How long do you keep your bottles upright?

[Gekko4321]

How long, after bottling, do you keep your bottles upright before laying them down to age?

 

[robie]

At least two days. Then for about 5 days I place them on their sides in a plastic tub, just in case they want to leak. After that I place them on their sides on a shelf, or upside down in a wine bottle box.

 

[Gekko4321]

How often do you experience leakage? Is it common or rare? What do you think caused it? Thx!

 

[Runningwolf]

2 days and never had a leak

 

[ibglowin]

Leakage increases with age it seems........

I only wait 24 hours. Have not had a problem to date with almost 700 bottles using the "perfect agglomerate" cork from Fine Vine Wines.

 

[Gekko4321]

Nice success rate! 700 bottles? Do you sell them or simply drink alot, have many friends, or quite the cellar??

 

[ibglowin]

Once your friends find out you make wine, friends you haven't seen in years seem to just "stop by" out of the blue. I have a lot on the racks, some in rotation to drink others not ready yet. I give a bunch away to friends and even frenemies, some we cook with and some, believe it or not, we actually drink ourselves.

 

[Gekko4321]

Impressive!

 

[PeterZ]

I lay mine on the rack as soon as they are corked, capsuled, and labeled. Never had a leaker.

 

[robie]

I have never had a bottle leak. I use precautions, just in case, since my wine racks are all on carpet.

For Christmas we are going to give several of our friends a bottle of our homemade port. Other than that, I am reluctant to give much wine away and definitely not until it is fully ready to drink. I have a friend whose friend gives him bottles of his homemade wine. My friend just ends up tossing it. The problem is that the wine is not ready to drink, but the wine maker doesn't tell him to hold onto it for awhile.

 

[paubin]

I also leave them upright for a couple days, then on their sides for the rest of their days. Never had a leaker in storage. I have also given freinds bottles and told them not to open until a scertain date but they did anyway and now I refuse to give out wine until I'm sure it's completely ready.....wine moochers can't be trusted !


Pete

 

[bstnh1]

I leave mine upright from 2-5 days. I've bottled about 600 bottles using bi-disc corks from Widgetco. Never had a leak and some age in the bottle 5 years!

 

[Husky OFF zero niner]

I leave them upright for 2 to 5 days, then I wipe the bottles down with a cloth soaked in Star-San, apply the shrink caps and labels then place them in my very expensive wine rack of side stacked milk crates (see picture). I prefer #9 long corks (agglomerate) never had a leaker or a blow out. Put up about 300+ bottles a year, drink about half myself share/give away the rest. First couple of years I did more batches just to get ahead of the ageing game.

 

[GaDawg]

3 days

 

[NorCal]

Most my wine lives in cases and spends their life cork up. I’ve only been making wine since 2013, and no issues thus far. I do have to say there isn’t too much of the ‘13, ‘14 wine left as my plan has always been to consume within 5 years.

 

[balatonwine]

my very expensive wine rack of side stacked milk crates (see picture).

Sounds like a Williams-Sonoma product.....

 

[Julie]

Lol, anywhere from 3 days to a week depending when I get the labels made and apply them. I have never had a leak except when I was soaking my corks.

 

[jgmann67]

I will typically wait a day anymore. I used to leave them for days to allow the cork to expand before putting them on their sides. But, having never experienced a problem AND having switched to a #9 1.75 better quality cork, I'll bottle and shelf them the next day. After a week or more, I'll revisit them with capsules and labels.

 

[Boatboy24]

Anywhere from a couple days to a couple weeks. It just depends on the schedule and how lazy I'm feeling. Most of my wine is stored in cases, a la @NorCal . But when in cases, I store them upside down.

 

[GaDawg]

My last batch I just put the free labels on that came with the kit. The ones I plan to gift, I’ll put proper labels and capsules.