Revisiting the sediment issue with kit wines

[katmike57]

Hello, this is my first post here but I've been following for some time.

I've been making wine from kits for about 2 years now and have been mostly pleased with the results. I've more recently done some high-end kits like WE Private Res (Amarone, Bordeaux, Fiero, Nebbiolo). I have some RJS En Premeur kits in process and one Cru Select (Sangiovese). I'm convinced that even if you follow directions to the letter and bottle at the 6-8 week mark, you're going to have sediment problems, especially the reds. Am I right?

The answer is probably obvious - perhaps rack more often and/or wait a longer period of time to bottle. But, I've read where cold might help in getting the solids to fall out, so if I transfer to bottling bucket and let sit in the fridge about 3 days before bottlng, is that going to help much?

 

[stickman]

I wouldn't recommend that, sitting at cold temperature in the bottling bucket would allow significant oxygen to dissolve into the wine. If you really want to store cold, then a topped up carboy would be a better choice and it may take more than a few days for sediment to fall out, for tartrates to fall out maybe two weeks.

 

[wineh]

If you don't want to filter your kit wines, my experience is that a couple of extra rackings and a 90 day process seems to work.
As for cold stabilization, that is a process to remove potassium bitartrates (wine diamonds) from the wine. While considered to be a fault, they are harmless and don't affect the flavour of the wine. I have noticed that this has become less of an issue with kit wines in the last couple of years, and only affects my wines after spending a winter in my cellar (crawl space).

 

[BernardSmith]

But isn't cold stabilization used more for white than red wines? Sediment is part of the nature of the beast. I make country wines far more than I make grape wines but I would expect a great deal of sediment to drop in the first few months of aging and a fair amount to continue to precipitate out of solution over the next 6 months or more: this from tannins, fruit particulates, and all kinds of other compounds that flocculate as the CO2 dissipates and escapes from the wine.

 

[wineh]

But isn't cold stabilization used more for white than red wines? Sediment is part of the nature of the beast. I make country wines far more than I make grape wines but I would expect a great deal of sediment to drop in the first few months of aging and a fair amount to continue to precipitate out of solution over the next 6 months or more: this from tannins, fruit particulates, and all kinds of other compounds that flocculate as the CO2 dissipates and escapes from the wine.

Yes, on all accounts. The difference here is that we are talking about kit wines which, although easier to work with than grape or country fruit wines, do have their quirks. I didn't even know what wine diamonds were until I started making ultra-premium kits.
To restate a comment I made years ago: people who make wine from scratch have my utmost respect ; your work is waaay harder than mine.

 

[mainshipfred]

I don't make kits or use clearing agents so my recommendations may be irrelevant. If you're considering aging wine for any length of time you should really considering discarding that 6-8 week instruction and in my opinion it doesn't matter if it's red or white. I can see merit is your cold clearing method. A lot of us put the last of a rack in the frig to help it clear faster and save wine. Another thing that comes to mind is if it's not completely degassed there is movement in the wine which will, to a certain degree, keep the lighter sediment in suspension. I believe these play a role in sediment with bottling too soon.

 

[katmike57]

Yes, on all accounts. The difference here is that we are talking about kit wines which, although easier to work with than grape or country fruit wines, do have their quirks. I didn't even know what wine diamonds were until I started making ultra-premium kits.
To restate a comment I made years ago: people who make wine from scratch have my utmost respect ; your work is waaay harder than mine.

Exactly. I have utmost respect for those making from scratch. I have neither the desire nor patience. But I'll gladly drink it
Back to my orginal post - strangly enough the WE Nebb kit had very little sediment and it's been in the bottle about 8 months; nothing different about how I did it. Being somewhat new at this I followed the directions pretty closely - just finding some frustrations in what might be impossible to do in 8 weeks with no sediment. If needed, I'll just go longer than 8 weeks from what I'm reading.

 

[Rembee]

Bulk aging and allowing the wine to degas naturally is the way to go in my humble opinion. Racking monthly if needed. As the gas comes out of solution the fines will tend to drop out more readily.
And welcome to the forum!

 

[winemaker81]

I'm the outlier here. If you follow the kit process and rack carefully, you will have clear wine.

