# Ice Diamonds experiment



## Runningwolf (Jan 30, 2011)

For what it's worth; I just pulled 7 gallons of Isabella/Blackberry wine out of my freezer after being in there for ten days. I immediately racked it off of the ice diamonds into a new carboy. I saved all of the diamonds and put them into a pan of 76* water and stirred. They did not dissolve. I then heated the water on the stove and continued stirring until the water reached 150*. Other than the water turning purple I still had all the sludge. As you can see below the crystals broke down from stirring but I cannot see if any dissolved at all.
Conclusion: There's certainly no hurry to rack off the crystals after cold stabilizing.


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## Wade E (Jan 30, 2011)

Looks like quite a bit of diamonds for a 7 gallon batch! What was the Ta on this?


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## Catfish (Jan 30, 2011)

Those look kinda tasty. Did you try one.


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## Runningwolf (Jan 30, 2011)

Wade E said:


> Looks like quite a bit of diamonds for a 7 gallon batch! What was the Ta on this?



Wade that screen may be deceiving as its about 3-4" in diameter from the funnel. Either way I have never tested for acid and just starting this year as i set up my lab. The juice came from Walkers. I had it split up in two Better Bottles and there was a thin layer on the bottom of each one plus some crystals clinging to the ribs on the sides of the bottles.


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## djrockinsteve (Jan 30, 2011)

My juices from Walkers were high in acid.


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## grapeman (Jan 30, 2011)

I commonlycan get up to a half cup per carboy, especially in whites. 

That is exactly the determination I came to Dan. No Rush! Others say to rack off immediately, but I can't see the reason. They do not go back into suspension or solution.


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## Lurker (Jan 30, 2011)

I have always use a 30*fridge for about 2 or 3 weeks and racked it quickly before the diamonds melted. I guess that now I'll be in no hurry to rack. I do have a freezer available. How much headspace did you leave. I should not need much since the wine will contract? Was it in glass or plastic? My questions naturally mean that I want to copy your method. Wine that has been refrigerated is better.


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## winemaker_3352 (Jan 30, 2011)

Good to know - i always thought they would dissolve back into the wine.


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## Runningwolf (Jan 30, 2011)

Richard, I usually split a 6.5 carboy up between to 5 gallon Better bottles with a shot of Argon. I just did a one gallon with only an inch of head space and no problem. The six gallon glass carboys will not fit in my freezer with airlocks on them. I am seriously thinking of just using them in the future with solid bungs so the fit (don't tell Wade). I will remove the bungs as soon as I bring them back out of the freezer as pressure starts building up immediately as the wine warms up.


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## Catfish (Jan 30, 2011)

My garage is about 35-40 degrees throughout the winter. Can I put my carboys out there? They are all aging in 5 gallon carboys. Thing is, I don't plan to bottle at that 35-40 temp. I want to wait until around May to bottle. Will that slow warm up effect the wine?


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## Lurker (Jan 30, 2011)

Dan, I usually make my final rack from carboy to 1 gal glass jugs. It'll be another month so I'll try it then. I'll let you know how it works out.


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## Tom (Jan 30, 2011)

Catfish said:


> My garage is about 35-40 degrees throughout the winter. Can I put my carboys out there? They are all aging in 5 gallon carboys. Thing is, I don't plan to bottle at that 35-40 temp. I want to wait until around May to bottle. Will that slow warm up effect the wine?



Yes it will slow the aging process. What kind of wine you talking about?


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## ibglowin (Jan 30, 2011)

Interesting experiment Dan!

I just brought in my fresh grape Cab Sauv from down South yesterday. It was pretty loaded with Tartaric acid crystals. It has been in the garage for 3 weeks and the carboy temp has ranged from 26 to 37 degrees. I racked it cold and it was crystal clear when I finished. 12 hours later after it warmed up to room temp it dumped another load.......

This is the 3rd time I have racked it now in 5 months! Every time I think it's done it dumps again !


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## robie (Jan 30, 2011)

Runningwolf said:


> The six gallon glass carboys will not fit in my freezer with airlocks on them.



This might be a good use for the non-liquid air locks I've seen (in pictures only). I can't say for sure, but they look to be the same height as a typical solid bung. Maybe they would help your carboys fit in your freezer. I might be all wet, too, as the pictures may not be telling the whole story.


