Oak Barrel

[Windsor]

I bought a 5 gal American oak barrel with plans of using it right away. I rinsed it out an filled it with clean well water to let it swell up for a few days. For a few reasons I never got back to using it. It has been about 1 1/2 months now.
I have kept it topped up with water.
Will I have to treat the barrel with something now before I fill it with wine?
Thanks

 

[ibglowin]

You very well could have bugs if you left water in it for months plus you just wasted a lot of oak on H2O that will be poured down the drain. You need to treat the barrel with citric acid followed by KMETA solution.

 

[Boatboy24]

Did you happen to have any sulfite dissolved in that water? If not, my temptation would be to fill the barrel with sulfite solution for a week before putting any wine into it.

 

[ibglowin]

Use this procedure to sanitize your barrel.

1. Fill barrel half-way with cold water.
2. Add 2.5 grams of Potassium Metabisulphite for every liter of the barrel’s total volume.
3. Add 1.25 grams of citric acid for every liter of the barrel’s total volume.
4. Bung the barrel. Roll it to mix in the Potassium Metabisulphite and citric acid.
5. Remove bung and finish filling barrel with cold water. Replace bung and let full barrel stand 48 hours.
6. Drain barrel. Rinse several times with cold water.

 

[GreginND]

I'm curious about the citric acid. Since the TTB does not allow citric acid additions to grape wines, wouldn't it be better to use tartaric acid in a barrel? I've seen lots of suggestions to use citric but never tartaric.

 

[ibglowin]

You rinse out the citric acid afterwards so none actually goes into the wine.

 

[GreginND]

Sure, I understand rinsing. However, you can't ensure that rinsing will get it all out of the wood. But I am wondering why citric instead of tartaric. Is it just the cost or are there other problems with tartaric? I think citiric is a little cheaper than tartaric. There are some folks who are very adamant that a winery should never use citric for anything because of the possibility of contamination of wine. Even for sanitizing. Citric is not stable to microbes.

 

[ibglowin]

Citric Acid essentially makes the sulfur dioxide more effective at killing/sanitization (lower pH) than KMETA alone.

 

[ibglowin]

Remember the antimicrobial effectiveness of SO2 is pH dependent so the lower the pH the better it is at killing bugs.

 

[GreginND]

Citric Acid essentially makes the sulfur dioxide more effective at killing/sanitization (lower pH) than KMETA alone.

Yes, of course. But that has nothing to do with my question. Tartaric acid would acidulate as well.

 

[ibglowin]

In that case Google is your friend.....

 

[ibglowin]

There is no reason you can't use Tartaric Acid other than the fact that in bulk quantities (your best price)

Tartaric Acid: $5.73/lb
Citric Acid: $2.18/lb

 

[GreginND]

As an aside, I would caution anyone from using citric acid that could expose the wines to it if you are doing MLF. MLB will convert citric acid into acetic acid (vinegar).