Order of doing things......

[Cowboy77]

Hi all. Relative newby with a couple batches under my belt, but have a question about the order of doing things in regards to winemaking after fermentation is done. Always reading and looking at the forums on winemaking and have learned so much here. It's relatively clear to me what to do up until fermentation has been completed in secondaries. It's at that point that I'm confused, as it seems like everyone does it differently. Would like to get you all's thought on the order of things after fermentation is complete. Specifically, what is the order involving these things: stabilizing, back sweetening, cold stabilize, bulk age, fining agents, and bottling. Another words, what comes first, second, third, etc. Thanks in advance!

 

[jgmillr1]

Assuming you are making a sweet, grape wine that will be served chilled here.

This is the process I use for that:
1) Allow fermentation to complete and perform any fining desired
2) Stabilize with sorbate (200 is legal limit but 250ppm is more stable)
3) Dose with a high dose of sulfites (75ppm)
4) Make any acid adjustments or blending
5) Cold stabilize to ~28deg F (add 0.1g/L cream of tartar to the cold wine to speed up precipitation)
6) Allow to warm up slowly
7) Rack off tartrates and lees
8) Filter down to 1um pad filtration
9) Sweeten
10) Filter to 0.45um pad filtration
11) Bottle while passing wine through 0.45um membrane filter

It is important to make all acid adjustments, blending and the majority of your potassium additions BEFORE you cold stabilize. Otherwise you will make the wine unstable again with future additions or pH changes. Don't back sweeten until the sorbate is present and the yeast is gone. The tartrate precipitation seems to go faster and better when the wine still has yeast present. I'm guessing it helps nucleate the crystal formation. Regardless, it helps drop yeast in the wine and pins down the lees which makes racking easier later. Bulk aging would take the place of the filtering. Additional limited sulfites additions are needed with racking and length of time between steps.

If you are making a fruit wine, you don't need to cold stabilize since there isn't any tartaric acid.

 

[Yooper]

I do things a bit differently. Because I don't sweeten my wines, I don't use sorbate. I try to keep 50 ppm of sulfite in the wine, and bottle when the wine has been clear and in a carboy with no lees falling for at least 60 days. I usually cold stabilize my reds, but sometimes my whites too.

I don't filter my wines, either. I tend to bottle only when the wine has been clear for a long time, and so have no sediment in the bottle.

I make a lot of "country" wines, using non-grape fruits but I do make some grape wines as well.

 

[Cowboy77]

Thanks so much for the info guys! I really appreciate your time.

 

[bernardsmith]

Hi Cowboy77. Not sure that there is a specific order but logic suggests that you
Fine - that helps remove particles,
Bulk age - that further helps clear the wine and allows various chemical reactions to take place quietly under the radar that improves the flavors
Stabilize - to help ensure that any yeast still in the wine will not become active in the bottle
Back sweeten - If that is your goal
Balance acidity - The amount of acid needed will be offset by the sweetness
Bottle.
So stabilization, adding sweetness and checking for TA is done very close to bottling though the fact is that even after bottling chemical changes still take place...

 

[jgmillr1]

Just be sure to make your major potassium additions (sorbate, large sulfite dosage, bicarbonate) and anything that changes pH (acid adjustments, blending) BEFORE you cold stabilize or you risk having tartrates in your bottle when you chill your wine.