Yet another Degassing question with vacuum

[rshosted]

Ok. After bottling my crazyfruit wine, and realizing it had gas still, I poured it back into the carboy and degassed... again.

To do this, I purchased a vacuum pump similar to the Mightyvac (only cheaper). Now I have an Apple Chardonay that I am oaking with oak spirals right now. I racked it into a six gallon carboy and decided it was about time to start degassing it with my new MightyVac.

So I hooked up the hand vacuum pump and pull the HG Inches to about 22. I can see bubbles coming up to the top as one would expect. Note, the wine is about 50* (warmimg up slowly from a cold stabilization). I look inside to see almost all of the bubbles coming from the oak spirals!

Now why would the majority of bubbles be coming from the oak spirals at the bottom of the carboy specifically?

Everytime I pull the pressure back up the bubbles come from the oak. Also, the oak has been in there for about two months, sitting on the bottom of the carboy. Very saturated with liquid by now.

Do you think the oak makes the carbonation/gas come out of suspention easier? There's no way the wood could still have that much air in it after degassing for this many days.

I am about to put my wine in a blender to get rid of the gas

 

[Wade E]

The air bubbles always come from the bottom. It is also very hard to degas a wine at that temp!

 

[Waldo]

Wade is correct. I would get that temp up to around 70 and then degass it

 

[PeterZ]

When gasses come out of solution they tend to form around the roughest surfaces they can find. When I was in college and we needed to boil something we put little pieces of carborundum (like porous volcanic rock) in the bottom to make the boil start there with small bubbles, rather than have explosive boiling take place.

Waldo is right. Gasses are less soluble the warmer the liquid is. That is a universal law that applies to all liquids and all gasses.

 

[jsmahoney]

I think I should have listened in Science class more often!

 

[PeterZ]

I didn't learn any of this in science class. I learned it by working (as a salesman first, and later a technical support dude) in industry.

 

[sangwitch]

I purchased the generic mityvac yesterday myself. ($17.99)


I tried it out and got some bubbles coming up, but nothing major.Then I remembered this thread so I dropped a marble into the carboy and "pow!" the bubbles started foaming up.


The only problem is keeping the vacuum. I had to hold the tube to keep the vacuum from dropping quickly. If I had a bung with a smaller hole it would be perfect.

 

[Wade E]

So the marble worked huh! Cool, Ill have to try that!

 

[PeterZ]

For those interested in vacuum degassing using a Foodsaver, Tuesday Morning is carrying them right now (at least here in Memphis) at really low prices. The low end models, which sell for a little under $100 at WalMart are $34.99. They have a million different sets at 3 price points - $35, $65, and $115. The basic pump guts are the same - all will pull the same level of vacuum. I bought the best set I could get at the $65 price point, but I haven't tested the vacuum because the only gauge I have is attached to my vacuum brake bleeder, and all the attachments have brake fluid on them.

 

[rshosted]

Good score PeterZ,

Just so you all know, I have a FoodSaver, and a Brake bleeder. I have used both.

Here are a few things I noticed:

The FoodSaver is nice because it is automatic. The problem with it is, that it only cycles for about 10 seconds then shuts off, but gas is still being released. It would be nice if it would stay on until the user was done (rather than the machine).

The brake bleeder requires the user to keep pumping, but will keep vacuuming (as long as the users hand works )

I just hooked my brake bleeder to my food saver. The brake bleeder will pull about 23 in lbs on my carboys.

The foodsaver only pulled 18 inch lbs when hooked to the brake bleeder.

I find myself using the brake bleeder rather than the Foodsaver.

For what its worth...

 

[jobe05]

rshosted: Everyone is right about raising the temperature, but I will add, that you should also degass after bottling, before corking. Smaller bottles degass quicker and I think I can get more gas out of the wine because I can get 27 HG on a 750ML bottle, and only about 23 to 25 (on a good day) on a carboy (or maybe it's just fear of imploding a carboy.... which is unlikely). Try it at your next bottling, you'll be amazed at how much air you get out.

 

[OGrav]

good info! I have a food saver in the closet.I think mine has a hold button on it to keep it going. I was afraid to use it for fear that I was going to implode a carboy. The next five gallon batch I will try it out. Still a little leery without a gauge. At what point will a full carboy implode; 40 inches? Most of my batches are small one gallons I'm experimenting on and I don't bother, I just leave a low level in the airlock for it to off gas easily while still providing a lock for a month or two. So far with small batches I haven't had any carbonation in the bottle..yet.

 

[Wade E]

Do not use a foodsaver on a gallon jub as I believe Jobe imploded one and Ive heard lots of people burn out their foodsavers degassing wine.

 

[OGrav]

Thanks for the tip, don't think the wife would be too pleased if I burnedthe pump. Harbor Freight had one of those hand pump ones for sale this week; I might pick it up.

 

[Harry]

The mityvac works great for me i had a lot of gas in my Pineapple Wine ,I t00k quite a few degassings to get rid of it . I can hold about 25 in vac for about 30 minutes, I have the plastic one and i think it leaks down a little.


Harry