# Is Barrel Topping Really Necessary? Test started today...



## crushday (May 2, 2020)

Today I started a topping up test in response to @jsbeckton and his post titled, “Forgo Topping Up?”

I filled two barrels with identical wine, a 2018 Merlot from Master Sommelier fermented at the same time under similar conditions. Both have been bulk aging in an undisturbed carboy since March 18th, 2019 - so they‘re well aged already.

Upon filling, I added a 1/2 teaspoon of KMeta. One will be topped up monthly and more KMeta added as needed (I’ll use my Vinmetrica SC300) to keep the free SO2 ppm within acceptable ranges.

The other barrel will remain untouched for six months until it is either bottled as brilliance or discarded as a failure. 

Too bad it’s going to take six months to come to a conclusion but my hope is to finally answer the topping up question. More on or around November 1, 2020!


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## FTC Wines (May 2, 2020)

We have 3 barrels so will be watching your study closely. What size barrels are you using? We top off 2X a month now. Roy


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## crushday (May 2, 2020)

FTC Wines said:


> What size barrels are you using?


Roy, these are six gallon Hungarian oak barrels. In the picture, it’s the two on the far right, #4 and #5. #5 will be untouched until bottling time. I power washed and steam cleaned (325 degrees) before filling.


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## FTC Wines (May 2, 2020)

Ok, thanks. We two 40 liter and one 23 liter Vadai barrels.


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## Mike - Next Level Oak (Aug 10, 2020)

I'm curious how this will go as well. Is the main concern oxygen/headspace in the barrel from not topping up?


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## salcoco (Aug 10, 2020)

the wine will oxidize keep tasting the not topped barrel once taste start to go bad start topping up seems a waste to go all out on the experiment


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## winemaker81 (Aug 10, 2020)

This is an interesting topic. In theory, there should be no oxidation in the barrel. Evaporation from the barrel produces a vacuum -- after 3 weeks I have to fight to pull the bung from my barrel, and it comes out with a loud POP.

I recall a post a few months ago regarding a South American winery that seals a barrel for 18 months (IIRC) and the result resembles Sherry.

The results of this experiment should be interesting.

EDIT: fixed typos


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## Ajmassa (Aug 10, 2020)

winemaker81 said:


> This is an interesting topic. In theory, there should be no oxidation it the barrel. Evaporation from the barrel produces a vacuum -- after 3 weeks I have to fight to pull the bung from my barrel, and it comes out with a loud POP.
> 
> I recall a post a few months ago regarding a South American winery that seals a barrel for 18 months (IIRC) and the result resembles Sherry.
> 
> The results of this experiment should be interesting.



i had that same thought as well, however I don’t actually know anything for sure. Just that the natural vacuum created can be quite strong.

I sorta did this experiment in an indirect way. I have a 3 year old wine that I just keep discarding. It needs some tweaking. And even with troubleshooting I’m doubtful it will ever be good enough to wanna drink or stamp my name on, but don’t have it in me to dump...yet.

I ended up with an empty barrel and used a portion of that wine to keep it filled. Filled the 30L barrel in January. Dosed with so2 maybe 3 or 4x since then. 
When I needed to top it up I really didn’t want to mess with the other carboy’s setup since it was exactly (x2) 5gal carboys and all my 3’s and jugs were filled. Nor did I want to waste good wine on it so I just kept putting it off. Eventually I said screw it- no topping up at all! Since I didn’t care much about the wine it was easy to let it go. 

it’s now over 7 months later. The angels share is very noticeable. I will rotate the barrel’s position every so often so nothing dries out. And every time I pop the bung to dose so2 the vacuum seal is very strong. Haven’t done a proper taste test or comparison to the carboys. But it smells good. And no surface spots or anything from what I could tell.
Will be removing soon enough. Curious if my results will end up similar to @crushday’s results.


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## crushday (Aug 10, 2020)

I'll be bottling my test barrel in about 3 weeks. I'll run the appropriate tests, take color difference pics and post the results. We'll know soon. From the time I filled barrel #5 I have not touched it. However, barrel #4 has the same wine and I've treated it normally throughout by topping up and adding kMeta every other month.

Should be interesting...


