Wine Bubbling After Degassing and Fining

[Wine_Wayne]

I am relatively new to wine making. I am working on my seventh batch of wine, so I have a rough idea of what I am doing but not even close to being an expert.

I decided to experiment and try to create a sangria type white wine. I used Alexander's Muscat concentrate and several fruit juices (orange, strawberry, apple, pineapple, and cranberry) then added sugar until I ended up with a specific gravity of 1.088. Fermentation went much faster than I expected, 6 days later the SG was down to .998 so I decided to stabilize and fine the wine. I degassed by stirring for 20 to 30 minutes. Then I added Kieselsol then Chitosan after degassing (about an hour between adding each). I racked the wine into a 6 gallon carboy and topped it off and added an airlock.

The problem is that it keeps on bubbling and foaming. I try cleaning the airlock and replacing it but the wine keeps on bubbling. Should I have waited more than 30 minutes after the Chitosan before adding the airlock? Is it normal for the wine to keep bubbling even though I degassed it?

 

[beardy]

I am relatively new to wine making. I am working on my seventh batch of wine, so I have a rough idea of what I am doing but not even close to being an expert.

I decided to experiment and try to create a sangria type white wine. I used Alexander's Muscat concentrate and several fruit juices (orange, strawberry, apple, pineapple, and cranberry) then added sugar until I ended up with a specific gravity of 1.088. Fermentation went much faster than I expected, 6 days later the SG was down to .998 so I decided to stabilize and fine the wine. I degassed by stirring for 20 to 30 minutes. Then I added Kieselsol then Chitosan after degassing (about an hour between adding each). I racked the wine into a 6 gallon carboy and topped it off and added an airlock.

The problem is that it keeps on bubbling and foaming. I try cleaning the airlock and replacing it but the wine keeps on bubbling. Should I have waited more than 30 minutes after the Chitosan before adding the airlock? Is it normal for the wine to keep bubbling even though I degassed it?

Did you stabilize with k-sorbate & k-meta? Sounds like there's still some fermentation going.

 

[Turock]

OK---well, your big problem is that you should have done NONE of that. Just because the hydrometer reading is down to .998, does not mean fermentation is finished. Secondary fermentation goes on for a period of time.

What you should have done is to set the carboy aside and leave it alone because this wine needs to bulk age for about 9 months--and maybe a little longer. The only thing you should be doing is racking it when you get a lot of debris in the bottom.

You cannot use sorbate in cloudy wine---you cannot fine cloudy wine--and wines that are not kits or early drinkers should not be manually degassed. The wine needs to clear--it needs to have the bulk of the yeast cells removed before sorbate will work, and in that time frame, the wine degasses on its own. Once all rackings have been done,and if the wine refuses to clear THEN you go to fining agents. You should always allow the wine time to clear on its own. But if I had used all those types of fruits, bentonite in the primary would have been a good idea because it would do a good job of clearing all that fruit.

So to sum up, you made a mistake in trying to force a wine to clear---it can't be done. It takes time. You don't quite understand the techniques here which is why you're having trouble. But hey---I remember being totally clueless myself. Just hang in there--you'll learn. If the wine is clogging up the airlock, you might want to thief a little out so it stops doing that. Then just let it sit---rack as needed---let it age for 9 months or so. Problems later, let us know. Winemaking requires patience.

All that manual degassing introduces oxygen which can oxidize your wine. Be sure you have enough sulfite in it to protect it. After the first racking, add some meta to it if you didn't use any pre-ferment.