pH & TA both high

[GeoffMcG]

I have just crushed my Pinot Noir grapes and the must pH is 3.9 and TA is 0.97
These are both higher than I would like. I could add tartaric acid to reduce the pH but I believe that would push the TA even higher.
I would welcome any recommendations on how I should proceed.

 

[Rice_Guy]

If your volume is small enough you can chill to refrigerator temp, as low as -2C to precitate potassium tartrate, ,,, takes a week or so.
You wouldn’t be the first to run high pH wine, it means you can’t have five year shelf life and need higher meta.
At the lab bench I would “cheat” and add 85% phosphoric acid to push it down like sodas do. Commercial wine will not permit this but this is mainly a home wine forum. You would have to deal with high TA later as running a secondary fermentation or chill proofing over winter.

Australian crop? High sugar? I am a northern US grower so I will never get to pick high pH grapes, hot climate folks may have better solutions.
Good luck, wine is forgiving unless you are trying to age it a decade.

 

[Tim3]

Sounds like this could be a result of high potassium fruit. I hear that’s pretty common down under. I found a good reference from the AWRI which might help with your solution. Long story short, add tartaric acid aiming for a pre-fermentation PH of 3.4.

https://www.awri.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/s2036.pdf

 

[salcoco]

add tartaric to get ph desired then post fermentation cold stabilize to remove acid.

 

[GeoffMcG]

If your volume is small enough you can chill to refrigerator temp, as low as -2C to precitate potassium tartrate, ,,, takes a week or so.
You wouldn’t be the first to run high pH wine, it means you can’t have five year shelf life and need higher meta.
At the lab bench I would “cheat” and add 85% phosphoric acid to push it down like sodas do. Commercial wine will not permit this but this is mainly a home wine forum. You would have to deal with high TA later as running a secondary fermentation or chill proofing over winter.

Australian crop? High sugar? I am a northern US grower so I will never get to pick high pH grapes, hot climate folks may have better solutions.
Good luck, wine is forgiving unless you are trying to age it a decade.

Thanks, I have about 170 litres so I could try to chill it in smaller batches.
This is my own crop with Brix about 25. It's been a very mild summer so I was surprised to get such high sugar, last year it was about 22

 

[GeoffMcG]

Sounds like this could be a result of high potassium fruit. I hear that’s pretty common down under. I found a good reference from the AWRI which might help with your solution. Long story short, add tartaric acid aiming for a pre-fermentation PH of 3.4.

https://www.awri.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/s2036.pdf

Good article, I'm going to add tartaric acid to correct pH and worry about the TA later