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## pete1325 (Aug 12, 2020)

Not much to add cause I bulk age in glass Carboys, but want to follow this thread for future reference. I have a 25 L Barrel coming soon and want to be prepared when the time comes to age in barrels. Thanks for starting this one.


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## jsbeckton (Aug 18, 2020)

Should be interesting as I’m lazy and always looking for an excuse to do less!


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## Aiserock (Feb 9, 2021)

@crushday, Any update on the test results? Thanks for taking the time to do this.

Anthony


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## crushday (Feb 9, 2021)

Aiserock said:


> @crushday, Any update on the test results? Thanks for taking the time to do this.
> 
> Anthony


Anthony, without a doubt topping up is necessary. The wine that I didn't top off was/is drinkable but comparatively akin to a half a bottle left open overnight from last night's dinner - drinkable but displaying the effects of oxygen. The topped off wine was/is fresh, fruity and worth the extra effort to top off every month. Lesson learned: TOP OFF EVERY MONTH!

I have the exact numbers in my office to show how it changed throughout the six months. I'll pull those and get them to you.

Let me know if you need anything else.


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## hounddawg (Feb 9, 2021)

what is your average ABV%, ,,, I only do country wines, but i double to triple my fruits/berries so i can make my wines still be very smooth with higher ABV% which give a opened bottle a lot longer life, of course from what i read, grapes is a totally different animal to tame,,,, so i figure the rules are apples to oranges type deal,
Dawg


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## crushday (Feb 9, 2021)

hounddawg said:


> what is your average ABV%?


Dawg, I'm usually in the 13-15 range. On the wines in question, the starting gravity was 1.105 and the finished gravity was .990 - estimated ABV is 15.04. Both wines were Merlot.

I have 50 pounds of frozen pears I need to thaw and start wine with. I've been lazy as of late...


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## hounddawg (Feb 9, 2021)

i like to read grape threads to see the difference, and i have learnt that grapes are way more intensive than country wines, your ABV's are pretty close to what i like to run, i think grapes are harder to keep in line, 
thanks
Dawg


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## Handy Andy (Feb 10, 2021)

Interesting! I have a some fruit wines, and have noticed they don't appear to oxidize, when we only drink part of a bottle. Where as with grape wine it oxidizes over night. Do citrus fruits lack some chemical makeup that grapes have allowing them to oxidize?


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## winemaker81 (Feb 10, 2021)

Handy Andy said:


> Do citrus fruits lack some chemical makeup that grapes have allowing them to oxidize?


For citrus wines, I suspect the acid has something to do with it.


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## FTC Wines (Feb 10, 2021)

Just saying, we had a 10 year old Apple wine over the weekend. The color was a tad darker than usHal but did not taste oxidized at all. ABV 12%. We made this wine WAY before our Vinmetric 300, so don’t have a lot of stats. BTW the wine was Awesome! Roy


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## Handy Andy (Feb 10, 2021)

I had a excess of oranges growing so I made some orange wine, to see what it would be like. It does not taste acidic.
It was bitter due to me fermenting it on the skins, so I sweetened it for my wife. She has now claimed as her own! The following batch I fermented off the skins, and am waiting for it to finish its fermentation. I do not know which breed of oranges are growing on my property, but they are small and very sweet.

Edit My Orange wine is reading a PH of 3.6


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## Ajmassa (Feb 10, 2021)

crushday said:


> Anthony, without a doubt topping up is necessary. The wine that I didn't top off was/is drinkable but comparatively akin to a half a bottle left open overnight from last night's dinner - drinkable but displaying the effects of oxygen. The topped off wine was/is fresh, fruity and worth the extra effort to top off every month. Lesson learned: TOP OFF EVERY MONTH!
> 
> I have the exact numbers in my office to show how it changed throughout the six months. I'll pull those and get them to you.
> 
> Let me know if you need anything else.


but often that wine is even better the 2nd night. when you say “showing effects of oxygen” what do you mean specifically?

the fact that the untouched barrel was not spoiled is interesting. and the other being more fresh and fruity— could that just mean it’s nit as far along the aging path? since those are traits of young wine. 

once o2 effects stop improving and start to decline isn’t the first noticeable effect the color? and wine starts to brown. 
I’m wondering if not topping actually helped mature the wine faster but you just preferred the other. just spitballing here. think this is possible? or was it blatantly obvious?


