Opinions on oxygnating wine while racking, I have even quit using my hose and have started to shake the carboy really good while it is transfering the first one and holding hose up and letting it drop down into the carboy secound rack.

I don't normally want to get that much oxygen in my wine after it is about finished with fermentation. The only reason I may splash rack my wine is if it is left on the gross lees a little too long it may have a strong sulphur odor. Otherwise I just rack and don't try to splash it into the secondary.

Oxygen is good in the primary because it helps the yeast to ferment. I stir my primary twice a day to encourge oxygen. Not in the secondary. If you leave your wine until it is completely fermented out before racking to the secondary add some campden is a good idea.

There is a lot of CO2 attached to the wine all the way up to the 3rd racking. Splashing and letting the wine drop into the carboy is what I was using to help break it lose. At the 3rd racking I have been being a lot more careful. Was using a whip the first couple of rackings. But this seemed to do about the same thing as splashing. Do you do anything to help the CO2 drop off or just wait it out.

Sometimes doing nothing is better. I guess making wine is kind of an old man's hobby. Sit back and wait. The more you wait the better the wine gets. Keep in mind once the wine has fermented out, usually in the secondary, any CO2 is going to escape through the air lock with time. Some of the commercial wineries add CO2 to protect the head space. I start off my primary with about 6 or 7 gallons, rack to a 6 gallon, and after about 3 weeks rack to a 5 gallon. Then I only rack every 2 months. I add 1 campden tablet per gallon every other racking or 1/2 campden tablet per gallon every racking. You need to protect the air space above the wine plus your wine can oxidize without enough campden. I don't bottle before about 8 months. About 6 weeks before I am ready to bottle I add my potassium sorbate, campden, and oak if desired. Replace the airlock. I filter with a #2 filter before I bottle. Unless my wine is really low on acid I don't add acid until the wine has been racked several times.

All of that said, I don't want you to think nobody degasses their wine. Some winemakers actually use an electric drill and a paint stirrer. Others just stir, stir, stir. I just prefer not to beat the crap out of my wine because time will solve the problem. My opinion is that it changes the flavor. Jack Keller claims that flavor will come back. Check out the below site on degassing. Scroll down through until you come to degassing.

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

Yea I do the same exact thing, I am really tired of the drill thing though and yes I do notice the flavor loss with it but it did come back but took some time. I have a cherry/mango ready to rack from primary today. I'm only going to only splash if I smell sulfer and not stir and see what happens. If I understand you right this should allow me to get a better feel for how this wine will taste latter.

Yes, I think you will gain a lot more with patience.

Visited Local Winery yesterday He really stressed this O2 thing. Even told me to sulphite every racking that was new.

The general rule of thumb for sulphiting is full doze, 1 campden per gallon, every other racking or 1/2 doze, 1/2 campden per gallon every racking. I don't think adding more campden to your wine will hurt anything. Years ago they used to add tremendous amounts of sulphites to wine and other foods. They have decreased those high levels due to some people having bad reactions to sulphites. There was an article I saw about sulphites at one of the wine supply places. I'll see if I can locate the article. White wines do need more sulphites than red wines. Adding tannins to white wines is a good idea to help it keep longer.

As far as O2, I am wondering if he was talking about the light stirring of the lees if you don't rack for over 3 months. I rack about every 2 months after I rack off of the gross lees. If you don't rack wine for over 3 months hydrogen-sulphide gas starts to form even though it is only light lees. You can correct that by lightly stirring the lees to break that up. Or, you could just rack every 2 months. Once your wine has fermented out there is no need for further oxygen, just aging it and protecting it from oxygen. If you open a bottle of wine and let it breath for 15 minutes you will some great flavors. Leave that wine open to oxygen for 3 or 4 hours you can see exactly what oxygen does to wine. Turns it to vinegar.

In commercial wine making they add as much sulphite as allowed, then stir the crap out of their wine to degas it. Some of the sulphites leave the wine as they degas. The remainder of the sulphites stay in the wine. Their objective is to make wine as quick as possible and get it sold. If you look at some of the kit wines they claim you can bottle the kits within 30 days. Just not my kind of wine. You can degas by stirring or degas by time under an airlock.

I don't recall if I gave you the web site of Jack Keller or not about some of the basics of wine making. Very interesting. I have been making wine since about 1973 and I still go back and review some of his info on wine making.

