Need advice on apple mead ingredients

[spol73]

Hello from Warren county, NJ. My wife and I are west cost red wine lovers, so we, that is me decided to make our own. I started off with a Welch grape juice and will rack it 3rd time tomorrow. So far it looks promising. I do have all of the essential equipment, enzymes, etc.
Today I used the meat grinder to grind 40 lbs of apples mixed with 1.5 lbs of raisins, plan introduce potassium metabisulphite and leave the mead for the night. Tomorrow will add pectic enzymes.
The recipe is not very specific about water needed for 6 gal mead, besides I decided to grind the apples instead of chopping them.
1. How much water should I use considering that I have two 5 gal bucket at my disposal and will remove the solids before racking into a 6 gal carboy?
2. How do I measure the specific gravity of the mead and how much sugar should I add? (Welch juice was obviously easier to measure)
3. Recipe calls for 10 lemons. I want to use the acid blend. How much to be on the safe side. (I do not own the pH tester)
4. Would it be advisable to add tannins and/or oak chips later?
Thanks

 

[the_rayway]

I've only done one batch of apple wine so far (all juice), so I am by no means an expert. However, here are my 2 cents:

1. I would suggest using all juice for the mead instead of adding water - you will get better flavour that way.
2. Once the apples, etc. have sat for a day or two with the water/pectic enzyme, you should get some juice separation. Carefully extract the juice to measure SG with your hydrometer. Then use one of the wine calculators to figure out your honey additions
3. Acid blend - how tart were the apples? Taste the juice! I would adjust acid at the end as mead seems to make the acid swing wildly sometimes during the ferment.
4. I added oak chips to my apple wine post-ferment, and it was really nice. Mine was mostly crab apples, so it gave a nice mellow vanilla/toast flavour.

Hopefully someone with more experience will also chime in.