The following procedure for testing free SO2 appeared on another website sometime ago. One of the chemicals is soluble starch solution. You can purchase 1% or 2% starch solution or make your own (Mix about 1/2 a teaspoon of corn starch in a cup of cold water, bring to a boil and use when cool). The commercial solution may have a mold inhibitor. If you notice discoloring of the solution you made, make a fresh batch. You will also note that the formula for calculating the free SO2 appears different. For a 50ml sample of wine it is the mathematical equivalent of the one Hal had posted earlier. If you use a different strength of iodine solution or a different sample size, use the formula Hal had posted. <?
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“The standard Ripper test is quite easy to do on white wines, but can be difficult to do on reds because the color shift is hard to see.
You need a few chemicals:
0.02N Iodine solution
25% sulfuric acid
soluble starch solution (Be sure to boil this if it's been awhile since you used it, or if making fresh.)
You also need some glassware:
10ml graduated pipette (disposable is OK)
50ml graduated cylinder (Nalgene is best for this)
Reaction vessel (I use a 500ml wide mouth Erlenmeyer flask for this, but you could use almost any clear vessel - e.g., a jelly glass, small Mason jar, even a wine glass.
Measure 50ml of wine using the graduated cylinder and dump it into the flask. Add a few drops of the starch solution. Just before titrating add ~10ml of the sulfuric acid to the flask. Fill the pipette to the zero mark and add iodine solution to the flask with constant swirling. Watch for the endpoint in the flask, which is a color change to a faint, persistent indigo, going dropwise as you get close. Read the volume of the iodine off the pipette and calculate the free SO2.
ml iodine *(0.02 * 20 * 32) = ppm free SO2
It takes a bit of practice to do, but it isn't all that difficult. The only expensive item is the 0.02N iodine solution, which must be kept in a dark place when not being used.
You don't need a 50ml volumetric pipette for measuring the wine or a fancy burette with a stopcock on a ringstand to get good readings with Ripper. Simple tools will get you a number that's plenty good enough for your purposes. Your technique at measuring the volume of iodine required and spotting the endpoint are what's most important.”