Wine from Merlot grapes

[Car-Boy]

I have been making kit wine for a little over 2 years. I have a friend who started a small vineyard with about 70 vines, Cabernet, Merlot, Sangovese, and a couple othervarities. He has never made wine and he thinks since I have made wine from kitsit should be a piece of cake to do it from grapes. I know that is not true and have been reading several recipies from Evans Cellars, but still need more step by step directions.

 

[Wade E]

Do you have a crusher/destemmer or are you planning on doing this all by hand? You will want a refractometer to know when the grapes are at the right brix and a ph tester also. We can walk you through it though.

 

[grapeman]

When did your buddy start these vine? For Merlot it will take 3-5 years before he would get an appreciable crop. If he has grapes this year in small quantities, you can destem by hand or improvise a cheap destemmer. Once he starts getting more, it will be a lot of work. The process isn't difficult- just go step by step. Give us a bit more information and I am sure we can help you out.

 

[Car-Boy]

Thanks for your replies! My buddy started his vines 3 years ago. He is planning on buying some of the stuff we will need.We hope to start off small this year and once we get to know what we are getting into, go from there. I think harvest in the Mesilla Valley area is usually mid August to mid September. That is why I wanted to start this post early enough to see if the stuff I have frommy kitsneeds to be up graded, and what else we will need. I currently have 2 fermenting buckets andthree 6 gal. carboys.

 

[Wade E]

you will need a lot of carboys and some big fermenting vessels or maybe a variable capacity or 2.

 

[grapeman]

Are there grapes set in bunches on the vines this year yet? If so about how many bunches per vine is there? You can use that to help estimate what you can expect to get this year then plan accordingly for harvest and needed capacities. You can probably get by this year without a large outlay.

 

[Car-Boy]

I talked to my buddy and he will count the bunches on the vines and the number of varieties of each grape. I don't think all varieties were planted the same year.

 

[Dean]

Ok, first, I'd get some fermentation barrels (yes barrels!). Usually, you can get blue juice barrels from food processors. These are 55 to 80 gallon drums. They work really well as primaries. Failing that, rubbermaid 50 gallon trashcans can be used in a pinch as a primary.

You should get a refractometer to measure brix to know when to harvest (22 to 24 brix is right for Merlot). You'll need an acid titration kit so you can measure TA and a PH Meter so you can measure PH. Skip the PH test strips as they are not very effective. You can even use your PH meter to measure TA as well in the event of great color extraction.

You'll need a barage of chemicals; calibration solutions for the PH meter, titration solutions to measure TA, pectic enzymes, Other oenological enzymes such as optired, MLF culture for Malolactic Fermentation (usually required for Merlot), Acids in the case of additions to bring TA up and PH Down, and then all the rest of the stuff you use as a kit maker. You might also want some oenological tannins too, but that can come later on.

Oh, one last thing...a press! You'll need to press those skins at the end of fermentation to get a lot of wine out. a #30 should be plenty for 70 vines worth, but you can go bigger if you desire. I'd separate your free run wine (the liquid) from the pressed wine, and blend after all is said and done. You'll probably need some bigger carboys (I use 15 gallon demi-johns.) Oak alternatives should be beans, staves and spirals.

Finally, you'll need a selection of yeasts to ensure you get desired results. You could go with a neutral yeast like EC-1118, or K1V-1116, or you could go red specific like BM45, RC212, Pasteur Red, etc (the list can go forever on yeast)

This list seems big, but really, it's a long shopping list, but the procedures are not that hard. With kits, the balance of acids, brix measurements, crushing and pressing has all been done for you.

 

[Goodfella]

Hey guys...


I am still trying to understand some of the things you are discussing here.


My question is... What is the difference between the acid tests and the Ph tests? isn't pH mainly just an overall acid ratio test?

 

[grapeman]

pH is a measure of how acidic it is- think of vinegar versus sulfuric acid- one is much more acidic than the other. The TA test kits tell you how much of that acid there is. Typically acids with a higher pH have lower TA.

 

[Wade E]

Those acid test kits also dont work well with dark red wines as its hard to notice the color change so a ph meter is the better way to go.

 

[jsps]

Wade, for the darker wines, I've been diluting them with a known quantity of water (usually 1:1), then doing the appropriate calculations after testing the acid. Is there a downside to doing this that I've overlooked?