WineXpert Topping Off Carboy After Racking

[singingfun]

Greetings from Maryland. This is my first ever post on this site and I hope I'm following correct protocol.

My friend and I have been making kit wines for about 1-1/2 years now. She grew up with her dad making wine so I always defer to her expertise. We live 30 minutes apart and the wine is being made in my basement. We get together every couple of months to bottle the wine that is ready and start one or two new batches. I handle the details that happen in between - racking and adding stabilizers, etc.

We have one disagreement running right now and it has to do with the amount of water that we add in the first step. Of course we have the primary fermenters but when we are adding water to the line, we can't agree on where the line is. I know this sounds dumb but as soon as it starts to approach the line, she wants to stop adding water. We easily could be adding another entire gallon of water and it would be more "on the line."

This would not matter except, when I go to rack it to the 6 gallon carboy, there isn't enough wine to fill it. This puts me in a dilemma. Since it's in my basement, I feel deeply responsible for this stage of the wine. One time I added distilled water and it took a gallon to top it off. My friend prefers that I NOT do this, saying it's watering it down. I disagree. The kit was meant to have the correct amount of water and it needs to be there. I do think it should be added at the beginning, however, not at the first racking.

One time she asked me to go out and buy cheap wine from the store to top it off. So this added about $15 to the cost of the wine and I was not happy to be adding a cheap store brand to our creation.

This time, I came up with an idea that I think will please us both.

At the second racking, the one where we take it from 6 to 5 gallons, I always save the remaining wine. I put it in big wine bottles and jokingly refer to it as sludge. Sometimes we drink the sludge later when she comes over to bottle. Sometimes I just drink a couple glasses of it here and there. With the last 2 batches of wine, the ones we bottled a week ago, I didn't drink any of the sludge (dieting). So here I have a big airspace in 2 carboys and enough sludge to top both off.

I have several reasons for wanting to resolve this problem. First, I don't want my wine concentrated. Second, we did lose one batch of wine due to mold on top. The wine company replaced it but I'm sure they won't continue doing that. I feel like the bigger airspace on top, the more potential there is for mold. Is my thinking correct? So I want to get the level up to where the bottle is skinny and have the airlock right on top of it.

If I continue to use the sludge at this stage, and I really am comfortable with this idea, I think I need to put a good cork in those big bottles at the second racking. I usually use the corks that you can pull out by hand and they are not as tight.

Another thing I am noticing is the more oak that goes into the first step, the more we need to overcompensate for adding water. The oak soaks up the water so that leaves us with less wine coming through.

I did want to also comment that one of the wines I'm making right now is Piesporter. It's our second time making this wine and I actually paid for this batch to be entirely mine because I love it so much. It has dried flowers sprinkled over the top and by the time I rack, those darn flowers are interspersed throughout and continuously clog up the siphon. I had to give up siphoning into the carboy when there was really a lot of wine left at the bottom. It was thick at the bottom but I ended up throwing so much out that I wondered if I should have removed the screen from the bottom of the siphon and just transferred more of the thick stuff over to the carboy.

If you are curious, I ended up adding Luna Bianca (more than 150 mL) to the Piesporter. I added about the same amount of Meritage to our current batch of Stag's Leap Merlot. I think these will be compatible blends.

Any advice you can give me is welcome.

Oh, I did have one last thought. It has to do with the sludge I'm adding to new wine. Is there anything in the "sludge" that should not be in wine that is just starting out? I don't want to be adding anything at an early stage that was meant for a later stage. I do try to take it off the top of the bottle and stop adding when it gets thicker at the bottom.

Okay. Thanks for any advice.

 

[keena]

Where to start
first off, air space is bad! You want as little as possible once you get it in your secondary.

A far as topping off. Personally I use juices from the store, water, or sanitized marbles. It depends on the taste. marbles will obviously keep it exactly how it is. I use water in my lemon wines if the lemon is to strong, juice to add flavor. Whatever works for you. Also the sludge idea would work very well, only thing I'd recommend is you buy the 89 cent bung and $1.20 airlock so its sealed just like your carboy.

