Merlot Problem

I have only made wine once before and it was from a kit and it came out pretty good. So about 8 months ago i figured i would try making a Merlot from just juice. I bought a 5 gallon pale of must, went through all the normal procedures. About a month ago i added some oak chips, i tried it the other day. It was very acidic and also the color was extremely light. I have knew the color was light the whole time to but figured it might fix itself but obviously has not. Any suggestions for fixing this or will it get better with time. When should i bottle. Any suggestions would be helpful

With the colour - it comes from the skins for red wine. If you are buying juice it would miss out on the skin contact. I usually give my cab sav 3-4 days on the skins to extract full colour and tannins. I hope they at least gave it a cold soak with the skins to extract some colour.
The acidic taste is a bit harder. Is it under airlock or sealed? Does it have any of that nail polish remover smell, or vinegar smell? Did you use any camden tablets? Is there very much airspace? The most common problems are oxidation from too much contact with air, or volatile acidity if acetobacter get in (this also requires air). You can also get a secondary malo lactic fermentation which adds co2 which will give an acidic taste but if you have an airlock this should have dissipated. If you haven't added camden tablets you should, it is pretty important for red wine.
hope this helps.