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## Catfish (Jan 30, 2011)

Tom said:


> Yes it will slow the aging process. What kind of wine you talking about?



Concord, Niagara, Catawba, Apple Cider, all from fresh local juice. 

I thought the cold stabilizing actually sped up the aging process. Which makes it taste better in most instances.

Like the deal with freezing the wine for a few days. They say it taste better after it has been frozen. Like it has aged for a long time.


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## Runningwolf (Jan 30, 2011)

ibglowin said:


> Interesting experiment Dan!
> 
> I just brought in my fresh grape Cab Sauv from down South yesterday. It was pretty loaded with Tartaric acid crystals. It has been in the garage for 3 weeks and the carboy temp has ranged from 26 to 37 degrees. I racked it cold and it was crystal clear when I finished. 12 hours later after it warmed up to room temp it dumped another load.......
> 
> This is the 3rd time I have racked it now in 5 months! Every time I think it's done it dumps again !



Mike are you saying you keep dumping crystals or sediment each time? I just assumed once they dumped crystals the first time that was it. You know what it means to assume.


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## ibglowin (Jan 31, 2011)

Yep,

Big ol layer of pink crystals on the bottom about 1/2 inch think! I was very surprised that they showed up again as I thought for sure this would be it. Looks like another racking down the road at some point.....


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## Runningwolf (Jan 31, 2011)

Holy gay crystals Batman! What if you added potasium Bitartrates to it before CS. Do you think this would help to get them all out. What temp are you CS at.


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## ibglowin (Jan 31, 2011)

No idea, first Rodeo with fresh grapes, and first time ever to add Acid but probably not the last when Fall comes back around and I pick up 4X more grapes than last year. I have several bottles of other commercial stuff in the cellar all made from grapes grown down South. Some have won Gold awards at San Francisco. I need to open a couple and do some pH, TA analysis so I can determine what the big boys in my State are doing with these grapes. 

Two schools of thought right? Adjust them (bring em into line) or just let the wine be what it was naturally meant to be.

Since these were kept in the garage they were totally at Mother Natures mercy. 

They were as cold as 26 degrees (wine temp in Carboy) and 37 degrees at the end when I pulled it out.


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## Wannabe (Jan 31, 2011)

Can I ask what causes those crystals? I never knew such a thing existed! When do they show up?


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## Runningwolf (Jan 31, 2011)

Tartrates in your Wine Glass: Do They Matter? 
Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 at 10:24:44 AM
by Josh F., Wine Enthusiast Companies
Have you ever taken a nice, white wine out of your cellar and as you reached the bottom of the bottle, noticed there were crystals floating in it? These are tartrate crystals. They are formed when the tartaric acid in your wine combines with the potassium (also found naturally in wine, another one of wine’s many health benefits) under very cold temperature conditions forming the salt, potassium bitartrate. If you’ve ever used cream of tartar in cooking or baking, it is the same substance pulverized into a powder. In fact, these crystals scrapped off of wine barrels are the source for the cream of tartar you buy in the supermarket. Tartrates can be found in red wines as well, but they are more often found mingling with the sediment, and are normally decanted out.


Wineries can and do add a step in processing called cold stabilization. Here, they chill the wine down to near freezing, causing the tartrates to precipitate out. Then they filter the wine to eliminate them.

The higher quality a wine is, the more likely it is to have tartrates. This is because good wines are not cold stabilized, filtered or over processed, in order to preserve the intricacies and subtle character of the wine.

If you’ve ever seen these tartrates, you may have wondered what to do about them. Well, one thing you can do is absolutely nothing. Tartrates are completely tasteless, odorless and harmless, so there’s nothing you really have to do. However, if you don’t like having these little crystals floating at the bottom of your wine glass you can simply decant your white wine as you would an older red using a funnel with a screen.


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## winemanden (Feb 4, 2011)

You're quite right about the heat Wolf. You can still buy wines with diamonds in them. Think about it, if they fell out of the wine due to cold, then surely they should go back when the wine warmed up. 
Most people wouldn't buy a bottle if they saw Diamonds in the bottom. That's why most wines are filtered.

Regards to all, Winemanden.


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## robie (Feb 4, 2011)

I don't think the crystal will go back into suspension if the wine is warmed back up. There were several posts about this very subject earlier in this thread.

I think one problem is concerning folks who don't know about these crystals; after all, they can appear very much like glass crystals.