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

Here is some info on sulphites you may find interesting

SULFITES
Preservatives are an important part of wine making. Don't worry that adding them to your home-made wine. Not only do they keep wine from developing infections, they also keep the wine from oxidizing. If you are concerned about the use of sulfites in wine read on!
Preservatives are an important part of wine making. Don't worry that adding 'preservatives' to your home-made wine. The thing we most often recommend is sulfite, and it occurs naturally in small amounts during fermentation. Sulfites are your friend. Not only do they keep wine from developing infections like film yeast, mould, and acetobacter (vinegar bacteria), they also keep the wine from oxidizing. Without the use of sulfites you have to be terrifically careful to keep all of your equipment very sanitary and you still have to drink your wine up as quickly as possible before it spoils.
Many people worry that they may be allergic to sulfites. True sulfite allergies are very rare. It's more likely that they have been exposed to a high level of sulfites in the past. In the 1970's restaurants would douse their salad bars with 2000 PPM (part per million) sulfite solutions in order to keep the produce fresh. Mixing this with acidic foods, such as salad dressings or vinegar, would cause the salad to release clouds of sulfite gas, provoking unpleasant reactions.
What most people describe as a sulfite headache is a reaction to bio-amines. These are compounds formed in wines for various reasons, one of the commonest being malolactic fermentation in the presence of sugar. Some commercial wineries start malolactic inoculation before the end of alcohol fermentation, guaranteeing the formation of bio- amines. Since wine kits don't go through malolactic they do not form bio-amines, and consequently don't provoke allergic reactions.
People familiar with bread making, or who have knowledge of beer making will want to re-hydrate the yeast prior to pitching it. This contradicts our instructions, which direct you to sprinkle the yeast directly on top of the juice. Who are you going to believe? You can re-hydrate the yeast if you wish, but be aware that anything less than utterly strict adherence to proper re-hydration procedures will kill your yeast instead of helping it. There's a long scientific explanation for this, but it boils down to viability. Simply sprinkling the yeast on top of the must will give you a higher live cell count than re-hydrating in most cases, and will be far less trouble.
Potassium Metabisulphite is a stable source of sulfite in winemaking. The use of sulfur compounds is not a recent innovation. The Dutch shipping companies popularized the use of sulfur in the 16th century by refusing to ship any wines not treated. They insisted on the use of sulfites because the treated wines were the only ones that survived a long sea voyage without spoiling.
Sulfites work by releasing free sulfur dioxide, which inhibits yeast, mould and bacteria. It does this in two ways: one, it kills some of the organisms outright, and two, it blocks the surviving organisms ability to reproduce. If your winemaking equipment is physically clean and you've rinsed it with a sulfite solution, nothing will grow on it.
Sulfites are also added directly to wine after fermentation, to help prevent oxidation. Oxidation in wine follows the same pattern that you see in the cut edge of an apple-the wine turns brown and takes on a flat 'cardboard' taste. Sulfur binds with the oxygen in the wine and prevents this damage.
Some facts that might clear up any misunderstanding about sulfites:
• Sulfites are a recognized food additive. The federal government controls their use. .All commercially available wines contain sulfites, even those labeled 'Kosher' or 'Organic'. The legally allowable amount in British Columbia, where WineXpert kits are made, is 70 PPM.
• Nearly all dried fruits and meats contain sulfites. Raisins, for instance, have up to 250 PPM. Frozen orange juice, bacon, dried noodles, all contain sulfite.
• The amount of sulfite provided in WineXpert kits will result in a level of between 15 and 30 PPM in a finished wine.
• All grape-based wines produce sulfites naturally during fermentation, up to a level of about 1O PPM. Even with no addition of sulfites, wines will still contain them.
• This is not to say that sulfites are totally benign. People with asthma or emphysema should avoid inhaling sulfite powder or the gas that comes off the prepared solution. It can act as a bronchial constrictor, aggravating any breathing problems. Also , adding extra sulfites to wine is of no benefit, as it can spoil I the flavor, giving it a 'burnt match', smell. It's important to follow directions for sulfite additions.
• The upshot of sulfite use is this: without sulfites you'd have to be very careful to keep all of your equipment sanitary and you'd still have to drink your wine quickly, before it spoiled, probably within one or two months.
A final, but very important consideration is that if your customer insists on leaving out the sulfite from their wine kit, they must also leave out the sorbate. Sulfite suppresses malolactic bacteria, but sorbate does not. Without any sulfite to prevent malolactic fermentation, the bacteria will convert the sorbate into hexadienol, producing a stupendously horrible aroma of composting geraniums and rotting trout.
copyright 2004 J.R.Leverentz

Yea I have studied Kellers web site a lot. It is why I started making wine again. I though he might be halfing his sulphite dosage. I shot him, the winery, an email to find out. I will say his white and my peach taste alot alike so I must have got something right. I had learned to make wine I'll say "grandma's way" which is alot like Jim the Wine Maker's way. Not verry pridictable as to your results and no sulphites so it was drank young and sweet. I read Jacks intire site before his fire and decided to start making it again. I guess I need to learn malactic fermentation now. I do believe that I atleast like the 1/2 dose every racking. I may start diong this. I allways worry about the inbetween racking. I really take my time with it but will allways look around and worry "what did I forget to sanitize"? I think that would take alot of pressure off of that racking. Not to say that I intend to start getting lazy about it. But I like the idea that the wine will be getting sanitized again just in case.