UPDATE - I'M ALIVE AND HAVE WINE!

[WineAllDay]

UPDATE: So, last week around this time I set about making some homemade wine. Note, I did not end up keeping 100 gallons in my room, instead only 50 and kept the windows open! So far, 7 days in, I'm still alive!

I also made two "mini" bottles of said wine in clear plastic bottles to get a sense of what's going on in my FDA food-grade buckets. The results as of today are incredible!

Original LD Carlson Company hydrometer Sp. Gr. reading was 1.150 (I did about 3 pounds of sugar per gallon of juice)

Question: The 1.100000 part was in the blue "dessert wine" area and the.150 was in a white area called "reading below meniscus" - what exactly does this mean?

Today's LD Carlson Company hydrometer reading is 1.040 (the .040 is in the orange area titled "beer")

1.150 - 1.040 x 131.25 = That gives an alcohol percentage of 14% of my calculations are correct? Could someone advise?

Did a small taste test, it was great! Def smelled the alcohol!

 

[brew_darrymore]

Thank God! I've been following your other thread and the silence made me feel nervous!

 

[IslandLizard]

Thank God! I've been following your other thread and the silence made me feel nervous!

You took the words out of my...

 

[brew_darrymore]

So, this image will get you an idea how to read your hydrometer measurement below meniscus.

 

[WineAllDay]

Hahaha, thanks. So did I calculate correctly?

 

[brew_darrymore]

Yes, you did calculate correctly. Your wine is at a bit over 14% at this moment. What type of yeast did you use? Perhaps your final gravity can go even lower.

 

[WineAllDay]

Amazing! Red Star Premier Cuvée Active Dry Yeast (5 grams). I used the entire pouch per 5 gallon bucket.

 

[brew_darrymore]

With your starting gravity, you can expect a final gravity below 1.030, which translates to ABV near 16%

 

[Tennessee Brew]

From a 22 year firefighter AND animal control, Carbon Dioxide can be very dangerous and in places where there is no air circulation it can be fatal. The same gas is used in euthanasia. Even with good circulation you can get dizziness, headache, hyperventilation , irregular heartbeat etc.
I would suggest some tubing (fish tank tubing or oxygen hose) a bunch of T connectors and fit them to the fermenters and run all of that outside into an airlock which can be easily made. Don't chance it more than you have to.