I made a red wine from New York Finger Lake juice that has been bulk aging in a carboy (racked every 3-4 months) for 11 months now. I'm getting ready to bottle it and I just took a sample taste. I was surprised that it was quite fizzy. Honestly. there could be a good chance that I never gave it a good degassing. It's been almost a year, I can't remember. In the past I never gave it a thought because the finished wine was never fizzy. I've been zapping it pretty hard with an electric drill for 2 days now and there still seems to be a good amount of CO2. Is this wine stable and in need of more degassing, or can fermentation still be about even after a year. What can I do? My latest taste was not fizzy, but the air lock was showing CO2 pressure. If I shake the carboy, CO2 still rises.

I'm not sure what New York Finger Lake Juice is. Is this a kit? Or a recipe you tried? Post the recipe and general proceedures you used. You mentioned you racked every 3 or 4 months. That could be part of the problem. Not racking wine every two months SO2 can build because of the wine sitting on gross lees or even fine lees. Are you getting a rotten egg odor?

My proceedures are to take a juice, of any kind, add 1 crushed campden tablet per gallon. That will eliminate any possibility of unwanted bacteria and prevent unwanted fermentation. 24 to 30 hours later I add the yeast. This is all done in an open primary. After approximately 5 days the wine will have fermented to about 1.020 SG or lower. I rack it into a carboy and install an airlock. About 3 weeks later I rack off of the gross lees to another carboy, add 1 crushed campden per gallon, stir it in, and install the air lock. 2 months later I rack again and at this point you can add 1/2 crushed campden tablet per gallon, or wait until the next racking in 2 months and add the 1 crushed campden tablet per gallon. After about 8 months your wine should be ready to bottle. If you are patient you don't have to degas your wine mechanically with an electric drill motor and stirring wand.

Does your wine taste and smell good? Is it possible you used a carboy for your primary and the yeast has been choked for oxygen and just taking a long time to ferment? Have you measured the SG? Is it fermenting or is it just outgasing of the metabisulphate? Outgasing of metabisulphate shouldn't take longer than about 6 weeks. What form of metabisulphate did you use? Powder? Or campden tablets?

Hi and thanks for your reply. The wine currently smells and tastes great. My process went like this:

Primary
1. Juice purchased on 11/8/08 - 6 gallons of Noiret juice from Fulkerson Winery: <http://www.fulkersonwinery.com/>
2. Started wine in primary on 11/15/08 (life got in the way of a quick start) - Hyrometer reading was already at 1.09 (natural fermentation already started. Starting sugar level estimated between 1.10-1.13)
3. 6 Campden Tablets crushed and added to slow or kill already active "wild" yeast.
4. 1 packet Premier Cuvee yeast
5. 4 tsp Yeast Nutrient
Secondary
6. 11/19/08 Transfered to carboy with SG 1.000. Added French Oak Chips...about 3oz boiled then cooled
2nd Carboy
7. 12/5/08 fairly cleared and transferred to 2nd carboy, 6 Campden Tablets crushed and added
8. Had to add water to bring level of wine upto bung...added about 32 oz. plus about 1 750ml bottle of pre-made "welches" red wine.
My notes don't exist for the rest of time, but I'd guess:
9. after 2 months (still interested in project) transfered to carboy, maybe campden tablets added, maybe not
10. 3-4 months passed, completely lost interest in project. Transfered to carboy. Thought about getting ready to bottle
11. 3-4 months passed again, transfered to carboy with real intent to bottle, got busy with other projects.
12. 1 month passed and now ready to bottle, tasted wine, smells and tastes great, EXCITED again , but slightly fizzy
13. dissatisfied with fizz so zapped carboy with drill. Lots of gas released, zapped again, zapped again.
14. fizz while drinking is gone but there is still enough gas trapped to push pressure on airlock

Please help with fixing the gas problem for this project and the others I'm going to undertake. Its juice season again
Thanks for reading.

Very interesting. Everything was looking good with the natural fermentation. Wondering why you changed when you were at 1.09 SG? Think that was OK. Premier Cuvee' is a strong champagne strain. Everything looked good after the Premier Cuvee'. I think when you added the Welches wine the MLF started again. I would add 1 crushed campden tablet per gallon and at the same time stir in 1/2 teaspoon of potassium sorbate per gallon. Let it sit for 6 weeks and I think your fiz will be gone.

Campden basically is a hostile inviroment for yeast. Once the campden totally outgases if there is any sugar left in the wine fermentation will start up again. If campden is added with potassium sorbate once the campden outgases the potassium sorbate prevents any further fermentation. No fiz.

Never add potassium sorbate without adding campden because you will get a geranium or dead fish smell from your wine. If a wine has totally fermentented out .096 SG you probably don't need the potassium sorbate. I add it to my wines to be sure there is no further fermentation.

I also add my oak, campden and potassium sorbate about 6 weeks before I plan to bottle.

I don't know much about New York grapes. Many of the northern climate grapes have much higher acid in them. My Frontenac grapes get picked at about 24.5 Brix and this year they still had an acid of 1.5% which is pretty high. If the acid in your New York grapes were higher than normal (.60%) the MLF natural yeast fermentation tends to lower the malic acid. Lowering the malic acid that way works but sometimes lactic acid builds and should be measured. If you used the Lalvin 71B-1122 it tends to lower some of the malic acid in the wine. Just some thoughts. I like the Red Star Premier Cuvee' and have used it a lot. Easy starter and works up to 18% alcohol.

For my Frontenac grapes I used potassium carbonate to lower the acid to .70%, then used the Lalvin 71B-1122 yeast. I'll monitor the acid after fermentation is finished.

Very interesting. Everything was looking good with the natural fermentation. Wondering why you changed when you were at 1.09 SG?

I'm learning and experimenting.

Premier Cuvee' is a strong champagne strain

I didn't know that. The brew supply shop clerk advised that I should use that yeast. I told him my last red wine I made foamed a lot with the yeast I used and it made a mess once I transfered it into the carboy. I think he was trying to help me keep foaming down and he wasn't familiar with the grape juice I was using.


I'll stabilize the wine as you recommend with the campden and potassium sorbate. I've used the combo for past wines. This is the longest I've ever bulk-aged and I assumed that the wine would stabilize on it's own. Chalked up another tick in the learing column. Thanks so much for the feedback.

The Red Star Premier Cuvee' is a very good yeast. I've used it a lot. You don't have to worry about stuck fermentations, and it is good to 18% alcohol and you can just sprinkle it over the top and it will start every time. You might want to check out the below web site if you don't already have it. Sounds like you are already experienced in wine making. Interesting reading. If you schroll to the bottom he lists all the strains of yeast and basically what they do.

http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/yeast.asp

One thing I try to do when racking to the secondary from the primary is wait until the strong fermentation is just about finished. There is really no set SG number before you rack. I like to be below 1.020 but sometimes, like you said, if the yeast is a high foamer you may have to wait longer.

When I saw that you added the other wine to your wine I just suspected that maybe for some reason it hadn't totally fermented out. So now it is just slowly fermenting. The campden and sorbate will take care of that.

I almost forgot, welcome to the forum.