 

[robie]

To start, always add water to the recommended level. Add the water before you add any grape pack, flowers, and/or oak.

Always, always, always keep topped off after all alcohol fermentation is completed. There are a lot of differing opinions concerning topping off with water, versus wine. I use wine, but the kit manufacturers say water is OK.

That sludge, if allowed to settle, is great for topping off. If you keep everything topped off correctly, you will never have to rack down from a 6 gallon to a 5 gallon. You will usually have to add a little commercial wine to top off, because there is not going to be enough cleared wine from the sludge to completely do the job. Yes, you have to buy that top off wine, but you also get to drink it in the end. When I bottle a 30 bottle kit, I get 30 bottles.

You likely got mold either because you didn't top off or you didn't add enough sulfites (Kmeta). Also, make sure you sanitize everything every single time you use it.

If you put things like oak chips, flowers, grape packs in a sanitized mesh bag and keep it pushed down in the fermenter, you won't have the mess stopping up your siphon. All LHBS sell these bags.

Good luck on your wine making.

 

[DoctorCAD]

You shouldn't need more than 1 750 ml bottle of water (or wine) to top off with. The kits are made 4% strong to accommodate that amount.

Go ahead and suck up most everything from the primary, it will settle out in secondary anyhow. And there is nothing in the sludge to hurt the wine.

P.S. Fill your 6 gallon carboy all the way up with water and pour it into your secondary. Mark THAT level on the bucket and you should be much closer to the required amount of filling up.

 

[wineh]

Sing,
You and your friend need to get together, fill your 6 gallon (23liter) carboy to the correct level, and dump it in your primary fermenter. The two of you can then agree on where to mark the 6 gallon line, and fill to there from then on. If the picture you provided in your post is what you get from the primary, you are indeed not adding enough water to begin with, as it should be above the shoulder.
Winexpert instructions are quite clear: you have to make your must to the correct amount (23liters) or your wine may not turn out. They also instruct that at the first racking (from the primary), you will leave some headroom in your carboy, which should amount to about 1 liter (1quart), which you are to leave to add stabilizers later. Topping up too many times with water will dilute your product, while topping up to often with wine will unnecessarily increase your costs.

 

[Chateau Joe]

No two carboys are ever the same. When you are done with that batch of wine, go to the hobby store and get a cheap glass etching kit. Go home and with a reliable measuring device fill the carboy with 6 gallons of water. Then take your glass etching kit and mark a line on the outside of the carboy where the top of 6 gallons is. Again, get something reliable to measure out your water, not just some ordinary milk jug.

 

[Dugger]

Just a few things to note:
- you mention going from 6 gal to 5 gal at the second racking and I'm not aware that any kits advise you to do that; they all want you to stay at 6 gal all along so that you do not have air space in the carboy. If you have enough different sized carboys you can proceed without topup by using them and dividing up your wine accordingly ( like a 5gal/19 liter and a 3 liter)
- I don't think I'd worry about oak chips absorbing enough wine to have a bearing on your top up.
- what size is the carboy you have shown in the picture? 6 gal (23 liters) or 25 liters? It looks like a mexican one and if it is 6 gal it should be pretty close to accurate and you should not need much topup at all if you do your rackings properly
- does your bucket come with a 23 liter mark or is it one you put on yourself? Try to get the mark as accurate as you can to 23 liters to keep topup to a minimum and also to ensure the kit starts off at the intended SG.

 

[Brian]

To start, always add water to the recommended level. Add the water before you add any grape pack, flowers, and/or oak.

Robie I agree with everything you say except this one part. When doing a kit that has elderflowers, oak, or any dry additive to add to the primary I always add that right after the bentonite mixture. That way when you add the juice it mixes that right in at the same time. I do add just a little bit more water to my primary to compensate for the rehydrating of these items but not much. I find it a pain to fill the primary then add the oak or whatever and then stir it until it mixes well. Just let the juice and added water do that for you. I have made many kits this way and find it gives the same results. Just MHO

 

[dmulligan]

Never be shy about topping up a poet with brandy! Unless it is a chocolate orange in which case Grand Marnier might be in order.

This advice holds for Winexperts Ports too.

David