I started a grapefruit wine 2 months ago and I just did a gravity reading on it And my abv is already at 19.3%. What should I do? Is there anyway I can stop the yeast from producing more alcohol and possibly speed up the clarifying process.
Help. Abv 19.3%
- Thread starter loren601
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What was your recipe? and to answer your 2nd question No, ferment to completion. To answer you first question, what is your goal and for your third question, there are additives that can help clearify, but they also are known to strip flavor if used to excess.
Few yeast strains go above 15%, and even fewer tolerate 18%+.
Are you certain of your reading?
Are you certain of your reading?
yes, but you must know what you put in, how many gallons, etc.
Camden and Sorbate work by preventing yeast reproduction, which means the current yeast will go until they run out of life, so your ABV could keep going (what are your starting and current gravity readings?) 19% abv, would mean around 140 points of sugar shift.
Anyhow you can try and slow this all down buy cold crashing, racking - to reduce amount of yeast, although the live is more likely in suspension - and then adding Camden. But really it is hard to stop a fermentation short of heating/pasturizing. And that can give your product a 'cooked' flavor that maybe good, or will just be 'off'.
Yooper said:
I used a high yield yeast with a potential of abv 20% and added yeast nutrient for the first 3 days. On top of all that I was trying to make the wine sweeter so it started with roughly 21 lbs of sugar in a 6.5 gal carboy
6.5 gallons of must? or 6.5 gallons total volume so must+head space? ... sugar is 46 ppg, so 21lb is like 966 points 966/6.5 = 148 - or OG of 1.148 Minimum (assuming you get no sugar from any other source like juice or such)
Well off hand, I'd guess you only have about 15 more points it can go - down to about .990 or .985 Although that will add about 1 to 2% more ABV.
This receipe was 24lb of grapefruits (all, but juiced etc) and 21lb of sugar fill to 6.5 gallons? wow... I'm surprised your OG wasn't higher than 1.150. I'd have thought the juice of the grapefruit would have added some.
Anyhow back to your question. The only way to stop yeast is to have it run out of food, or heat. Chemicals don't kill active yeast, only prevent more yeast from growing.
This receipe was 24lb of grapefruits (all, but juiced etc) and 21lb of sugar fill to 6.5 gallons? wow... I'm surprised your OG wasn't higher than 1.150. I'd have thought the juice of the grapefruit would have added some.
Anyhow back to your question. The only way to stop yeast is to have it run out of food, or heat. Chemicals don't kill active yeast, only prevent more yeast from growing.
ACbrewer said:
I don't have my exact OG in front of me I'm still at work. Thanks for the info I didn't realize that about the chemicals. My other question is when can I back sweeten this wine? It's really tart an I don't wanna sweeten it to late for fear of the wine not becoming clear
My experience has been that I waited until my lemon wine (aka skeeterpee) finished fermenting - about 2 or 3 days with stable FG, then racked to new container with 'stablizers' (potasium sorbate, + camden tabs/metabisulfate) at that point I think I gave it a day or 2 and then sugar to sweeten, and then checked Gravity and left it for 2 weeks, checking gravity after 2 weeks to be sure that it didn't start again fermenting.
So a few days should be good. I think it could even been weeks. Assuming you use table sugar and not honey (honey is cloudy).
So a few days should be good. I think it could even been weeks. Assuming you use table sugar and not honey (honey is cloudy).
Best I can figure, you should get it stopped, backsweeten with what you want, and that should dilute the rocket fuel some. I wouldn't worry too much about clearing it yet, that stuff is going to need to sit a long while, anyhow for it to be drinkable.
