# How long on must?



## Paulc (Mar 15, 2011)

So what is the rule of thumb for leaving fermenting juice on the skins, stems, and seeds during the primary ferment? Ferment started on Saturday; I had hoped to do a cool, slow ferment for at least a week, maybe two but I have to head to OH for a funeral Thursday evening. I am thinking I need to go ahead and get the juice off the must since I won't be here to stir the cap under. At this point, if I rack on Thursday the juice would have had 5 full days on the must to ferment. Any thoughts?

TIA, Paul


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## wvbrewer (Mar 15, 2011)

What was the SG when you started? I would check the gravity and see how it has progressed. If you are fermenting slowly it will take longer to finnish. If you are fermenting to dry it may take much longer if not rack it on one crushed and dissolved campden tablet per gallon when it is around 1.020 and let it ferment for another 30 days.


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## Paulc (Mar 15, 2011)

This must started at 1.110 SG. The wine makers book I have, an older one, says 48hrs for rose and 5 or 6 days being enough for a darker, fuller wine. My concern is that while I am out of town I will not be able to stir the cap after Thursday evening unit Monday night. So that will be almost 4 full days for funk to start growing on the cap. Right now the ferment is going really well...maybe the yeast has gotten far enough out in front of other stuff that allowing the cap to harden and dry would not be a problem...? 

So, anyone out there that has done a 5 gal bucket of frozen grapes, I am working with Sangiovese, how long did you let it ferment on the grapes? 

thanks, paulc


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## grapeman (Mar 15, 2011)

Do you have a press? If so I would press before heading out. You should have enough colors and tannins extracted by then. The other route would be to get somebody else to punch the cap down.


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## Paulc (Mar 15, 2011)

yeah, I was not sure about trusting someone else with my wine. This is my first ever from grapes so if it gets screwed up I want all credit for that

perhaps I will try to jerry-rig a home made "press" by Thursday evening...

thanks, paul


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## Paulc (Mar 16, 2011)

measured the SG this morning at 1.06 which I guess is not bad. It started at 1.110. Hopefully it has extracted a good deal of tannin and color.


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## grapeman (Mar 16, 2011)

If you are still that high, I would wait until after the funeral to press it. It will still be actively fermenting.


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## Paulc (Mar 16, 2011)

Okay, so I need some solution that does not involve asking someone to come over and stir my wine. The only person that I might ask is going to be really busy this weekend with work so I hate to impose on them. 

I am trying to come up with a solution that will allow the must to continue fermenting on the skins without my having to stir the must. The two ideas I have had so far would be putting a bunch of the skins into my cheese cloth sleeve and weighting it down with marbles so it is below the lever of the juice. Good or bad idea?

The other idea I had was to basically create a plexiglass plate with perhaps 1/4" holes in it that I could put on top of the must and weight the plate down enought to cause juice to rise above the top of the must. I imagine I would need to weigh it down enough to keep it below the surface but not so much to limit the open spaces between the skins...

Is this sounding too complicated to be worth it? What if I press the must real well and just hope for the best?

Any thoughts would be really appreciated. Thanks, Paul


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## Rock (Mar 16, 2011)

Sounds like a submerged cap ferment.My cousin ferments his grapes like this with very good results.


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## Wade E (Mar 16, 2011)

Like Rock said above, you need to figure out a way to keep the solids below the surface like a sanitized weight of some sort. Maybe a lid to hold it all under with a weight on top. How long are you going to be gone is the key question though?


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## Paulc (Mar 16, 2011)

I leave tomorrow evening. I won't be able to stir it again until Monday evening...maybe my "plate with holes" idea with some kind of sterile weight. I have several pieces of obsidian(volcanic glass) that I could wash, sterilize, and then put on top of the plate... might be worth a try. Paul


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## Wade E (Mar 16, 2011)

That should work fine.


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## Paulc (Mar 23, 2011)

*submergered ferment seemed to work*

Hey All, so I got home about lunch on Tuesday. Was not able to look at the wine until last night...and there was nothing strange growing in the primary! I was really not sure my idea would work but it seems to have been successful. I used a fresh out of the box Brute garbage can lid which it turns out is food grade plastic. I cut it to fit snugly in the 5 gal pail and drilled a bunch of holes in it. I also weighted it down with two pieces of volcanic glass that I washed and hit with k-meta. 

SG is down to 1.000 so I hope to rack within the next 24hrs or so into a carboy and introduce the ML...hope it continues to go well. Tasted some of the wine last night and it is very promising.

Paul


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## Rock (Mar 23, 2011)

Good job Paul,happy aging.


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## ibglowin (Mar 23, 2011)

Good to hear all is well!


