After I crush my red grapes and need to add any ingredients -- what volume do I use to calculate how much sulfite, acid, yeast, etc to add? The volume of the must including skins, seeds and pulp OR the volume of the juice I expect to get from the must?
For example, I crushed 22 cases of Sangiovese that produced 300 liters of must in the tub. But I expect to get about 200 liters of juice. Do I use 300 l or 200 l to calculate the amount of sulfite, acid and yeast to add?
Marc - Use the juice volume...in your case 200 L. Bill Frazier Olathe, Kansas USA
I shall be controversial and suggest that you might want to consider a different answer for each of the additives;
Sulfite; I would use the complete must volume (300 l). You are trying to achieve a projected ppm; that needs to be inclusive of all the material in the must.
Yeast; it doesn;t matter. I personally think that pitching packets of dried yeast into must based on "x grams per y gallons" is nuts. One packet can satisfy even the largest volume. I take one packet, and reserve a given amount of juice after crush but before sulfite addition. I use wat juice, and water, with the yeast to create a relatively large starter that I will later pitch into the must. Yeast cells multipley all by themselves - no need to buy a bunch of packets.
Acid; I would be conservative and use the juice volume (200 l). But I suggest you conduct multiple bench trials, and 'nudge' your acid to where you want it in increments. It's too easy to overadjust.
With all respect....300 liters must and 200 liters juice from 22 lugs of grapes seems to me to be a bit high. Not by THAT much but enough that you might want to be careful adding that acid.
If the "lugs" the op mentioned are 36 pound boxes that some CV grapes are shipped in, then it is not unreasonable.
There are also different size "Lugs". The ones I use hold about 25 pounds but there are larger ones that hold over 30 pounds.
We ordered Sangiovese in 36lb cases. After crushing the must volume in the tub read 300L. The free run was about 210L and we pressed another
30L.Just curious, do you know the pH of the Sangiovese you got. I got some of the CV Sangiovese in 36 pound boxes this year also and the pH was 4.01. The Brix was 24.2. I checked it several times and recalibrated my meter and compared it to know values of other wine I had. Needless to say I added tartaric and am trying to keep track of the TA also. It will be ready to press about Monday. Last year the Sangiovese I got was excellent and I did not have to do a thing to it. The final pH was about 3.45 and I blended it with 50% locally grown Cabernet Sauvignon. It turned out really well.
Paul, unfortunately all I have to measure pH is the strips. So it isn't that accurate. But I thought it came out to about 4.0 and the Brix was 24. I added TA also. I will testing again when we rack next weekend.
How long has the must been macerating? What yeast do you use?
Paul E. Lehmann wrote:
Those numbers sound identical to what I had at crush.
I have been fermenting for 8 days and will press tomorrow morning. The cap has fallen.
I used EC 1118 this year and I am fermenting in my basement wine cellar where the temperature is about 70 degrees.
I used same yeast and pressed after 7 days. Where did you get the grapes?
I got my grapes from S&S in Baltimore.
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