Headspace

[koolegged]

I have a traditional mead in secondary. when I transferred it I topped it up an inch below the bung. I thought it was done fermenting. I used d47 and was making a medium sweet, it was supposed to stop at 1.010 but after I transferred it I noticed it was still going. I took a reading and it was dried out. Now there is a slightly larger headspace. I took out 4 ounces to check the gravity. It has been that way a couple weeks. I plan on back sweetening this weekend. Should I be worried about that much headspace?

 

[Chris_The_Rogue]

It would help to know what size fermentation vessel your using. But i cant imagine An inch or three of head space hurting anything.

 

[koolegged]

the mead is in three gallon and a one gallon carboys. I took out 4oz from each one when I did my reading.

 

[bmwr75]

For future reference, if you are sanitizing your graduated cylinder, thief and hydrometer, you can add the 4 oz you remove back to the carboys. I do this all the time.

 

[koolegged]

I actually never thought of that. Lol

 

[bernardsmith]

I guess my question is why would your mead stop fermenting at 1.010 if you added D47. That you want the mead to be medium sweet is your business, but what tells the yeast this? D47 can ferment dry any fermentable sugar in the mead and all sugar in honey is easily fermentable...

 

[koolegged]

what kind of question is that? And it has nothing to do with my question about headspace. And to answer your question, you do realize all yeast has a limit to how much alcohol it can handle? Putting in more sugar than the yeast can handle will result in a wine with residual sugar. Occasionally the yeast can go beyond their normal limit, which is what happened in this case. With the amount of honey I used it should have stopped around 1.010 or there about but instead it fermented out dry to to almost 15% abv which is a little above the alcohol tolerance of d47.

 

[damdaman]

You're probably fine. At least, if it were me, I probably wouldn't worry about it if I was going rack again with the next month, which, if you had more fermentation and you dropped more lees, you'd want to do anyway. I'd just top up at the next racking. But that's me. If you're really worried just add a little boiled/cooled water in, no biggie.

As for the yeast tolerance, which I realize isn't what you were asking, the listed alcohol tolerances are approximations and every fermentation is different. The right combinations of food, nutrients and temps can easily lead to a yeast not reaching/exceeding its listed tolerance.

 

[fuelish]

For future reference, if you are sanitizing your graduated cylinder, thief and hydrometer, you can add the 4 oz you remove back to the carboys. I do this all the time.

Yeah, you can.... although I tend to taste mine instead

 

[koolegged]

Yeah I taste mine too. Lol