Pineapple wine not bubbling?

[detritus]

I just started my second batch of pineapple wine about 5 days ago and I'm having the same problem I had with my first batch: the airlock isn't bubbling. Have any of you experienced this with pineapple?

The first batch used canned pineapples with Cotes de Blanc yeast. The fermentation seemed really, really slow. The airlock never bubbled and after about a week the must started smelling skunky so we decided to dump it, figuring the yeast was bad or there was something involved in the canning process that messed up the yeast's activity.

The second batch we went with fresh fruit and champagne yeast because it always seems to be a really strong fermenter. Now the batch seems to be doing better, and when I open the primary fermenter up to stir it lots of CO2 bubbles up and it smells like normal fermentation. Still, though, it never sends up bubbles through the airlock. I even opened up a new airlock for this batch, thinking the airlock itself might be broken.

Any ideas what's going on? This is only my 4th batch, so I'm still pretty new at this. Thanks!

 

[Runningwolf]

detritus welcome to our forum. There are plenty of people here that will be ablr to walk you through any issues you are having. Please go to the introductory section and tell us about you and what you have done or would like to do. What area are you from? Once again welcome aboard we look forward to assisting you.

 

[Wade E]

Cotes Des Blanc is a nice slow fermenting yeats designed for lighter fruits and white grape wines, It ferments slow so that you dont burn off the fruity esters that you would in a vigorous fermentation, this is a good thing. Another note is that being slow ferment like this it will allow gases to escape through places like rubber grommets where the ao=irlock fits into the lid due to its slow build up unlike where w fast fermentation will make the airlock go crazy and probably laek at those points also.

 

[St Allie]

Hello and welcome to the forum detritus,

use your hydrometer to gauge the fermentation.. that's generally the most accurate way to establish what is going on in your carboy.

It's also worth mentioning that pineapple is very acidic.. this could be a problem for your yeast.

I haven't made pineapple wine.. however I have had an acid problem with both lemon and guava wine in the past.. these can be harder to ferment..changing your yeast type and boosting the fermentation by using a large starter will help.


If you get a moment to pop your recipe on here for us to have a look at it for you.. there may be something there we can help with..


Allie

 

[Tom]

I have made Pineapple from fresh fruit. Like Allie and Wade said ck the gravity and watch which yeast you use. I used CDB and it worked fine so, Ck your gravity as the seal may be bad.
Makes a great wine..

 

[detritus]

Sorry for the lack of intro. My husband also joined the forum a few weeks ago and introduced himself, but I forgot that I hadn't done the same. Will post in the introductions thread.

I doubt it's a problem with the bung/airlock being leaky, as we have used this exact same set up a couple different times and always have a lot of vigorous bubbling. I knew the CDB yeast was slower fermenting, but I've used champagne, red Pasteur, and Montrachet yeast all with lots of active bubbling. It just seemed like something was "off" with the prior batch, especially with the funky smell. I'm not concerned about this batch being contaminated because it's smells normal, but seems oddly slow.

It sounds like it might be the acidity. I don't have pH strips so I don't know the exact reading. Both recipes are from Terry Garey's the Joy of Home Winemaking, tripled for 3 gallons. The only difference (aside from canned vs. fresh) is that the canned recipe uses 1 teaspoon of acid blend and no tannin, and we subbed the CDB yeast for the first canned batch. The fresh pineapple recipe is below:

3.5 quarts water
2 lbs sugar
3-4 lbs pineapple
1/2 tsp acid blend
1/4 ts tannin
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1 Campden tablet
1/2 tsp pectic enzyme
1 packet Champagne yeast

 

[Wade E]

I agree that it sounds like the acidity. you could try adding some energizer in there cause it could be lack of nutrient. Most fruit wines are lacking in this area and nutrient isnt as good as energizer. I use 1 tsp of nutrient and 1/2 tsp of energizer per gallon batch.