Please click on an FAQ link below to view information regarding that question.   Question: How can I be sure that my wine is ready to bottle?   Answer: If your wine is clear, stable, and free of CO2, its ready. Clear means free of particles that could later fallout of suspension and leave a deposit in the bottles. Stable means finished fermenting and with enough sulfites (S02) present to prevent oxidation and spoiling. Free of C02 means that although the fermentation may be finished, a wine can still be saturated with carbon dioxide. If it is, it will go into the bottles with the fizziness intact, and depending on the conditions, could expand and push the corks out (or worse, break the bottles), or provide you with the dubious pleasure of drinking a sparkling wine that’s supposed to be still (sparkling Merlot , anyone?). To get rid of C02, stir your wine. The Whip Wine Degasser (#G9100) is an excellent tool for this purpose. When the fermentation is finished, most people add fining agents, and this is when vigorous stirring is called for. Like shaking up a soft drink, vigorous stirring chases the bubbles out and not only prevents the wine from being fizzy in the bottle, but also helps the fining agents to work better. If you’re not using fining agents, make sure your wine is free of C02 before bottling.   Question: What are the differences between the various types of corks?   Answer: Agglomerated corks are made from chipped cork pieces ground to a specific size and glued together with non-reactive polyurethane glue. Inexpensive and easy to handle, these are suitable for wines that will be held for six months to a year. Synthetic corks will not become tainted, won’t dry out, crumble, break or leak. A great way to provide a barrier to oxidation for wines that will be aged for a few years. We recommend using the Gilda Single level corker or one of the floor corkers when using these corks, as more force is required to get them in. Natural cut corks are just that: simply punched out from cork bark. They rely on the density and elasticity of the natural cork bark to seal the bottle. Depending on the quality of the cork, you can expect your wine to last from 3 years to more than 10. Another thing that comes in to play when choosing a cork is the bevel. This is the tapered edge that some of the less expensive corks have around the top and bottom of the cork. This is to allow easier insertion with hand held corkers. The thing to remember is that the bevel actually reduces the amount of surface area in contact with the neck of the bottle. This contact is what prevents the passage of wine past the cork. If you have a 1 inch long cork, but 1/8 inch is beveled off of each end, it is effectively only 3/4 inch long.   Question: How do I prepare corks?   Answer: If you are using a high quality, iris- jawed floor corker there is no need to soak or sulfite any of the corks that Midwest sells. Simply insert them dry. If you are using a small, hand-held corker (plunger, single or double-lever types) you may need to prepare your corks by soaking them in warm water for 20 minutes. If you have trouble getting corks to pass through your hand-held corker, you may want to try adding 1 cup glycerin to every four liters of warm water that you use for soaking. This ensures that the corks get enough moisture to lubricate their passage through the corker, not so wet that the corks will crumble apart. While some books talk about boiling and long soaking in sulfite solutions, these are very bad ideas. Cork is tree bark, and boiling it turns it to mush. Mush won’t seal your bottles. Long soaking does the same thing. Corks can soak up sulfite solutions and transfer them to the wine. Once you have opened a bag of corks, you may need to take special care of the unused corks. The trouble with handling very dry corks is that it’s tough to judge how long you can soak them before they become mushy. However, there is a nifty technique that you can take advantage of, if your corks are brittle either from age or low humidity storage. You can construct a ‘cork humidor’. You will need a sanitized plastic bucket and lid, an empty wine bottle, and a 1.25% solution of metabisulphite (eight teaspoons of metabisulphite powder dissolved in a gallon of cool water). Fill the wine bottle halfway with the solution, and carefully stand it up in the bottom of the bucket. Gently pour your corks into the bucket, in the space around the bottle, and put the lid on tightly. Leave the bucket in a room temperature area for about a week. In that time the liquid evaporating from the wine bottle will raise the humidity in the bucket in turn raising the humidity in the corks, making them pliant enough for easy insertion. The sulfur dioxide gas coming off the liquid will prevent the growth of molds or bacterial organisms, keeping the corks sanitary. No further treatment of the corks will be necessary before bottling. If you want to store your corks this way, replace the solution in the bottle every four weeks, and keep the lid tightly sealed. That way your corks will always be ready for use.   Question: I’ve noticed a little bit of mold on top of the corks of some of my wines. Is the wine spoiled? Is the bottle leaking?   Answer: This isn’t necessarily a sign that your wine has leaked through. It could be that a small amount of wine stayed on top of the cork at bottling and has molded there. Carefully wipe the top of the cork and the bottle neck with a clean damp cloth before extracting the cork, and the wine should be fine.   Question: After my bottled wine had been sitting for a short time, the corks started popping out of the bottles. What did I do wrong?   Answer: Your corks keep popping out because you are bottling your wine too early and it is continuing to ferment in the bottle. As the yeast consumes the sugar still in the wine, it produces both alcohol and carbon dioxide (CO2) gas. In your carboy, the CO2 escapes through the airlock as bubbles. Once you bottle the wine there is no place for the gas to go. Some of it is absorbed into the wine and the wine changes from a still wine into a sparkling wine. When the wine has absorbed all of the CO2 it can absorb and the pressure continues to build, either the cork is blown out of the bottle or the bottle explodes. You should never bottle a wine that has not been stabilized or at least has a specific gravity lower than 1.000 and shows no sign of refermentation for 30 days after racking. Here are some tips to keep this from happening again: 1) When apparent fermentation has stopped, rack the wine into a clean, sanitized secondary and reattach the airlock. Look at the wine 24 hours later. If there is positive pressure in the secondary (you are seeing bubbles coming out of the airlock), the yeast is still working. Racking allows the wine to absorb oxygen and this extra shot of oxygen often rejuvenates a wine that previously seemed finished. 2) When the pressure inside a carboy appears to go negative (i.e. the liquid inside the airlock is being pushed toward the part of the airlock connected to the bung), check it daily for two weeks to see if it swings back to positive. When high pressure weather fronts pass through an area, the liquid in an airlock will tend to be pushed downward by the high pressure and it will appear that fermentation has finally ended when in fact it hasn’t. The only way to know for sure is to take a hydrometer reading. 3) When you are sure all fermentation has stopped, check the specific gravity of the wine. If it is not dry (1.000 or lower), repeat the procedures in step 1, above. If it is dry, crush one Campden tablet per gallon of wine (or use 1/4 level teaspoon of potassium metabisulfite per 5 gallons of wine -- do not exceed this amount) and dissolve it and 1/2 teaspoon potassium sorbate per gallon of wine of in a half-cup to full cup of the wine. Stir very well to ensure it is completely dissolved. Pour this into a clean, sanitized carboy and rack the wine into it. Reattach the airlock and wait 10-14 days minimum (Midwest recommends waiting a full month). Then bottle your wine as you normally do.   Question: I recently bottled some Chianti, and the corks are turning red. Why?   Answer: Your corks are probably turning red because wine has gotten between the cork and the sides of the bottle neck. This happens because when you force a cork into a bottle, the air between the cork and the wine gets compressed. If you leave the bottle standing upright for 2-3 days, the pressure will work its way out around the cork. If, on the other hand, you lay the bottle down immediately, the pressure pushes the wine (instead of the compressed air) out around the cork. Leave your bottles upright 2-3 days, then lay them on their sides and watch them for a few days thereafter. The bottles should not leak. If they do, pull the corks and put in new ones. Most wine bottles are sized for #9 corks. Make sure your corks are the correct size for a good fit.