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## Handy Andy (Feb 10, 2021)

Stupid question, Should you be disturbing the barrel? Why Oxidized Wines Are Bad but Oxidative Wines Are So Good . From what I have been reading in many links the oxidative wines of Jura in France, rely on a film of mold developing over the wine to prevent them becoming over oxidized.

Edit another link on Oxidized wine making Ask a Somm: What Are Oxidative Wines?. It seems its all down to controlling the amount of oxygen getting to your wine, whether it is mold, or some other method. I dont think I will try this on purpose.


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## Handy Andy (Feb 10, 2021)

winemaker81 said:


> For citrus wines, I suspect the acid has something to do with it.



Oranges, Grapefruits and Lemons have much higher levels of antioxidants, than in grapes. Could this be the reason fruit wines don't oxidize so easily. A chemist might know?

Edit I dont understand the following BUT Quinones might have some thing to do with it. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229310928_Oxidation_mechanisms_occuring_in_wines
" 
Non-enzymatic oxidation, also called chemical oxidation of wine,
prevails in fermented wine and begin by the oxidation of polyphenols containing a catechol or a galloyl group.
These phenolic reactions, both enzymatic and non-enzymatic, result in by-products named quinones.
However, in non-enzymatic oxidation, oxygen does not react directly with phenolic compounds. The
limitation on the reactivity of triplet oxygen is overcome by the stepwise addition of a single electron, which
can be provided by reduced transition metal ions, essentially iron(II) and copper(I). The sequential electron
transfer leads to the formation of hydroperoxide radical (HOO
•
), hydrogen peroxide (H
2
O
2
), and hydroxyl
radical (HO
•
). The later radical will oxidize almost any organic molecule found in wine and will react with the
ﬁrst species it encounters,depending on their concentration. Sulfur dioxide (SO
2
) and ascorbic acid, when
added to wine, are able to reduce the quinones. Alternative options have been assessed for the prevention of
oxidation during wine storage; nevertheless, these are not fully understood or commonly accepted
"


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## winemaker81 (Feb 10, 2021)

Handy Andy said:


> A chemist might know?


You have exceeded my memory of chemistry. However, antioxidants may play a key roll.

The comment on ascorbic acid explains why it's in a lot of packaged foods.

When I first read the post I thought "quinones" was "quinoa". I was mystified why a South American grain would be in wine .....


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## Boatboy24 (Feb 10, 2021)

@crushday : what were these barrels closed up with - solid stoppers, bungs with airlocks? Thanks!


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## hounddawg (Feb 10, 2021)

Handy Andy said:


> Interesting! I have a some fruit wines, and have noticed they don't appear to oxidize, when we only drink part of a bottle. Where as with grape wine it oxidizes over night. Do citrus fruits lack some chemical makeup that grapes have allowing them to oxidize?


i have only every only done country wines, there's been time's,, that I've drank half a bottle and set the other half down beside the night stand, i just flip the cork upside down give it a slap to reseal, and a week later or more, when i go to pour me another glass it is still the same as when i opened it, if not better for letting it breath, my red fruit wines i like to open an hour before pouring, I've never done a grape, but from what I've read, they are way more Complicated,,, 
Dawg


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## crushday (Feb 11, 2021)

Boatboy24 said:


> @crushday : what were these barrels closed up with - solid stoppers, bungs with airlocks? Thanks!


Solid silicone stopper.


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## Ty520 (Apr 27, 2021)

crushday said:


> Anthony, without a doubt topping up is necessary. The wine that I didn't top off was/is drinkable but comparatively akin to a half a bottle left open overnight from last night's dinner - drinkable but displaying the effects of oxygen. The topped off wine was/is fresh, fruity and worth the extra effort to top off every month. Lesson learned: TOP OFF EVERY MONTH!
> 
> I have the exact numbers in my office to show how it changed throughout the six months. I'll pull those and get them to you.
> 
> Let me know if you need anything else.



I remember several years ago, a winery made a big name for itself and developed a cult following for its oxidated wines. the funny thing is, the owner admitted it was the result of pure negligence and laziness of not wanting to top off his barrels.


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