Bulldog Pup vs. Siphon

(1) The wine in the container being racked isn't exposed to air. (2) The transfer goes much faster under inert gas pressure than it does by gravity. Also, when the siphon breaks, the gas in the line is inert - not air.

Tom S

Thanks. Maybe this newgroup should be called rec.ask.tom.s ;-)

I saw the Compleat [eek] Winemaker has them for $329... which seems kind of expensive for a little piece of metal. Does that sound about right?

Argon or Nitrogen?

One more..... you can push the wine uphill with a bulldog pup.

clyde

That sounds about right to me Michael. They aren't all that little and made from SS. Another source to check would be Boswell, which I think is in San Rafeal.

For this ap, it doesn't matter..... unless you're handling a wine destined to be sparkling, then it should be CO2.

clyde

I'm using a carboy cap and racking cane with my kegging setup to transfer my wine. I sanitize, purge, and pressurize a keg with CO2. A racking cane goes in the upper spout of the cap and a picnic tap gets shoved over the other spout (everything is sanitized, of course). I then use gentle pressure to push the must out of one carboy and into another. The picnic tap gives me the control to keep too much pressure from building up, my must doesn't touch much (if any) air, because I've blown out my empty carboy with CO2. The whole procedure is really easy to do and takes less time. I've also never made a mess like I did with my old racking setup and I can put the carboys side by side since I'm pushing the must instead of siphoning. I also don't worry as much about a plugged line because a little bit of pressure will clean any blockage.

Just my $.02

As long as the level of the wine in the tank is higher than the level in the barrel, gravity will push the wine into the barrel. It doesn't matter what the height of the racking flange is until the level in the tank drops to the level in the barrel you're filling. Also, racking from the top buys you nothing. The siphon effect will still quit when the two levels become equal.

I should probably just get a stand and then this won't be a

I suppose renting/borrowing a forklift for racking is out of the question...?

Tom S

Well, all this has sort of changed now. We ended up crushing 2.5 tons of syrah last week instead of the 1.5 we planned and now the tanks are all taken up. I don't mind a bit of aeration for the syrah so I'll just bucket over what can't be siphoned.

But now I'm now going to ferment the pinot in macrobins... even further away from barrels. BUT, they do have forklift slots - that's a great idea! I'll be the envy of my neighbors, tooling down city streets in a Bobcat.

Thanks, ...Michael