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## Paulc (Mar 23, 2011)

Anyone have any thoughts on MLF? I have a packet, can't think of name off top of my head, along with 4oz of french oak. I was going to add both tonight during racking and let it sit till mid to end of April...? I expect to get about 3 gal of wine. 

Any thoughts on MLF? I have not tested it for malic acid but am really just betting MLF will make the wine more drinkable.

Any thoughts on how much oak? For how long? I like oak in my wine...

TIA, paulc


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## Rock (Mar 23, 2011)

Yes do Mlf also throw those 4oz of what kind of oak you have i like beans.Also what kind of wine are you making i know its a red?


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## Rock (Mar 23, 2011)

Paulc said:


> So what is the rule of thumb for leaving fermenting juice on the skins, stems, and seeds during the primary ferment? Ferment started on Saturday; I had hoped to do a cool, slow ferment for at least a week, maybe two but I have to head to OH for a funeral Thursday evening. I am thinking I need to go ahead and get the juice off the must since I won't be here to stir the cap under. At this point, if I rack on Thursday the juice would have had 5 full days on the must to ferment. Any thoughts?
> 
> TIA, Paul


I sure hope you took the stems out,just re read your post.


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## Paulc (Mar 24, 2011)

these are crushed grapes thru M&M in CT. So there might have been 2 small pieces of stem...it is all grape skins and juice. thanks


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## Rock (Mar 24, 2011)

So what kind or what brand of frozen must did you get Paul?


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## Paulc (Mar 25, 2011)

These are Sangiovese grapes from Sutter Ridge Vineyards in Cali. M&M wine suppliers are the folks I bought them from. I pressed and racked the wine off the skins last night(SG about 1.000)...I had to work at it a bit so I did get some solids I think but got a total of 3 gal of wine. Hopefully when I am all done I can have 2.5 gal to bottle in the late summer/fall...

I added my 4 oz of med toast french oak after soaking the chips in warm h2o, they smelled awesome. And I added ML bact...hope that works. Yeah the oak chips are in my better bottle which was a pain but that is what I had to work with...Anyway, the wine is still slowly bubbling away which I believe is the last of the sugar being burned by the yeast. Hopefully the ML bact will take hold and it will slowly bubble till the middle of the summer or so. 

To avoid the chance of making "geranium wine" I was not going to sorbate this stuff. Just let is sit for a month on the oak chips, rack it and add k-meta and then let it sit for at least 3 months. And depending on how it looks leave it sit some more...Is that the right next steps??

Thanks, Paulc


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## Paulc (Mar 25, 2011)

So I just stumbled onto another post where folks talk about only oaking their wine for 2 weeks and only 1oz of oak...already forgotten how much wine.

Understanding that amount of oak is a personal taste thing; is 4oz for a month in 3 gal of Sangiovese too long in your opinion...? I like oak in my wine.

THanks, Paulc


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## Rock (Mar 25, 2011)

I would start with 2oz and keep sampling every week.after 2 months you coul always add more.Then you will wish you made an other batch because you have been sampling and topping up and know your running low.


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## Smartdog (Mar 26, 2011)

Get a collander (Stainless steel is best) that is just smaller than your fermentor. Put it upside down over the cap. Put a weight (empty sealed plastic jar full of water or even some cleaned and samitized aquarium rocks) on top of the collander to submerge the cap.


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## Paulc (Mar 26, 2011)

good idea on the collander. that is pretty much what I did but I included wrapping the collander in a cheese cloth ferment bag that was kinda elastic to try and keep some more of the junk at the bottle out of the wine. It worked pretty well. I was able to get two layers of cheese cloth around the collander but got sloppy with pressing it down into the must so some solids came over the top and went up the cane.

Paulc


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## Wade E (Mar 26, 2011)

Paul, do not add any sorbate to this batch ever so you are correct there but with the k-meta, dodnt add it in a month but when MLF is done and sometimes that can takes months. You should either get a Chromatography test or a Accuvin Malic acid test kit.
http://www.finevinewines.com/p-1552-223-10.aspx

Here is a Youtube video on how easy ity is.
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQhgNMzAw5g[/ame]

here is a Chromatography video
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyegXP6G9r4[/ame]


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## Paulc (Mar 26, 2011)

Thanks for the info/clarification Wade. So I will rack off the oak chips when I think it has enough oak, then top it off some how and let it sit. I will add K-meta before I bottle it. 

I have read about using the k-meta solution to sterilize the bottles and then not rinsing the bottle but directly adding wine. The residual k-meta in the bottle is "enough" to protect the wine. So the wine is bottled without adding the measured amount of K-meta to the wine prior to bottling. 

Great idea? Terrible idea? Anyone tried this with success?

tia, paulc


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