# racking cane



## djcoop (Mar 1, 2006)

Ok, I was just re-reading my packet from George. And I just realized when I moved from the primary to the secondary on my chianti, I didn't use my racking cane. HMMMM, it moved from one place to another. What did I miss or did I germify everything w/ my spit!







Oh well........... too late now, but just for future reference.


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## Waldo (Mar 1, 2006)

My gawddddddddd DJ you not sucking up and spittingyour wines from the fermenter to the carboyare you






You have taken the "Taste at every step" to a whole new level


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## MedPretzel (Mar 1, 2006)

Waldo, you make me laugh!


DJ, from primary to glass carboy, you do not need to use the racking cane. The racking cane is there for to leave some of the sediment that has fallen throughout the fermentation process behind. It's a helpful gadget, but best used in the carboy, when you can see the sediment too.





You will see that there is a tip, an adjustable inner hard-plastic tube and the tube that surrounds it all. The inner hard-plastic tube has the racking tube on it. Now, you can adjust the inner hard-plastic tube higher or lower, depending on how much sediment you have. Try a couple of runs at different heights of the inner hard-plastic tube and water, to see what I mean.





Acutally, I have a racking cane, but didn't really use it. And then when I did, the inner-hard-plastic tube broke. So now I use it as a stirrer.


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## Funky Fish (Mar 1, 2006)

djcoop said:


> Ok, I was just re-reading my packet from George. And I just realized when I moved from the primary to the secondary on my chianti, I didn't use my racking cane. HMMMM, it moved from one place to another. What did I miss or did I germify everything w/ my spit!




What did you do - just use the siphon tubing? That's fine, of course. The racking cane is just a piece of hard plastic that will allow you to get to the edges of the bucket without having to worry about it curling up on you (as the tubing might).


ETA: Or are you talking about an _autosiphon_? My bad. A racking can is essentially a straight tube with a 90-degree bend (very similar to the inner tube of the autosiphon). The autosiphon is it's own thing - it is a racking cane plus an automatic siphon-starter.*Edited by: Funky Fish *


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## djcoop (Mar 1, 2006)

No autosiphon, just racking cane.


OH WALDO!!! I tasted a lot of wine that day and a little oak! At least I think it was wine. The jury is still out on that one...........


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## masta (Mar 1, 2006)

DJ,


Don't you have a spigot on your primary? I looked through the catalog and it appeared all of George's starter kits came with a primary with a spigot.


All you need is a length of hose and the transfer from the primary is done in 5 mins...just tip the bucket so you get all the liquid and leave the thick lees behind and add that to the compost pile!


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## smurfe (Mar 19, 2006)

I rarely if ever use the racking cane from the primary to the carboy. I just take the hose of the cane and stick it on the spigot on the bottling bucket and let it flow. The less I have to clean up after, the better I like it. 


If I do use a racking cane I use that Racking pump I bought a while back to try that really has no other use other than racking out of a bucket since it don't fit in a carboy.


Smurfe


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## OldWino1 (Mar 25, 2006)

I use a cane I'm scared I will break the spigot off or bump it and have it leak.Just me and what you get used to.. What a hobby.


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## PolishWineP (Mar 26, 2006)

Most of our primary fermenters are from our Pre-Georgian days and we don't have spigots on them. When we rack from primary to secondary we usually use the auto siphon. But yesterday we had a very chunky cherry wine we racked and even old Bert saw the wisdom to my suggestion of just using the hose rubberbanded to our "original racking cane." (A wooden dowel used only for making wine. That was how my folks did it back in the day.) With the amount of chunks in the wine it would have plugged for sure. I use a baster to get the syphon started. (We have a couple of them that are for wine making only. If they see a turkey they scream!



)


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## OilnH2O (Mar 26, 2006)

PWP


You said, "I use a baster to get the syphon started." 


I just bottled yesterday and "lost" the syphon around bottle number 24 (using the auto-syphon) -- and still had quite a bit of wine left (enough to get, carefully, two more good bottles, and 2 1/2 more slightly cloudybottlesthat will become future "top-off" bottles).


But, back to the baster, I'm assuming that you are using the baster like a theif, taking up wine, and then, with the syphon tube held vertically and high, introducing the wine from the other end -- so that when you thenmovethe tubedown and below the upper vessel the syphon action starts? Am I visuallizing this correctly? (That would take care of DJ's "germ" concern....)


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## PolishWineP (Mar 26, 2006)

Nope. 1 end of hose isrubberbanded to the wooden dowel, being held in the wine byBert. The other end is held by me over the carboy in my left hand. With the baster in my right hand I squeeze as much air as I can out of the bulb, stuff the tip of the baster into the end of the hose, and let the bulb draw the wineinto the hose while removing the baster from the hose. Once Bert thinks I've got it started I feed my end of the hose into the carboy. Baa da bing! Baa da boom! This is easy when your primary is full. I lost syphon when Bert had to run for another carboy(had more wine than we thought!



). I hadn't held the dowel quite right. He had to tip the primary so there was less height for the wine to achieve to start syphon again.


And I have been know to use the auto syphon as a pump when things start to clog up!


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## Waldo (Mar 26, 2006)

I use the same method as PWP and it works great. I band my siphon hose about 1/4" above the depth of the lees in the carboy and it works pretty well in avoiding sucking up sediment into my racked wine. *Edited by: Waldo *


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## djcoop (Apr 4, 2006)

I love my racking cane now!! I've got it down and could just rack from one carboy to another all day long. But... (there's always a but....), after I use it, clean it and I spray w/ k-meta, there is still little bits of moisture in the can (it doesn't come apart?). Should I just assume this is ok since I spray w/ k-meta??


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## PolishWineP (Apr 4, 2006)

If you think it's clean and you've run sanitizer through it, there's not much more you can do. We decided a while ago that we're going to have to quit worrying about everything around the house looking "nice" and put more concern into things like using our space to be sure that our wine making equipment gets dry instead! Do what you can, then punt.


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## masta (Apr 5, 2006)

I always use all of my equipment directly after sanitizing it andjust shake and or drain all of the liquid.... don't worry about the small amount of liquid/moisture left on it.


Remember...visually clean then sanitize = no problems


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## OldWino1 (Apr 8, 2006)

You tell it Masta I spend all my time in the Kitche clean from dinners and my wine utencils. I go though a lot of Dawn Thanks Sam's Club.


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