That doesn't help much, does it? So let's define my version of "rack carefully". This is what I do for kit wines. It is near to what I do for fruit and white wines, while reds differ a bit more as pressing is involved. But for now, it's kits.

The first racking is between 1.010 and 1.000. This is a dirty rack -- I don't intentionally suck up sediment, but my focus is on not leaving wine behind. Since I have active fermentation, I leave head space so the fermentation has room to bubble. If using 23 liter carboys, this is not a problem.

Second racking is after 1 to 2 weeks, depending on the wine and my available time. Fermentation completes and I let the wine set an extra few days to let the gross lees compact. This racking is cleaner than the 1st, but is still somewhat dirty, as I'm avoiding loss of volume. Excess loose sludge goes into a bottle, and into the fridge for a week to clear. I'll often recover half a bottle or more.

Add the fining agent and rack back into the carboy. I use a 5 US gallon carboy with the excess in smaller containers, but a 6 gallon carboy works. With the 6, there will be head space.

After 2 weeks, rack again. This is a clean racking. Tilt the carboy at an angle and get as much wine as you can, but do NOT suck up any sediment. This should fill a 5 gallon carboy and you can age however long you want.

Continue racking the remainder -- it may be dirty-ish. Put all excess in small bottles in the fridge to clear. Depending on how careful you are, this remaining wine can be as clear as the main lot. If it's not? It's a few bottles, don't serve it to others.

Prior to bottling, if there is a dusting of sediment, I rack again before bottling, leaving a bit behind, and bottle the clear wine. This produces 24/25 bottles of clear wine. If there is a dusting, the excess goes into the fridge, and depending on numerous factors, gets bottled with the previous excess, typically another 3 or 4 bottles. Most of the time, this wine does not drop sediment in the bottle.

Time versus fining agent? It's a trade off. All fining agents, including filtering, have pluses and minuses. Everyone has to make their own decisions on that, with the understanding that time does not always fully clear the wine.

There is no need to be consistent. If making kits, following the instructions. The kit is optimized for those instructions. For red grapes, I mostly don't use a fining agent. For whites and fruits I have used bentonite, and may use kieselsol/chitosan.

 

[bstnh1]

I'm the outlier here. If you follow the kit process and rack carefully, you will have clear wine.

That doesn't help much, does it? So let's define my version of "rack carefully". This is what I do for kit wines. It is near to what I do for fruit and white wines, while reds differ a bit more as pressing is involved. But for now, it's kits.

The first racking is between 1.010 and 1.000. This is a dirty rack -- I don't intentionally suck up sediment, but my focus is on not leaving wine behind. Since I have active fermentation, I leave head space so the fermentation has room to bubble. If using 23 liter carboys, this is not a problem.

Second racking is after 1 to 2 weeks, depending on the wine and my available time. Fermentation completes and I let the wine set an extra few days to let the gross lees compact. This racking is cleaner than the 1st, but is still somewhat dirty, as I'm avoiding loss of volume. Excess loose sludge goes into a bottle, and into the fridge for a week to clear. I'll often recover half a bottle or more.

Add the fining agent and rack back into the carboy. I use a 5 US gallon carboy with the excess in smaller containers, but a 6 gallon carboy works. With the 6, there will be head space.

After 2 weeks, rack again. This is a clean racking. Tilt the carboy at an angle and get as much wine as you can, but do NOT suck up any sediment. This should fill a 5 gallon carboy and you can age however long you want.

Continue racking the remainder -- it may be dirty-ish. Put all excess in small bottles in the fridge to clear. Depending on how careful you are, this remaining wine can be as clear as the main lot. If it's not? It's a few bottles, don't serve it to others.

Prior to bottling, if there is a dusting of sediment, I rack again before bottling, leaving a bit behind, and bottle the clear wine. This produces 24/25 bottles of clear wine. If there is a dusting, the excess goes into the fridge, and depending on numerous factors, gets bottled with the excess, typically another 3 or 4 bottles. Most of the time, this wine does not drop sediment in the bottle.

