Hydrometer reading off the scale!

[BackToBasics]

I should probably have asked about this when it happened but never mind...

I was gifted some frozen damsons from last years harvest so, obviously, I set about making a damson wine. The recipe I was using called for 2.5kg of fruit and 1.5kg of sugar to make up 1 gallon. I thought as I read it that it seemed a lot of sugar but, not knowing any better, carried on regardless. As the title suggests the hydrometer reading was off the scale. I'd estimated at 1.130 but I don't really know other than it being >1.120. Is there anyway of getting a more reliable reading when this happens? Can you can a hydrometer with more markings on it (mine stops at 1.120)?

Anyway, here I am six weeks later and it's stuck at 1.038. I didn't expect the yeast to able to ferment it right down to 990 (18.6% if my initial estimate was right) but expected something lower than where it is. I'm using vinclass dried active wine yeast if it matters.

It tastes okay but is very obviously very sweet. Not bad in a liqueur-y kind of way.

 

[oldbloke]

I make most of my wines with around 1.2kg...
Damsons are about 9% sugar so 225g there (if it was 2.5kg stoned, less if 2.5 whole), and 1.5kg sugar, total 1725g
About 383gm/litre
Then check the chart at http://www.brsquared.org/wine/CalcInfo/HydSugAl.htm
About 19% if it went dry, but it clearly isn't going to
Chart suggests your SG was about 1144 so your drop is 106 giving ABV of 14.6ish

 

[LeithR]

You could at the outset have added more water or juice of some sort to dilute the brew down to something more manageable.

At this stage I would suggest you try a high alcohol tolerant yeast maybe a champagne yeast and effectively make a starter with some of the brew in a 1L bottle. If it starts and clearly shows those signs, then you can pitch it back into the rest of the brew and monitor it to ensure it starts and the SG drops.

Good luck. One tip, its always worth taking an SG reading before you add sugar, this way you can calculate how much sugar you can add to the brew to get what SG you want for your starting SG. You can use the calculators at the top of this page for doing that.

There are some very good tips including calculating sugar requirements in John Palmers book How to Brew. The online version can be accessed here
http://www.howtobrew.com just be aware it is an early version, my hard copy is version 3 (from Amazon) and its a year or so old now.

Good luck - hope this helps. :

 

[BackToBasics]

Cheers guys. Great info and definitely food for thought on later brews.

The fruit was whole when weighed but I can't imagine that the stones were more than a couple of hundred grams though. Even if they made 500g of the weight I think I'd be looking at around 13.5%. I think I might leave it as it is. The sample really was quite pleasant.

 

[Moley]

There are hobby hydrometers which go up to 1.150 if you shop around, but you wouldn't often need to read to that sort of level unless you were aiming to make rocket fuel and knew your yeasties were up to the job.

But you can still measure it if your hydrometer stops at 1.120

We always give hydrometer readings to three decimal places, but we are usually only interested in the final three digits, so ignore the "1." and think of 1.120 as 120 points.

With your off-the-scale must you could have taken a sample, mixed it with an equal volume of water, taken a hydrometer reading of that mixture and doubled it.

For example, if you got a reading of 1.072 then that's 72 points. Double it and you get 144 points, that's 1.144



If you have ended up with an oversweet wine, it's probably best kept as a blender, one bottle to back-sweeten a gallon of something dry.

 

[BackToBasics]

Cheers for all the info on this.

I racked the wine on Saturday and stuck it back in the back room. Checked it yesterday and fermentation has kicked off again. It's not exactly rapid but I'm getting a bubble from the airlock every 15 seconds or so. I'm going to leave it to do its thing.

 

[bobsbeer]

Every 15 seconds is good. Slow and steady, but given the high alcohol it will probably stop somewhere near 1.000. But give it time and let it do it's thing for a month or so. No need to rush it especially as you have racked already.