Too much campden?

[EHV]

I have a peach wine made with 9lbs of Vintners Harvest Peach puree and wine base. Initially had no fermentation after pitching and pitched another pack of Red Star Premier Cuvee. (I was really wanting some CO2 to start taking up the empty space in the bucket) After good fermentation I racked to a 6 gallon carboy to finish. Now I'm a little over a week in and I got the egg/sulphur smell going on. I pitched some more yeast nutrient and aerated to holy heck trying to introduce some oxygen for the yeast.
After I talked further with another individual about the recipe, he stated this smell may be caused by too much metabisulphite. The Winemakers (purple) Recipe Handbook calls for any 5 gallon batches to be multiplied by 5 (or per gallon made) except the yeast. So, being that 1 campden tablet was good for 1 gallon, I crushed 5 to add to the recipe. I was under the impression it is caused by stressed yeast, which could be a possibility as for the slow start to the fermentation. Any thoughts to help me out.

If it matters I cleaned and sterilized a piece of copper and stuck it in the carboy since I've read this may help with the issue in its early stages.

 

[EHV]

Anyone help me out?
I aerated with a whip on the drill and it degassed quite a bit overflowing about a gallon. The smell went away for a day and now its back again. I'm afraid this batch is going to be dumped., and probably wrap up my fruit wine making.
Is campden a possibility or most likely yeast stress?

 

[Sago]

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f25/added-way-too-much-k-meta-no-i-mean-way-too-much-332847/

This might help your worries for the meantime until someone comes in with some advice

 

[Yooper]

You did NOT add too much campden. 1 crushed tablet per gallon is the standard for 50 ppm S02. Unless you had something like triple strength tablets, you're good there.

It does sound like stressed yeast, though, for whatever reason.

Copper usually works if it's H2S, but you may be jumping the gun on that.

What were your OG and current SG readings? When you say the first yeast strain didn't take off, how long did it lag?

 

[EHV]

Original gravity was 1.095 and current is at 1.042. The original pitch had no activity after 3 days. Should I have aerated before the repitch? The smell coming from the airlock is kind of a musty, egg, sulphur type smell. It was gone but then came back again. The sample tasted slightly of it was well. More musty sulphur than egg....if that makes sense.
Juice wine is a lot cheaper to screw up on than fruit base, so this is a hard one to deal with. I'm not sure where I've gone wrong.
Thank you for the responses as well.

 

[Yooper]

Original gravity was 1.095 and current is at 1.042. The original pitch had no activity after 3 days. Should I have aerated before the repitch? The smell coming from the airlock is kind of a musty, egg, sulphur type smell. It was gone but then came back again. The sample tasted slightly of it was well. More musty sulphur than egg....if that makes sense.
Juice wine is a lot cheaper to screw up on than fruit base, so this is a hard one to deal with. I'm not sure where I've gone wrong.
Thank you for the responses as well.

Hmm, if it's at 1.042 it shouldn't even be in secondary yet. It should ferment faster and be finished by now, but yet it's still at 1.042. That points to a couple of things with the yeast.

I assume you used winemaker's base, so it shouldn't have preservatives in it, but check that and make sure. I'd make a yeast starter right now, by starting with some juice (even apple juice) and some water and adding a fresh package of yeast. Wait until it starts fermenting, and add some of your wine to it gradually. Once it's going well, add that to your wine and aerate well. Get the copper out of there- it's not even done fermenting.

You can toss in some more yeast nutrient, dissolve in some of the wine, and/or some yeast energizer. The yeast for some reason is very stressed.

Edited to add- pour the wine into a new vessel. That would help aerate it as well as dissipate some of the H2S (if that is what it is). Actually, do it a couple of times, back and forth, and then pitch the yeast starter. Let me know how it goes.

 

[EHV]

I did use 9 lbs of Vintners Harvest peach base and puree. I'm unaware of any preservatives in the bases,also I allowed the wine to "air" out for a day which I would have thought would allow any of those to render them useless. The fermentation right now is going about 1 bubble in the airlock every 2 seconds.
I will get a starter going and report back in a few days.
The copper was removed after about ten minutes in there and aerating. Few questions if you don't mind:
Do you add the copper after fermentation is done to try to pull out the H2S?
I am going to have to top off this peach if it makes it to secondary with something neutral since I lost a bunch of wine with the initial aerating/degassing. Over a gallon I believe to diminish the headspace left in the carboy, any recommendations other than RO?

Thank you Yoop. You are a jack of all trades on this forum.

 

[Yooper]

I did use 9 lbs of Vintners Harvest peach base and puree. I'm unaware of any preservatives in the bases,also I allowed the wine to "air" out for a day which I would have thought would allow any of those to render them useless. The fermentation right now is going about 1 bubble in the airlock every 2 seconds.
I will get a starter going and report back in a few days.
The copper was removed after about ten minutes in there and aerating. Few questions if you don't mind:
Do you add the copper after fermentation is done to try to pull out the H2S?
I am going to have to top off this peach if it makes it to secondary with something neutral since I lost a bunch of wine with the initial aerating/degassing. Over a gallon I believe to diminish the headspace left in the carboy, any recommendations other than RO?

Thank you Yoop. You are a jack of all trades on this forum.

Things like k-meta (sulfites) will off-gas, but preservatives like sorbate or benzoate won't. That shouldn't be a problem if you used winemaking supplies, but sometimes people use storebought juice so that's why I mentioned it.

Copper can be toxic (poisonous) and alcohol leaches it out (that's why you don't see copper serving vessels in brewpubs) so I would hesitate to use it except if it's the only way to save the wine. There is a lot of info on the internet about that- I'm definitely no expert on that.

I'd use a commercial sauvignon blanc or pinot grigio to top up if you've lost a gallon. Either that, or get a smaller carboy. You could buy a very cheap box wine of white, and that would be great for topping up.

If you're getting airlock activity, you can hold off on the yeast starter. Just keep this fermentation happy- stir/agitate as often as you can until you get to 1.010, add yeast nutrients or energizer, and keep it in the mid 60s or so if you can.

 

[EHV]

Thanks for all the help Yooper. Good advice that I needed. The peach is light in flavor so I will have to get creative.