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Head Space

HoosierDanny

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I have a syzer in a secondary.  I was wondering if I had to much head space.  Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.
Danny
 

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Generally you want as little as possible to avoid oxidation. Purging the seconary vessel with CO2 before racking into solves the problem best if you have it available.
 
It won't hurt to purge it even now if you're worried.  CO2 is heavier than air, so it will form a CO2 blanket under the air and push the air up & out as you put more CO2 in.
 
Assuming you mean Cyser and assuming it was pushing CO2 when you put it in there you're fine. But you will need top up (or purging) for future rackings.

I always make an extra quart to half gallon with wine for topping up. Then I clear off the lees in the fridge so I always have plenty of top up.
If you didn't do that what you could do if it went dry and you don't want it dry is wait until it's done fermenting, sulfite/sorbate and use apple juice to top up/backsweeten with.

Other options are sanitized marbles, wine (of a type that's fermenting, in this case apple wine).
 
Depends on how long you plan to store it in that container and what temperature variations it may go through.
Air volume is affected greatly by temperature.
A drop in temp could result in negative pressure in the carb, and some air locks will allow the liquid inside to be sucked into the brew. That could be very bad.
For that reason I use an 'S' style lock if I think there may be a chance of negative pressure in the carb.

Otherwise I'd say RDWHAHB.
 
It was 4 gallons of fresh apple cider and a 15 pounds of honey so its definitely a cyzer.  The airlock is telling me I'm pushing Co2 but I don't think it's much.  No bubblage.  I racked it once already and added a liter of white wine to top it up with and I hate to add anything more at this point that would change the flavor, so I'm leaning towards the sanitized marbles.  Or maybe just some clean chilled water.  I thought that by presenting the picture you'd be able to get a visual on the amount of space I was dealing with and get an idea if this was a problem or acceptable.  Thanks again for the input. 

Danny
BTW Maine Homebrewer, what is RDWHAHB?
 
It's wine, there's no rule against worry when making wine :)

If the airlock says CO2 is still coming out it must be coming out, it doesn't have to be much. This is the reason I wait until just before bottling to degass.
You will have to figure something out for future rackings.

That's almost what my last recipe was 4gals/12lbs. It was great after 2 years although a bit too strong to enjoy.
 
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