Alcohol Content

It depends on the yeast you use. I've made wine as much as 17% before.

It depends on more than the yeast -- if there isn't enough sugar there to produce more than 9% alcohol, that's all you're ever going to get, no matter what yeast you use.

If you're using commercial kits, or grapes or juice purchased from a vineyard, the alcohol content is about the same as in commercial wines, unless you deliberately add more sugar. The reason is that you're starting from essentially the same raw materials that the commercial wineries use, and so you're going to wind up with about the same alcohol content.

If you're making your own from other fruits, all bets are off. Wine grapes are the only fruit that contains enough sugar entirely on its own to make good wine. If you're using any other fruit, even other types of grapes, you have to add sugar -- sometimes a *lot* of sugar -- to get the alcohol content up into the 10-12% range that's typical of grape wines. And once you start adding your own sugar, well, you can make the alcohol content turn out to be anything you want it to be.

Want lots of alcohol? Use lots of sugar, and a yeast that will tolerate lots of alcohol.

Want less alcohol than usual? Use less sugar.

I like the taste of wine, not the effects of the alcohol in it. At what point does wine start tasting more like whiskey?

Don't really know how to make wines. But the difference between home made wines from commercial ones are their prices. Plus, whatever you are in control of whatever you like the wine should taste. Unlike in commercial ones where they already have the formula of how their wine should taste.

Probably never. Most strains of wine yeast die at alcohol levels of around 12 or 13%, some even lower. Champagne yeast will survive 18%. Whiskey, on the other hand, is typically 40% or more. 86 proof (43%) is common.