De-gassing tool

The device I use is Fizz-X. yes it's worth the $20. SS rod with plastic wings that flip out when placed in the drill (a slow drill I might add). I use a battery powered drill for this.

I guess you could make one as long as you used stuff you would eat off of.

I don't thnk it is worth $20. Go to:

But Wait! Go down to your local hardware store and buy a length of food-grade plastic or an aluminum rod and bend it to the general shape in the picture of the The Whip. That's what I did. Mine works great.

Anyone tried using a vacuum pump for degassing instead? Just a thought....

Yes, many people do.

Guy

Definitely don't apply any sort of vacuum to plastic carboys! Even glass might be dicey but plastic will just collapse and there goes your wine... running on the floor...

Pp

Excuse the pun but vacuum degassing a carboy, well... sucks. I don't think it's worth doing. You almost need to stir the wine while degassing to liberate the gas; it does not seem to pull all of the gas out. Other have mentioned loss of aroma too.

Joe

"Definitely don't apply any sort of vacuum to plastic carboys! Even glass might be dicey but plastic will just collapse and there goes your wine... running on the floor..."

Hey, you don't go crazy with pumping! You pump only so much that the wine level goes up close to the bung and then you stop pumping. After a while, the wine level will go down as CO2 has been released and has taken the place of the wine. You then stir the wine and use the pump again or pump and shake the carboy.

I have been using a vaccum pump for many years on a few hundred kits. In fact, I have many carboys with vaccum rather than airspace and airlock. Every other day I pump more CO2 out and then lock the vaccum. I don't care about a change in temperature or pressure, my wine is not affected as I keep 2 in. of vaccum/CO2 below the bung.

Try it and you will like it as they say.

Guy

Guy:

I was really talking about plastic carboys because those were mentioned in the original posting about vacuum but granted, lot of this depends on the setup, especially what kind of vacuum pump one uses. I'm curious about your setup, especially that part about locking the vacuum - how do you do that?

Thx,

Pp

Cut or break the handle off a bottle brush. A straight one like you use for wine bottles rather than a bent one used for carboys, and use it with a variable speed drill. Shouldn't cost more than 2 or 3 dollars asuming you have the drill.

Ray

I understand that some people do use vacume but I have not so I am not speaking from experience. I have read that the vacume would draw off some of the volitiles that give the wine its aroma. That was enough to stop me. Vacuming is a shortcut and short cuts usually have negatives.

Actually, I generally do not degas but let time remove the CO2, and it will. The few exceptions to this are wines that have short lives like many white kit wines and some juice wines. I have found that Welch's Niagara concentrate makes an excellent fruity wine but it goes over the hill in 9 months. I sure do not want to wait 6 months for it to degas by itself.

Ray

I'm curious about your setup, especially that part about locking

I use a Mity Vac vaccum pump, but I do not connect it directly to the rubber bung. Here is how to do it so that the carboy retains the vaccum once the pump is disconnected.

1. Cut a piece of a flexible plastic hose about 6 in. in length.
2. Thread that short piece of plastic hose halfway through a white plastic clip (the one used to shut the flow of wine.
3. Insert one end of the short flexible hose into the hole of the rubber bung fitted to the carboy.
4. When you want to use the vacuum pump, insert the vacuum pump hose black tip into the other end of the flexible hose.
5. Pump to extract air from the carboy.
6. clip shut the flexible hose so that the vaccum is kept.
7. Remove the pump/pump hose and black tip from the short flexible hose.
8. You can then go to the next carboys!

As far as removing aroma when degasing with a pump, you probably loose some in a shorter time compared to a longer time using TIME to degas. But how sure are you that it's not the same amount?

Guy Guy

Ok. Have just started experimenting with vacuum degassing. I found a really easy way to do it. I found some old "Boots" fermentation locks which had a large opening in the top, about the size of a wine bottle neck. I fitted them in a rubber bung into a glass demi. I then got my vacuum "wine saver" and found that the rubber stoppers were a perfect fit into the fermentation lock.

I then just sucked a depression and watched the bubbles! One thing to be aware of is to make sure you have racked off first. Also, I found it best to use some headspace as a vacuum reservoir, and also not to pump too hard. My wine-saver makes a click when you achieve the right holding vacuum. It is possible to just ignore this and keep pumping. I think you could spoil the wine with too high a vacuum. In the limit, the alcohol will boil off!

I tried pumping one hard on a demi which had not been racked and had 1/2 inch of lees. The entire floor erupted in a very spectacular way, and the wine was fizzing like the clappers! So much that it filled the headspace and came through the lock. So I am now proceding which a lower vacuum, stopping when the indicator clicks.

I have 5 gallons of shiraz that is nearly ready to bottle (having been stirr degassed conventionally), I think I'll rack that off from the plastic carboy to 1 gallon glass demi's and give some of it a vacuum degas as well to see if it pulls any more gas and changes the taste.

John