My Koch Numbers

[joea132]

Ran my numbers out for my Koch Cabernet this morning after almost 24 hours in Colorpro. 31 Brix, 3.98 pH and .76 TA.

I checked it and have gotten consistent results with other winemakers on my other batches with the same chemicals, so I have to assume they're good. I plan on trying to get down to 29 brix and rechecking acid. My only concern is that my pH is way high and will be over 4 after water. Any suggestions for my TA/pH? I'll be hitting the books on this one! Nick, the winemaker at M and M is on the case as well.

 

[joea132]

The solution we came up with is to ameliorate down to 26-26.5 with acidulated water. Then we will add tartaric acid to get down to 3.7. We will worry about the TA down the road.

In related news we are considering renaming our operation to Murphys Law Cellars...

 

[Rock]

When you do your calculation make sure you take out as much juice as your water addition will be.This should be around 10% of your volume of finished wine.Also dont forget to add 7 grams of tartaric acid per liter of water you are adding.This is what i did with my grapes.Got mine down to 25.5 from 28.Remember go slow with your additions and keep mixing well.Keep checking brix.and re-check next day for ph and brix.Before you add your yeast.Good luck these grapes took off like crazy and are doing real well on my end.Nice color and smells great.

 

[tingo]

Hi 123. You are correct, you need to add tartaric acid to lower your pH but you must also cold stabilize to lower pH further plus lower acidity. Either your grapes are high in malic acid or potassium right now. The addition of tartaric acid, cream of tartar, and cold stabilization will help remove potassium as well as lower pH and acidity. You may need to do this several times, its like shampoo: rinse, lather, repeat. Lol

 

[joea132]

When you do your calculation make sure you take out as much juice as your water addition will be.This should be around 10% of your volume of finished wine.Also dont forget to add 7 grams of tartaric acid per liter of water you are adding.This is what i did with my grapes.Got mine down to 25.5 from 28.Remember go slow with your additions and keep mixing well.Keep checking brix.and re-check next day for ph and brix.Before you add your yeast.Good luck these grapes took off like crazy and are doing real well on my end.Nice color and smells great.

Nick put a call in to Rick Lanza and he seems to think my high sugar came from dehydrated grapes. He suggested I don't take out juice because I've already been crushed for 2 days and he feels the additional water will make up for evaporation. Also he doesn't want to lose the flavor that the juice has already extracted.

I'm bringing a sample up to have them test it as well. I'm hoping my NaOH was weak.

 

[altavino]

thats good advice , with raisined grapes , I would add acidulated water but not do a sangee . I would also use enzymes to pull more out of the skins to counter the watering down.

raisining would also explain the higher than expected TA.

 

[joea132]

thats good advice , with raisined grapes , I would add acidulated water but not do a sangee . I would also use enzymes to pull more out of the skins to counter the watering down.

raisining would also explain the higher than expected TA.

That's a good recommendation, adding additional enzyme to pull out more from the skins. I may also consider an extended maceration depending how the fermentation goes.

 

[DrToe]

sounds like Nick is taking pretty good care of you. No?

 

[joea132]

I ended up getting my numbers verified at M and M today. We decided to add distilled water because we were concerned with potassium levels in well water. I added 3 gallons total which brought my brix to 26.5. My TA only dropped to about .687. The pH barely changed which I thought was strange.

I ended up adding 106.5g tartaric acid (assuming 1g/L to raise TA by .1) to get my pH down to 3.75. My TA ended up at .76. That was the highest in wanted to go for TA.

I'm very pleased with those results. The guys at M and M were fantastic in helping me out. Bob and Nick were very knowledgeable and helpful.

 

[Rock]

Good luck Joe,I choose the sangee method so I would have the same ratio of skin and pulp to juice.How many cases did you crush?

 

[joea132]

12 lugs. Apparently one batch had a heat spell and Rick Lanza feels that the grapes were dehydrated. That is why he suggested adding water without removing juice. And he suggested close to 5 gallons to add!

 

[altavino]

the vinoenology site has a water dilution calculator
http://www.vinoenology.com/

better than dead reckoning

 

[altavino]

Good luck Joe,I choose the sangee method so I would have the same ratio of skin and pulp to juice.How many cases did you crush?

this would be my normal practice (the sangee) but with alot of raisining you are in a water deficit so a sangee isn't needed .
without raisining sangee is the best way to go .

you need to adapt to the grapes you get.

this year in Oliver we have picked all our grapes before then end of September ! usually we would still have them hanging for a 2 or 3 more weeks.

my blaufrankish is the last stuff we pick , this year for the first time ever we had raisining in those grapes .

Usually its just the malbec we have that problem with , this year was so warm and dry even the bottom of the hill fruit next to the creek had some raisining.

 

[Rock]

this would be my normal practice (the sangee) but with alot of raisining you are in a water deficit so a sangee isn't needed .
without raisining sangee is the best way to go .

you need to adapt to the grapes you get.

this year in Oliver we have picked all our grapes before then end of September ! usually we would still have them hanging for a 2 or 3 more weeks.

my blaufrankish is the last stuff we pick , this year for the first time ever we had raisining in those grapes .

Usually its just the malbec we have that problem with , this year was so warm and dry even the bottom of the hill fruit next to the creek had some raisining.

These grapes had no raising what so ever absolutely pitcher perfect.

 

[joea132]

Rock, there were a few of loads that came over that were exposed to high heat at some point per Mr. Lanza I was told. My grapes didn't have any significant raisining but they seemed a little more "deflated" than the rest of the grapes I crushed. That was his rational for ameliorating.

 

[altavino]

the high brix and higher acid would indicate some dehydration and water deficit has occured . if you say this isn't so I'll have to take your word for it , but as a grower i can't think of any other conditions that would produce those numbers .

odd indeed.

 

[joea132]

There were multiple loads that came over. Rock must have gotten a different load.