Cold Crashing

[wineforfun]

Has anyone done this and exactly how long, etc. do you do it? I was at our local meadery, Moonstruck Meadery, and one of the owners was telling me about cold crashing my mead to get it to stop fermenting at a certain SG. He said it would also make the lees drop rapidly and help things clear up. I don't recall how long he said to do this. I had some mead I did it to for 36hrs but when I took it out, it started fermentation back up (could see activity in airlock). I added a dash of K-Meta and 1/4tsp Sorbate before I cold crashed too. I was assuming this same process could be done with wine also. I am just trying to understand the process and see if it would be useful or even something I would want to or should be doing.
Thanks.

 

[saramc]

Coldcrashing will help clear a carboy, but the yeast simply drop and go dormant and any that are left, and you cannot rack them all away, wake back up and start fermenting that sugar you still have. It can take as little as a day to weeks for it to clear, but usually a drop of 10F for 7-10d takes care of it. You can keep it cold but even then you may have fermentation happening. You can always pasteurize or ferment dry, stabilize with KMS and sorbate and backsweeten. Some will reply sterile filtration, but not foolproof either, and not a common setup for home winemaker.

 

[wineforfun]

Ok, thanks.
I was trying to get this mead to stop at a certain SG, and not have to run it dry and backsweeten. May have to go that route though. I tried starting it high enough that the yeast will run out of steam before it gets dry. Will see how it goes.

 

[winemaker_3352]

Dan might be able to speak to this.

But i think when they cold crash they do an absolute filtration afterwards to get the yeast out.