable and very "tart" Petit Verdot.

You have to measure both, balance both as best you can and at some point decide this is as good as it is going to get, and go with it.

My numbers after MLF are pH = 3.83 and TA =6.0. Not perfect but not way out of whack. I could make another addition of acid and try and tweak the numbers a bit more but as this will be used mainly as a blending wine (in small amounts) the numbers will become pretty insignificant when blended in with predominately Cab Sauv and Merlot that had pH's in the 3.5 to 3.6 and TA in the 6.6 to 7.5 range

Cheers,

 

[Runningwolf]

Julie,

That was the furthest from my mind. Most of those who know me (runningwolf, back me up on this), know that this is just an inside joke and that I hate the flavor of concord grapes. I know that others like them, and I am not judging them (at least that was not my intent).

Sorry, do not want to offend.

(can I leave the corner now?)

LMAO, How did I miss this entire thread? Very good conversation even if John is dragging me into the mud with him. LOL Honestly John I do not care for Concord or Niagara by themselves. Blend the two together or with other grapes or fruits they are awesome. My Niagara got me out of trouble this week blending it with raspberry and plum wines. Blending it with Cranberry is also awesome. Boy I'm glad no one brought up the big "W" word. LOL

 

[Turock]

There is no doubt in what you say when working with Calif. grapes.

But as I often say--I only work with cold weather grapes and fruit. One does not need to pay attention to TA when working with them. They are basically balanced out, as opposed to the high brix grapes. It's far more important to have good PH control, and most winemakers I know are taking a TA reading to know what the range of the PH might be. But that is not as accurate as a PH reading when you're trying to move in tenths. Fruit and cold weather grapes need good PH control because you're using no water.

So to say you ALWAYS have to consider and measure TA is not always correct. Depends what you're working with.

 

[ibglowin]

I guess we will just have to "agree to disagree" on that point.

So what cold hardy grapes are you making wine from?

Do you grow them yourself or purchase from someone?

I could see if you have been making wine from the same grapes for 20 years being able to pretty much go on "autopilot" after awhile but I suspect 95% of the winemakers on this forum are not in that category nor will they ever be.

 

[JohnT]

LMAO, How did I miss this entire thread? Very good conversation even if John is dragging me into the mud with him. LOL Honestly John I do not care for Concord or Niagara by themselves. Blend the two together or with other grapes or fruits they are awesome. My Niagara got me out of trouble this week blending it with raspberry and plum wines. Blending it with Cranberry is also awesome. Boy I'm glad no one brought up the big "W" word. LOL

What "W" word????

 

[JohnT]

pH is NOT a measurement of free electrons!

Like I posted above: pH is a measurement of how many free positively charged hydrogens are around. A positively charged ion is a Proton. In our case we are interested in measuring H+.

If you are using pH as your only method to adjust a wine, you are making a huge mistake IMHO. A wine having a TA of 6.6 g/l can have a pH of anywhere from 3.15 to 3.96. THAT IS A HUGE DIFFERENCE!

This is why you can't use just one or the other really but you must use BOTH!

Here is an excellent Primer on the differences between pH and TA in Wine

Glowin,

OK, Misspoke in the electrons, but my point is still valid...

PH is the measure of the STENGTH of acid that is present.
TA is the mesure of the acid WEIGHT present.

These are really two different types of fruit.

Additionally, I am simply trying to say that a beginner can make do with just measuring the TA to get wine that is fairly stable. They do not need to invest the $80 (min) in a PH meter.

GEEEEEEEEZE!

A proton is a particle that exists in an atoms nucleus and is used to determine atomic weight. It is not an ION. Ions are determined by the number of electrons present.

johnT.

 

[GreginND]

Glowin,

OK, Misspoke in the electrons, but my point is still valid...

PH is the measure of the STENGTH of acid that is present.
TA is the mesure of the acid WEIGHT present.

These are really two different types of fruit.

Additionally, I am simply trying to say that a beginner can make do with just measuring the TA to get wine that is fairly stable. They do not need to invest the $80 (min) in a PH meter.

GEEEEEEEEZE!

A proton is a particle that exists in an atoms nucleus and is used to determine atomic weight. It is not an ION. Ions are determined by the number of electrons present.

johnT.

Sorry, John. You are only right that the nucleus of atoms contains protons. But a positively charged hydrogen atom is simply a proton. Atomic hydrogen consists of one proton (nucleus) and one electron. When it loses the electron it becomes positively charged. All that's left is one proton.

An ION can be either positively charged or negatively charged.