Topic: Stuck Fermentation?

[TonyM]

Hi, I have started three batches of wine (2 blackberry and 1 marrow) and all three seem to have stopped fermenting after a month.

Can anyone offer any advice as to this equates to a stuck fermentation and if there is anything that can be salvaged?

I followed the recipe from "First Steps in Winemaking". They do refer to stuck fermentation but not in any detail. I was expecting a bubbling brew for a few months right up to first racking.

Thanks
TonyM

[jennym]

Sometimes I make very basic wine, there are plenty of experts on here who can give advice, but here's what I do anyway. Try filling the sink with warm water and standing the demijohns in it, sometimes this gives the fermentation a kick start if its got too cold.

[xqbgal]

Hi have you taken a hydrometer reading? I made blackcurrant wine last year and that only took a month to ferment out, so maybe yours has finished. Hope this helps.

[adrianhumph]

 Hi xqbgal,  :D
                       A month should be long enough to ferment out any wine. As jennnym  says , a hydrometer reading will tell you the specific gravity of the wine. If you have not got one , taste the wine ;D If it has stuck it will taste quite sweet. The problem with many of the recipes in first steps is that they are top heavy on sugar, using usually 3lbs per gallon. This is seen nowadays as too much, 2lbs per gallon will give you a finished wine of approx 12.5%, the average strength of a table wine.
 If you can get a hydrometer, all home brew shops sell them, buy also the tube to float the hydrometer in. This makes taking a reading easier, you just have to siphon the wine into the tube. If the wine has finished fermenting & is dry, the reading should be around the 00 mark on the scale, or below. If your reading is above 20 you will probably find the wine is too sweet & you may well have a stuck ferment. To deal with this, get another gallon of wine started, if possible similar to your original. but using only 2lbs of sugar to the gallon. When this has started fermenting briskly, pour off 2 pints into another container, & add 2 pints of your stuck wine, when this is bubbling briskly add some more stuck wine, continue doing this over a couple of weeks & the excess sugar in your stuck wine will be fermented out. When both wines have fermented to dryness you can blend them together.
                                  Hope this helps

                                  Adrian

[TonyM]

Thanks for the useful advice. I do have a hydrometer and tube so will do a test tomorrow. I did use a yeast labelled 'Country Wine' which I presumed would give a sweeter wine.

I also used 3lb of sugar!

If a sweeter wine is preferred, and the reading is between 0-20, is the next steps to 'rack' the wine into the next demijohn to allow the clearing process to continue?

TonyM

[adrianhumph]

 Hi Tony,  :D
                  If you are happy with the amount of sweetness, then yes, rack the wine into a clean demijon, add some form of stabiliser (metabisulphite, camden tablet) & move the wine somewhere cooler. Bare in mind however that any sugar left in a wine does have a habit of refermenting even when you thought it was stable ???
This usually happens when the weather starts to warm up in the spring. If you want to bottle your wine sweet I suggest you use the screw cap wine bottles that most wine now comes in, & leave the bottles upright when you store them. You can then check from time to time that refermentation has not  taken place.

                                                                           Adrian.

[Just Vegging Out]

What I do is add one or two teaspoons of sugar - any yeast left will feed on this and get going again - as it is only a month into making it should have plenty of yeast left - but be careful doing this too near to the end of making or it might be sickly sweet.  Also it will start itself off again if the temperatures warm up.  Sometimes when you do your first racking and siphon it into a new demijohn it will start fermenting again.  If you rack too early though and the yeast has not stabilised your wine could oxidise and the taste will not be exactly right - you can add a crushed campden tablet which prevents oxidisation - but in my experience campden's also slow the bubbling right down.  Best bet rack according to recipe -  mean while add one or two teaspoons of sugar and give a little shake - the sediment will settle again - but not too vigourous a shake as the dead yeast can impart a yeasty taste to the end result.  Don't leave the wine on the lees/sediment too long or again you will get a yeasty end result, and like I said if you rack it off too early the wine can oxidise.