When I give a bottle of my wine to a friend, I don't like having to explain that they might see what looks like glass in the bottom of the bottle, but not to worry about it. I just go ahead and do a CS, which of course doesn't guarantee there won't be further fallout in the bottle...

Other than that, the presence of the crystal doesn't bother me at all.

In some circles, in Europe especially, a really good wine is sort of supposed to have some sediment and crystals in the bottom of the bottle. Go figure.


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## winemaker_3352 (Feb 4, 2011)

Yeah - I agree - i just do a CS - and don't worry about it. That way i know the bottles i give away won't have anything in the bottle but wine.

But again - I am a perfectionist - bottles i give away are crystal clear, been CS, filtered, etc..


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## robie (Feb 4, 2011)

winemaker_3352 said:


> Yeah - I agree - i just do a CS - and don't worry about it. That way i know the bottles i give away won't have anything in the bottle but wine.
> 
> But again - I am a perfectionist - bottles i give away are crystal clear, been CS, filtered, etc..



I guess I should be filtering, also. I acquired a gravity filter as a part of some equipment I bought from a friend. I just have never used it.


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## Lurker (Feb 13, 2011)

To day I placed a glass gallon jug into the freezer. I will probably leave it in there for a month. Now I'm beginning to worry about the glass when I remove it from the freezer. Will it break? Any ideas or should I remove it to the fridge before it freezes. Has anyone done it with glass?


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## Wade E (Feb 13, 2011)

Ive never used the freezer myself, I use my fridge for longer periods or my cellar. I have 6 gallons of Chard in the cellar right now with a nice layer of diamonds in there that Ill probably filter next weekend and bottle.


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## Tom (Feb 13, 2011)

I'd be careful that it don't freeze and crack. Put it in a snow bank or spare fridge.


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## Runningwolf (Feb 13, 2011)

Lurker said:


> To day I placed a glass gallon jug into the freezer. I will probably leave it in there for a month. Now I'm beginning to worry about the glass when I remove it from the freezer. Will it break? Any ideas or should I remove it to the fridge before it freezes. Has anyone done it with glass?



Richard I now have a thermostat on my freezer and can't get it to go below 27*. To monitor the temp I bought a cheap indoor/out door remote thermometer from Wally World. I pace a few 1x2" strips on the bottom of the freezer to sit the bottles on. I have also done glass gallon jugs and 750ml bottles. I have never left them in longer than two weeks. Before I had control of the temp and the freezer was in the single digits I only left the wine in 3-7 days.
Ideally tip your jug on the 1x2 in the freezer. Carfully remove and set on your bench when ready still tilted on a 1x2 to keep the crystals on one side if possible. Use extreme caution not to bank into other glass while chilled. Rack off when wine is nearly room temperature.


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## grapeman (Feb 14, 2011)

Filtering the wine does not guarantee there will be no further fallout of crystals. Even with cold stabilization, you could get further fallout. I have filtered with a 1 micron filter and have still gotten some crystals and it was some of the best white wine I have had. Don't worry too much about it.


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## Runningwolf (Feb 14, 2011)

Grapeman is absolutely right. Filtering will not stop fallout of crystals. I also filter with a 1 micron filter and and had plenty of fallout. Thats the reason I cold stabilize all the time now.


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## Flem (Feb 14, 2011)

I have an old fridge that I can only get down to the low 40's. Is that low enough to cold stabilize? Is there a level you have to get to?


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## Tom (Feb 14, 2011)

Yep, Sure is


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## winemaker_3352 (Feb 14, 2011)

I would just leave in there for a good 4-6 weeks at that temp.


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## kazmerzakr (Dec 11, 2011)

Is there somehow a use for these crystals as creme of tartar?


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## winemanden (Apr 25, 2012)

Does cold stabilizing actually improve the wine, or is it merely a cosmetic effect?

Assuming your wine is perfectly balanced in the first place, won't CS throw it out of balance? Has anyone done a Ph/Ta before and after test?

Just me being curious again.

Regards to all, Winemanden


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## ibglowin (Apr 25, 2012)

Its mostly cosmetic. Under normal conditions you will see a small drop in TA and a small increase in pH due to the loss of some tartaric acid. 

That said it is usually not enough that you can actually taste much difference. Your wine will still be balanced after CS if it was before.


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## djrockinsteve (Apr 25, 2012)

The difference in the before and after readings is minimal. Not a huge difference.


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