First time making wine; using unknown fencerow grapes.

[Xnke]

I moved into the current house about 13 years ago and planted a "Thomson Seedless" grapevine. It isn't a Thompson grape, nor is it seedless...however it is a thickskinned, seeded, white grape. It's REALLY grape, and really tart flavored. Pressed juice is clear-green, but in the bucket it's golden colored. I made grape jelly out of it one year and it looked like honey in the jars.

I picked enough grapes to produce 2.5 gallons of grape juice, once crushed and squeezed out. Poured into a clean new HDPE (same stuff milk jugs are made from) 5-gallon bucket, added 1/4tsp of potassium metabisulfite and added 1.25 gallon of water and 4lbs 2.5oz of sugar. This reigned in the extreme tartness and it actually tasted like good, somewhat tart, grape juice the next night. Specific Gravity was 1.095 at 73F.

24 hours after the potassium metabisulfite, I added 1 5-gram packet of Red Star Premier Cuvee wine yeast and a half a ripe banana (it works for starting bread yeast, figured it'd work ok here too.)

That was 48 ago, and the fermentation is in full swing in my bucket; with a clean cotton towel covering it. Tonight, the Specific gravity is 1.085 at 70F.

I have 8 64oz beer growlers that I can rack into when it's time to put it under airlock, unfortunately I do not yet have a carboy, nor have I found any 1 gallon glass jugs locally.

My brother-in-law is a beer brewer in the wintertime...I'm just a 25 year old gearhead with a grapevine and an obnoxious pear tree that delivers 10-15 bushels of pears every year. Winemaking seemed like a good way to do something with all the fruit.

So when do I need to get my wine under airlock? I have read of people doing it at 0.995, 1.030, starting under airlock, starting under cloth, ect. Is there a general rule for when the conversion from aerobic to anerobic fermentation should occur?

 

[jamesngalveston]

some say the magic number for moving to air lock is 1.000, you may get different opinions on this...I fast track my wines, so I let mine ferment out in the bucket, I do not rack until its dry.

 

[JohnT]

First off, welcome to the forum.

Did you get the initial brix (sugar %) of the grapes or TA/PH levels? You said a number of times that the juice was rather tart. This is most likely because the grapes were not yet ripe enough.

If you are looking for a gallon jug, my advice is to try a liquar store. A lot of times they have deals on gallon jugs of wine for less then the price of purchasing a new gallon jug.

Depending on the temperature, sugar level, and yeast, you can expect to have your wine in the primary anywhere from 4 to 7 days. Of course this is a very general rule of thumb.

I would advise to rack to the secondary once you dip below 1.000.

 

[Xnke]

Lots of folks seem to say they just aren't ripe...I pick when the birds pick, the few times I netted the grapes and let them go longer they never got sweeter...even letting them stay on the vine to the first frost they still never lost the tart taste. The university farm grape growers say these are probably a scuppernog or other american wild grape of some kind; since my "thompson" was grafted, and the graft scar is visible, but these two vines (I thought I planted one, but there are two seperate ones) are growing from the roots and not the bud union. I am familiar with this kind of behaviour from growing roses...happens often.

Initial SG was 1.070, flavor was really intense, so I diluted with the water. At that point, the grape flavor was pretty good without the sharp bite, but i had to add the sugar to bring the SG up to 1.095. If the sugar had been high enough without the water, I probably would have just let it run, but it wasn't so I made the adjustments.

Either it'll be a table wine, or it'll be a white wine vinegar; both aren't cheap and I use both.

 

[Xnke]

Racked off into two 1 gallon jugs, and three half-gallon growlers. Everything is under airlock now, and has been for 4 days.

One of the half-gallons was topped off with fresh apple juice, as it was only a little over half-full, and has been marked as such.

The proto-wine tasted very much like a grape beer at the racking, which I measured SG that night, 75F at 1.025 SG, not quite dry but I wanted to take advantage of the CO2 cover gas, to prevent oxidation chances as much as possible. It is REALLY intensely grape-tasting, some of the tartness is back but it was actually quite pleasant.

After 4 days, I get one bubble every 3 seconds, +/- 1 second. Is this about right, being that I keep it stored in a dark room at 71-73F?

 

[Arne]

You had a pretty quick ferment. For the ferment to be done, you want it to get to 1.000 or below and have it stay the same for at least 3 days running. The bubbles may mean it is still fermenting, they may mean it is just degassing. The last part of the ferment will probably take much more time than the first part did. If you can't find gal. jugs anywhere else, try your local liquor store and buy a gal. of Carlo Rossi. You get a jug and some wine to drink. Sounds like you are on the way to some good wine. Good luck with it, Arne.