Judging or measuring clarity as wine is clearing - how clear is clear enough?

[SatchIce9]

Has anyone got an objective method for measuring the clarity of wine as it's clearing?

There will always be a strong element of subjective judgement I suppose, but I've tried to think of ways to take some of the subjectivity out of it.

One method I've come up with is to shine my LED bike light through one side of the demijon and look at it through the other side. When the wine is still cloudy/hazy, I just see a glow of diffuse light through wine to the other side. As the wine gets clearer, I can see the 5 indivudal LEDs of the light (see attached pic) and there is less of a diffuse glow as the light goes more directly through the wine with less scattering. That's not foolproof though because it also depends on the ambient light level when I do this - if it's dark or night time in the place where I do this (garage) its easier to see the 5 LEDs than in the daytime.

I've also wondered if a laser pointer could replace the LED light - shine the laser pointer beam through the demijon onto a white card to see if you can see a dot, but I don't have a laser pointer to try it for myself. Has anyone else tried that?

I've heared of the newspaper test - where if you can read newsprint through the wine then its certainly clear enough. I thought about using an eyetest chart with progressively smaller text or letters. What's the smallest text you can see through the wine - and use that as an objective measure of how clear the wine is.

Just thought I'd post this to share ideas and start a discussion.

 

[TheBluePhantom]

Yep, I am in the basement, but I have a window. I usually work down there in the evenings anyway. When the beam is very clear, then look at the side view. You can see the beam passing through the wine by the reflections off of the tiny particles. As these clear the beam get harder to see and finally disappears. Bouncing the beam off the bottom will show you how much crud is on the bottom. All is easier on light wines, or in my case ciders, but you can see through rather dark ones. I botte the wines, keg the ciders after I can't detect any particles.

 

[Raptor99]

I thought about using an eyetest chart with progressively smaller text or letters. What's the smallest text you can see through the wine - and use that as an objective measure of how clear the wine is.

I tried this, but it was difficult for me to see the text. Maybe the wine wasn't clear enough? Maybe eventually I will try this again. I could set up a clarity scale with numbers from 1 to 10.

The visibility of the text would also depend on the size (width) of the carboy.

 

[SatchIce9]

The visibility of the text would also depend on the size (width) of the carboy.

Yes Raptor99, that's something I didn't mention with any measurement or judgement of clarity. My clear glass demijons (carboys) are 16cm in diameter, so if you can read text or see the light clearly through them, it would of course be even clearer through say a 7cm diameter clear glass bottle or through a wine glass because of the shorter distance through the thickness of wine the light has to travel as there's less opportunity for light scattering from any microscopic particles that cause haze or cloudiness.
Another problem with trying to view text through them is the distortion due to the curvature of glass distorting things like a lens. It works best if you hold the print to the curvature of the glass and view it perpendicular through the middle to minimise the lens like distortion.
I'd love someone to try the laser pointer idea if they have one, and report their findings here. Some laser pointers are red light and some green light, so that might make a difference in red wines.

 

[Coffee49]

I don't put my reds to any clarity test. Rather I let my whites indicate to me the post primary clarification level, I go 10 months prior to bottling so all my suspension has settled

 

[SatchIce9]

I don't put my reds to any clarity test. Rather I let my whites indicate to me the post primary clarification level, I go 10 months prior to bottling so all my suspension has settled

10 months is more impressive patience than I have, Coffee49. When one of my wines seems slow to clear, I tend to worry that it's never going to clear naturally, so I want to take action rather than just keep waiting. I've just cleared a gallon of Ginger Wine I made in a few days using Bentonite (6% solution of 6g Bentonite : 96ml water). I had used 500g of Soft Dark Brown Sugar in the Ginger recipe, rather than using all white sugar, but I found the mollases flavour from the brown sugar a bit overpowering, so I don't mind if the Bentonite reduces some of that flavour a bit - although Bentonite is supposed to be one of the more neutral compounds for fining. I also need the empty demijon to make some more wine - that's a problem with waiting 10 months - it ties up equipment.
This is a good page for a summary of fining methods.
https://winemakerscorner.com/wine-products/how-to-clarify-wine/

 

[Coffee49]

Bentonite does a fantastic job of clearing, living in the great cold north I have also tried cold stabilization just before racking, amazed at what is left in a carboy .

 

[Maylar]

There's also Super-Kleer (kieselsol and chitosan). Two parts that each remove different types of haze. And once that's done, filter through 10 microns.

 

[SatchIce9]

There's also Super-Kleer (kieselsol and chitosan). Two parts that each remove different types of haze. And once that's done, filter through 10 microns.

I've used Kieselsol and Chitosan when it's supplied with wine kits - it does a very good job quickly, like 3-7 days. I've noticed that the sediment it produces seems more dense and sludgy than that produced by Bentonite, which can be a bit lighter and fluffy and is more easily distrubed when moving the container. That makes the wine easier to syphon off from the Kieselsol and Chitosan sediment, without disturbing it.

 

[Coffee49]

I have a setup to rack from one carboy to another without moving the vessels, it is tough to gauge when to stop a siphon, even after 2 rackings and 10 months I still have slight suspension at the bottom.

 

[Erik the Awful]

I use Bentonite and Sparkolloid. I've avoided Kieselsol and Chitosan because they're not vegan and I have vegan friends who drink my wine. The bentonite/sparkolloid combination has been making very clear wines.