Time versus fining agent? It's a trade off. All fining agents, including filtering, have pluses and minuses. Everyone has to make their own decisions on that, with the understanding that time does not always fully clear the wine.

There is no need to be consistent. If making kits, following the instructions. The kit is optimized for those instructions. For red grapes, I mostly don't use a fining agent. For whites and fruits I have used bentonite, and may use kieselsol/chitosan.

That's just about identical to the racking process I use for kits, although I always use the fining agents. And I have never had any sediment in red or whites, even after 5 years in the bottle. The wine in the carboy must be perfectly clear to my eyes for 2 weeks before I will bottle. The new Winexpert instructions are almost certain to give you sediment in the bottles due to the minimum racking they call for. I'm doing an Island Mist kit right now that calls for only 2 rackings - one after primary is done and the second a couple of days before bottling. Unless you're willing to waste an awful lot of wine, I fail to see how that will produce wine with no sediment.

 

[Johnd]

As for cold stabilization, that is a process to remove potassium bitartrates (wine diamonds) from the wine. While considered to be a fault, they are harmless and don't affect the flavour of the wine.

Just a FYI on the “wine diamond” topic, they’re actually not considered to be a fault in wine, I’ve attached an article from Wine Enthusiast that addresses the topic: Wine Faults and How to Recognize Them | Wine Enthusiast Look in th section below Fault #4 for details.

In fact, there are folks who actually consider them to be a sign of quality! To be fair, this is a site I’m not familiar with, and it’s a blog, but it’s still interesting reading. Winc

 

[winemaker81]

Wine Enthusiast has been around a long time -- in the distant past I found their ratings useful.

Recently I subscribed to their magazine and am not finding it interesting. Note that if you sign up with them, you'll be inundated with daily emails trying to sell you vastly overpriced wine paraphernalia.

 

[Swedeman]

The first racking is between 1.010 and 1.000. This is a dirty rack -- I don't intentionally suck up sediment, but my focus is on not leaving wine behind. Since I have active fermentation, I leave head space so the fermentation has room to bubble. If using 23 liter carboys, this is not a problem.

Second racking is after 1 to 2 weeks, depending on the wine and my available time. Fermentation completes and I let the wine set an extra few days to let the gross lees compact. This racking is cleaner than the 1st, but is still somewhat dirty, as I'm avoiding loss of volume.

I really can't see the benefit of the first racking, what will it accomplish that the second wont?

 

[winemaker81]

I really can't see the benefit of the first racking, what will it accomplish that the second wont?

Good question! The first racking gets the wine under airlock and moves the wine from an opaque container to clear one.

Early in my career, the job required that I travel 25% of the time, and I didn't always get much notice. I was rarely gone for more than a couple of days, but during wine season that can be a problem.

1st racking is while there is still activity, and the wine goes under airlock while still producing CO2. I can ignore the wine for weeks, and I don't need to check SG. I can look at the carboy and see when fermentation appears to be done, as the sediment drops and compacts. Then I check SG to confirm fermentation is done, and do the 2nd racking.

I haven't had to travel in decades, and when my kids were small, free time wasn't always easy to get, either. Now? It's a time tested process.

 

[Khristyjeff]

I'm the outlier here. If you follow the kit process and rack carefully, you will have clear wine.

That doesn't help much, does it? So let's define my version of "rack carefully". This is what I do for kit wines. It is near to what I do for fruit and white wines, while reds differ a bit more as pressing is involved. But for now, it's kits.

The first racking is between 1.010 and 1.000. This is a dirty rack -- I don't intentionally suck up sediment, but my focus is on not leaving wine behind. Since I have active fermentation, I leave head space so the fermentation has room to bubble. If using 23 liter carboys, this is not a problem.

Second racking is after 1 to 2 weeks, depending on the wine and my available time. Fermentation completes and I let the wine set an extra few days to let the gross lees compact. This racking is cleaner than the 1st, but is still somewhat dirty, as I'm avoiding loss of volume. Excess loose sludge goes into a bottle, and into the fridge for a week to clear. I'll often recover half a bottle or more.

Add the fining agent and rack back into the carboy. I use a 5 US gallon carboy with the excess in smaller containers, but a 6 gallon carboy works. With the 6, there will be head space.

