First time corking question

It helps if they are wetted and possible softened in warm water. Sulfite may be usefull if you have problems with bottle infections (although you shoudl not if your wine is sulftied properly). Do NOT boil them.

Corks should not be boiled because it tends to destroy their physical integrity.

What I've found works quite well is soaking them in several changes of warm water until the water runs clear, then draining them in a collander before inserting. The water softens and lubricates them some so they go in easier and conform to the neck of the bottle better. Mind that you don't use them while they're sopping wet or when you compress them in the corker they'll drip water into the bottle. Also, look at both ends of the cork and put the more defect free end into the corker first. If neither end looks good, throw it away. If you drop one on the floor, either re-clean it or throw it away.

Sulfiting the corks really isn't necessary, but having the correct level of sulfite in the wine is.

Tom S

First, you need some sort of corker. Don't laugh, had someone in my store the other day looking for smaller corks because the ones he had were too large for his bottles. The ones he had were standard #9 corks.

Second, further advise depends on

a) style of corker: hand or floor b) diameter of corks: #8 (usually 22mm diameter), #9 (23 or 24mm diameter).

Based on customer feedback (NOT personal experience), if you have a hand corker and 24 mm #9's give up now.

If you have a floor corker, the corks probably don't matter.

Oh, and on the topic of boiling corks....the old books say to do this. And they are correct, but ONLY for solid corks. The corks that are bonded together chips of cork should not be boiled.

Steve

Cox it "From Vines to Wines" recommends boiling your corks for 5 min's. This is an excellent book but that is terrible advise. I followed it for a couple of years and then realize that after about 2 years the boiled corks start turning to mush, leaking and generally falling apart. Boiling really breaks down the structure of the cork and is very bad for them.

Learn from the commercial wineries. They do not boil. In fact they do not do anything. They open the bag and use them. That is what I do now and have had no trouble. Rinse them if you want to or if they have cork dust on them but please do not boil them

Ray

Steve I have used a plastic plunger corker for over 20 years with my #

9 corks with no problem. Just place the cork in the corker and place it on top of the bottle 3 quick slaps withthe palm of my had and the cork is seated. I have use a floor coker before and they are nice but an unnecessary expense for a beginer.

On 4/5/2006 4:27 PM, fasteddy999 wrote: [thread snipped]

Fasteddy999,

I'm not sure what a plastic plunger corker is, but as a beginner I didn't have a corker, and I have nothing but praise for my Italian floor corker and the utility it has brought to my wine making efforts. I wish I had bought the corker years prior, and I would recommend to any wine making beginner that they acquire one just as soon as they decide that this is a hobby which they will continue to pursue. At about $100 (US) the floor corker is priced right at the cost of a premium wine kit, and it is worth every cent.

Cheers, Ken Taborek

I also use 9s with a hand corker. I use a rubber mallet to finish driving them in.

Never had a broken bottle (it does not take much force to finish the corks off), and I am not concerned that I would break one.

I used 9s the other day with a new floor corker. I tired it with an empty bottle at first and no problem.

However when actually bottling the wine the corks were only going halfway in on 15 of 30 bottle of Zin that I had. I couldn't figure out why other than maybe the inch of air that was left was causing pressure that wasn't present in the empty bottle.

Like you I f>

Fasteddy:

Everybody has different experiences. Let me explain it better.

I run a store and have bought various #9 corks. Some are 24mm in diameter, others are 23mm. I know that doesn't sound like much. However, the store has a compressed air driven corker. You can EASILY tell the difference between the 24mm and 23mm #9s. The machine easily inserts the 23mm's and strains with the 24mms.

CUSTOMER FEEDBACK from those using hand corkers is that the 24mm corks are much more difficult than the 23mm corks. Those using floor corkers doen't notice any difference.

So Fasteddy, if you're not having problems maybe you've been using the

23's. Or maybe the slipperiness of the plastic corker negates the extra mm.

Steve

The good inexpensive hand corker is made by Ferrari and is called the Gilda. It compresses the cork before inserting it with an iris just like a floor corker. If you hunt around for about $15- $20 more US you can get a Portuguese floor corker, it's well worth it.

You cant do synthetics with any sort of hand corker unless you are Man-Mountaindeen or Joe Magerac; the Portuguese can do either.

Boiling corks is a bad idea as others have said. I spritz with a 1% sulfite solution and drain, it's more for lubrication than anything else. I never use a bag of 1000 at one time so I feel it's cheap insurance. I just load up a funnel with a screen and place it in a bottle or flask to hold it up and use them after spritzing. I do the same thing with synthetics or naturals, I use both. The naturals get a warm rinse like Tom said, then I spritz with to SO2.

Joe

I live near Presque Isle winery, and after speaking with owner Doug Moorehead decided to drop the best 48 bucks (USD) on a portugese floor corker. Doug uses almagamated corks at his winery almost exclusively now, it is a lower grade cork, filled with cork dust and finished with a very fine skin of plastic. He sells these corks that are pre-rinsed with sulfite solution. All you need to do is dip them in a wee bit of warm water as rinse and lube and bang, corked bottles.

Here is a little pictoral essay of the Portugese floor corker in action.

Here you will notice the floor corker in full picture with an Ezra Brooks bourbon bottle loaded, mind you i used this bottle as example because the neck of the Ezra bottle is smaller than a standard wine bottle.

Here is the cork pre-compressed

Here is a compressed cork, now from here you need a swift plunge on the cork or it will be failed. The effort is more to compress the cork than to plunge it into the neck. The reason for this is because of the leverage you get on the handle and the angle. With one sweeping motion you get the entire process done.

Here is a pic of the finished product. Not an ezra bottle, but the result is exactly the same. Just for notes, this is a bottle of 2004 blackberry.

Again, I was exclusively screw-top hoss until I got the floor corker, now bottling is a breeze.

Hoss,

Nice pictorial description of how your corker works! Your corker looks almost identical to mine, from the fire engine red color, to the flanges on the legs for mounting to the floor. Except your corker appears to have a plastic iris, where mine has a bronze (brass?) iris. Mine is a few years old, and I wonder, if your iris is plastic and your corker newer, if this is a recent change to the design.

Cheers, Ken Taborek

No, they're 2 different models - the plastic iris is a Portuguese corker, the brass one Italian. The Italian is more expensive and I believe it can also handle 3L bottles, but I've also see reports that it can damage plastic corks. I've got the Portuguese model and am very happy with it.

Pp

ive got that same floor corker joe posted a pic of. it is great. puts em in good. lucas

Hoss, I use the same corker and when I use natural corks, it's the agglomerated from Presque Isle like yours. Doug sell Nomacorq also and your corker will do them too. I have never had issues with agglomerated but some people feel they are harder to extract from the bottle than natural and they are probably right.

The Portuguese corker has had a plastic iris for at least 10 years, that's when I first started looking at them.

The Ferrari (Italian) I have is blue and the iris over-compresses just a bit; when that happens it leave a tiny crease along one edge of the synthetic cork; I have no idea why it doesn't damage the naturals but it doesn't.

Joe

I have never boiled them (I think they fail prematurely if you do boil them). I just put them in a bowl full of water and sulfites hold the corks under with a plate or lid and let them sit overnight. Then bottle.