No oxygen or oxygen

[ErikM]

In aging red wines in bulk, I keep reading that exposure to air is bad, that it causes oxidation. Yet I read this from not from a Bordeaux winemaker's website-

"Every three months the wine is racked. This means that we will empty the tank by removing the deposit that has accumulated during these three months. The wine is transferred to another tank. Racking aerates the wine."

So is exposure to air the enemy or a good thing?

 

[AlFulchino]

they could still be doing this in a vacuum environment or one where a gas like argon fills the receiving tank and is expelled by relief valve as the liquid fills the tank

 

[Runningwolf]

I do not aerate my wine when racking unless if I want to. If you carefully siphon from one carboy to another and leave your hose on the bottom of the incoming tank you'll have very little aeration. In addition you can displace the oxygen with C02, Nitogen or oxygen first as All referred to. Monitoring your S02 helps also.

 

[Wade E]

Little exposure to wine is good, Lots of exposure is bad!! When its in a barrel it gets micro-oxygentation which is a small amount or an extended time and this helps the wine mature along with concentrate some. WE as wi ne makers usually worry a little to much about 02 exposure. Unless you racking your wine from 10 feet in the air many times over its life span or not keeping it topped up while aging you probably will never end up with a oxidation problem.

 

[JohnT]

Just to put my two cents in..

Oxidation does occur when wine has prolonged exposure to air. The amount of air exposure it takes to oxidize a wine depends on a vast number or variables.

The most significant of these variables, IMO, is the amount of tannins the wine contains. Other valiables like temerature, free sulfur, and wine PH also play a part.

You need to keep in mind that a cork is not a perfect seal. Minute amounts of oxygen leach into a bottle of wine through a cork over time. Amung other things, this is recognized as a wine "maturing". Indeed, even a wooden barrel allows a small amount of oxygen to leach into wine over time.

When a winery racks wine in an open format (exposed to air), and the wine is kept in large volumes in sealed tanks, the amount of exposure to oxygen is actually wanted since the wine is normally kept in a perfectly sealed container. In these cases the oxygen can allow for "off" gasses to escape and to contribute to the wine's "all over" softness.

So, in short, oxygen and be either bad or good, depending on your situation.

 

[winemaker_3352]

Welcome aboard!!

I think the above posts have pretty much covered it.

 

[AlFulchino]

John T...thank you thank you thank you...you made a case i have tried to make for a couple of years...but truthfully you said it better

 

[robie]

Welcome to the forum.

Everything said above makes good sense, to me, anyway.

Sometimes a wine can benefit from exposure to oxygen. Some companies actually make micro oxygenators to do just that and the pros, after sampling a wine, will sometimes recommend more micro-oxygenation.

A barrel is a micro-oxygenating machine! It allows very small amounts of beneficial oxygen to penetrate the barrel and soften the wine inside.

The winemaker who made the comment, which you quoted, is obviously an experienced wine maker, one who makes a living making wine. What I'm saying is he really knows what he is doing. He likely has very sophisticated equipment to check the wine and he also very likely spends some big bucks having outside consultants come in to objectively give him advice. I know they do this a lot in places like Napa, especially where high-priced wine is concerned. A good outside opinion can be helpful.

We home wine makers typically don't have or need such sophistication. As a result and other than when utilizing a wine barrel, we tend to lean toward the side of caution and put a lot of emphasis on preventing oxidation by doing as much as we can to keep our wine from oxygen.

You can experiment with this. Divide your wine into multiple parts and try different things on each part. Just be sure to keep notes (and pass the results on to us!!!)

I did a very simple-mined experiment where this is concerned. I bought bags like those used in boxed wine. Bags that are designed just for that and can keep the wine for up to six months.

I took a red kit and divided the wine into three parts. After it was all clear, I put the wine into three of these bags. I left the first part in its bag for one month, the second two months and the third three months. My thinking was that, since these bags allow air to slowly seep inside, it would provide some micro-oxygenation of the wine.

After the time periods in the bags, I bottled the wine and labels each bottle according to how long the wine was in the bottle.

In about another year I'll try them each in a side-by-side taste comparison. Who knows, maybe I will be able to taste the difference... maybe. Now, I just put all my reds through a wine barrel for several months.

 

[ErikM]

Thank you everyone for the responses.
Robie guessed that the winemaker was very experienced. Robie is correct. The qoute came from a commercial winemaker's winemaking notes.
Erik

 

[robie]

Thank you everyone for the responses.
Robie guessed that the winemaker was very experienced. Robie is correct. The qoute came from a commercial winemaker's winemaking notes.
Erik

Give us a link to his/her wine making notes. It sounds like something I would like to follow.

I am always interested in how the pros do things. I'm curious how they, other than by using really great grapes, can make a superior wine.

 

[AlFulchino]

my thought on your comment Robie : "
In about another year I'll try them each in a side-by-side taste comparison. Who knows, maybe I will be able to taste the difference... maybe. Now, I just put all my reds through a wine barrel for several months. "

is that it may not be a long enough period...but i would like to learn what you find out

 

[robie]

The wine in my little trial is a Brunello (WineXpert), which is already about 18 months old. I would like to have tried it with a fresh grape wine, though. Maybe even with a fresh grape white, like a chardonnay.

I'll post on what I discover.

 

[Runningwolf]

JohnT, great explanation!!

 

[Wiz]

I have found that in the making of wine, if the basics are followed, that the actual process can be very forgiving. If you don't deviate from the basics very far it is very difficult to not make an acceptable wine. Good wine comes from honing your skills.

 

[AlFulchino]

amen!!!!