After 2 weeks, rack again. This is a clean racking. Tilt the carboy at an angle and get as much wine as you can, but do NOT suck up any sediment. This should fill a 5 gallon carboy and you can age however long you want.

Continue racking the remainder -- it may be dirty-ish. Put all excess in small bottles in the fridge to clear. Depending on how careful you are, this remaining wine can be as clear as the main lot. If it's not? It's a few bottles, don't serve it to others.

Prior to bottling, if there is a dusting of sediment, I rack again before bottling, leaving a bit behind, and bottle the clear wine. This produces 24/25 bottles of clear wine. If there is a dusting, the excess goes into the fridge, and depending on numerous factors, gets bottled with the previous excess, typically another 3 or 4 bottles. Most of the time, this wine does not drop sediment in the bottle.

Time versus fining agent? It's a trade off. All fining agents, including filtering, have pluses and minuses. Everyone has to make their own decisions on that, with the understanding that time does not always fully clear the wine.

There is no need to be consistent. If making kits, following the instructions. The kit is optimized for those instructions. For red grapes, I mostly don't use a fining agent. For whites and fruits I have used bentonite, and may use kieselsol/chitosan.

I use an auto-syphon and used to think since the holes that allow the wine into the syphon are 1/2" or so above the bottom tip, I could set the syphon on the bottom of the carboy and not get a lot of lees sucked into it. Is it your experience that with kit wines (at least that is what we're referring to here), you have to hold the syphon off the bottom of the carboy and not tilt it to get a "clean" racking?

 

[bstnh1]

There is an end piece that fits onto the intake end of the auto-siphon that prevents liquid and lees from the very bottom of the carboy from being picked up. On the first racking, it will help a little, but because the sediment is usually so deep you'll still suck some. On subsequent rackings it will do a very good job of leaving all sediment behind.

 

[winemaker81]

Is it your experience that with kit wines (at least that is what we're referring to here), you have to hold the syphon off the bottom of the carboy and not tilt it to get a "clean" racking?

After re-reading it, my "dissertation" is missing a few details.

I always tilt the carboy. An old employer supplied wedge shaped wooden nameplates. I saved mine and use it under the far edge of the carboy.

I'm in the habit of lowering the cane into the wine as the level drops. As @bstnh1 said, the first racking may have deep sediment which will overflow the cap on the bottle, and sometimes for the 2nd as well. Also, if the lees is loose, it may get sucked in during the racking, even if it's thin. As I said, these racking are intentionally dirty to avoid wasting wine, but I don't want to suck up the heavy stuff.

After the first 2 rackings, I'm extra careful on the racking. I've had wines 7 years in the bottle with no sediment.

 

[heatherd]

Hello, this is my first post here but I've been following for some time.

I've been making wine from kits for about 2 years now and have been mostly pleased with the results. I've more recently done some high-end kits like WE Private Res (Amarone, Bordeaux, Fiero, Nebbiolo). I have some RJS En Premeur kits in process and one Cru Select (Sangiovese). I'm convinced that even if you follow directions to the letter and bottle at the 6-8 week mark, you're going to have sediment problems, especially the reds. Am I right?

The answer is probably obvious - perhaps rack more often and/or wait a longer period of time to bottle. But, I've read where cold might help in getting the solids to fall out, so if I transfer to bottling bucket and let sit in the fridge about 3 days before bottlng, is that going to help much?

Your kits will benefit from bulk-aging 12 months.

 

[Khristyjeff]

So, after a bad racking/bottling like this, do I need to dump back into carboy, let settle, then rack and bottle more carefully? Or, since this wine is just for my wife and me, will it be ok? Yes, I'm a bit embarrassed to show you this picture.

 

[bstnh1]

So, after a bad racking/bottling like this, do I need to dump back into carboy, let settle, then rack and bottle more carefully? Or, since this wine is just for my wife and me, will it be ok? Yes, I'm a bit embarrassed to show you this picture.
View attachment 72948

If it were me, I'd dump it back into a carboy, add 1/4 tsp. Kmeta and let it sit for a couple of weeks and rack it then. I'd also rack one more time before bottling.