# racking



## Trubador (Nov 14, 2006)

I'll be starting my first kit wine soon (Winexpert Selection merlot)

Instructions say to rack to secondary after 7 days or so, then after 10 days rack to another carboy. I only have one carboy. Can I just leave it in the carboy rather than rack to a second carboy? Or do most of you have two 6-gallon carboys that you rack to?


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## MUMBA (Nov 14, 2006)

*rack*

rack into gal bottles clean and put it back where it came from


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## dizzyswimmer (Nov 14, 2006)

You can rack it back into the primary, clean your carboy, and then rack it back into it.


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## Trubador (Nov 14, 2006)

dizzyswimmer said:


> You can rack it back into the primary, clean your carboy, and then rack it back into it.



that's exactly what i was thinking of doing. I just didn't want to go to the trouble of doing so if that second racking was not that important. What is it's primary purpose?


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## cpfan (Nov 14, 2006)

Trubador:

1) Many own an extra carboy. Others use the primary as an intermediate as dizzyswimmer suggested. Some find it easier to add the additives and do teh stirring in the primary. Sorry Mumba, but dealing with 5-6 gallon bottles is more than I would want to handle.

2) Please re-read the instructions. Unfortunately I cannot access Winexpert's web-site at the moment, and I do not make their kits.....BUT, I was under the impression that they did not have you rack prior to adding the additives.

Steve


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## Trubador (Nov 15, 2006)

cpfan said:


> Trubador:
> 
> 1) Many own an extra carboy. Others use the primary as an intermediate as dizzyswimmer suggested. Some find it easier to add the additives and do teh stirring in the primary. Sorry Mumba, but dealing with 5-6 gallon bottles is more than I would want to handle.
> 
> ...




A little bit off topic but, when degassing and stirring the wine, is oxygenating the wine a concern like it is in beer brewing? When I have beer exposed, I do everything I can to avoid putting oxygen into the beer, but the wine kit instructions seem to indicate using a drill mounted "mix-stir" to whip the wine up to a froth. While driving out co2, I have to imagine this also adds dissolved oxygen. This is not a problem?


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## Trubador (Nov 15, 2006)

cpfan said:


> Trubador:
> 
> 1) Many own an extra carboy. Others use the primary as an intermediate as dizzyswimmer suggested. Some find it easier to add the additives and do teh stirring in the primary. Sorry Mumba, but dealing with 5-6 gallon bottles is more than I would want to handle.
> 
> ...



Here are the instructions for the winexpert kit. 

http://www.brew-winemaking.com/ProductPDF/4808.pdf

It has us rack to the SECOND carboy as a "polish". No mixing is required on the second racking unless additional sulfite is added, then light stirring is required.

How important is this second racking?


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## cpfan (Nov 15, 2006)

Note as I said above, I do not generally make Winexpert kits. However, the way I read these instructions is....

1) rack after 5-7 days. Gets wine off the initial lees.

2) after 10 days DO NOT RACK. Note this is the racking that you originally asked about and I questioned. BTW, I would probably rack at this point. Yes, I know WinExpert claims that the wine won't clear successfully.

3) after 8 days rack to polish. Interesting description. I consider this racking to take the wine off the sediment from the clearing agent and in preparation for filtering.

Steve


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## smurfe (Nov 15, 2006)

I have made quite a few Wine Expert kits. Right at 30 of them. The biggest reason to rack off the primary is after 5-7 days you are loosing the CO2 production from fermentation that blankets the must in the bucket. You rack to your carboy and leave all of the sediment you can behind. The main goal of this is to get the wine off of the oak chips and get it to glass to protect the wine from oxidation. You do not top up at this time and secondary fermentation will occur. The wine will still be protected by the CO2 but you have a much smaller area to cover and protect.

As for racking you really need to stir those gross lees up into the must at stabilizing. This allows the sorbate, k-meta and clarifying agents to mix into the must and kill the yeast cells to stop the fermentation. It also gives the clarifying agent something to adhere to to aid in clearing the wine. The innisglas needs to adhere to the proteins to do its job. I tried racking off the lees in one kit to see if it indeed did affect clearing and it did. It took the wine forever to clear and I had to add more innisglas to get the wine to clear. 

Once you have stabilized the wine, de-gassed it and got it off of the gross lees, you don't really have to follow the time tables mentioned in the directions per say. These are minimum time frames and you can leave it in the carboy for an extended period of time as long as you have topped up the carboy to prevent oxidation. This is called bulk aging and you can leave it for extended periods of time. It is really no different than in the bottle. It is normally 2-3 months past the time I could bottle that I actually do bottle.

Smurfe


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## smurfe (Nov 15, 2006)

Trubador said:


> A little bit off topic but, when degassing and stirring the wine, is oxygenating the wine a concern like it is in beer brewing? When I have beer exposed, I do everything I can to avoid putting oxygen into the beer, but the wine kit instructions seem to indicate using a drill mounted "mix-stir" to whip the wine up to a froth. While driving out co2, I have to imagine this also adds dissolved oxygen. This is not a problem?



The amounts of CO2 being emitted from the wine protects it from oxidation. You actually do want a little oxidation at this point to help the wine develop. You just don't want to go overboard mixing. I use the drill mounted mixer and give it a few short bursts in one direction and then the other. after a couple minutes the wine is CO2 free. 

Smurfe


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