Must heating

[Cellar_Rat]

Come September I will, like many other get all excited about grapes. This idea started from another thread - how to get 400 liters warmed up and kept up.


I 'warm' 2 or 3 saucepans full on the stove and then to maintain temp I currently use a tent method. A small oil filled rad (with a stat) very close to the fermenter - in a tent of wool blankets & bubble wrap. Bit Heath-Robinson but very effective.

Has anyone used fish tank heaters - you know the glass tube jobbies.
I was thinking it might be easier. Use two, sterilize, plop in the red grape pulp, cover loosely - job done. No stove top warm up. Possibly more accurate. Less fire risk.

Thoughts?

PS: This is different from the stand DJ's in a cooler box full of water with a heater method.

[kessler]

Come September I will, like many other get all excited about grapes. This idea started from another thread - how to get 4000 liters warmed up and kept up.


I 'warm' 2 or 3 saucepans full on the stove and then to maintain temp I currently use a tent method. A small oil filled rad (with a stat) very close to the fermenter - in a tent of wool blankets & bubble wrap. Bit Heath-Robinson but very effective.

Has anyone used fish tank heaters - you know the glass tube jobbies.
I was thinking it might be easier. Use two, sterilise, plop in - finished. No stove top warm up. Possibly more accurate. Less fire risk.

Thoughts?

4K litres in one fermenter?

Buy an electric blanket and wrap around.

[Cellar_Rat]

hmm. Confession time - that was a typ0 should have been 400 liters.

.. in the mean time have found some stainless ones, which solves the problem of glass (was a bit concerned about the glass during punch down)

[goldseal]

With red musts, I would have thought the problem might be how to keep temperatures DOWN, not up.

My ciliegiolo was running well above ambient temperature last year, and was down to 1.000 in 5 days. The temperature in my garage was about 14c.

I would have thought the temperature rise would be larger in a larger fermenter, because there is generally less surface area per litre of must for the heat to escape.

[Cellar_Rat]

Yes indeed. Mind normally run at about 28c.

I like to get them warm to start with to get them going, as I prefer not to sulphite before (only after) ferm.

After crushing I get them to 15 -20 (from probably 4-8c ) and then inoculate with a very active starter.

Previously crush (& warming) finishes early evening and the ferment is going well first thing next morning.

I use a big gas ring and a jam pan at the moment, but if you turn your back it boils them - which is what I want to avoid.

[NorthernWiner]

I like to get a heat spike of around 30-31 C a couple of days into the ferment. Sometimes it hard to do that with a smaller batch, though. I have a couple of inexpensive electric blankets that I wrap around the fermenters, and then wrap another blanket around that.

A spike of heat really helps get good extraction from the grapes.

[NorthernWiner]

I just noticed you said 400 liters. For some reason I read 40. My largest batches are around 100 liters, and even at that size they seem to have no problem getting warm enough on their own. In fact, there have been some (usually Pinot Noir for some reason) where I've had to add frozen 2 liter bottles of ice just to cool it down some.

[Cellar_Rat]

I like to get a heat spike of around 30-31 C a couple of days into the ferment. Sometimes it hard to do that with a smaller batch, though. I have a couple of inexpensive electric blankets that I wrap around the fermenters, and then wrap another blanket around that.

A spike of heat really helps get good extraction from the grapes.

Yeah I can do this with 'my tent'.

For the initial warming I have dicovered that induction hobs can be set to a temp rather than hi/mod/low. That would help set say 80c = no boiled must.