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How much is too much Camden/KMS?

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J

Jim H

Worker Bee
Registered Member
Jun 8, 2013
434
2
18
NYC
Hi Meaders! I am a new member, although I have been lurking for a while. I am hoping to get some advice... I see similar posts about the topic, but I'd like to get some live responses on this (common) problem.

So, I made myself a small batch mead, 1 gallon. (2.6 pounds of greenmarket wild fall flower honey, D47 yeast and water) I let it sit for about a month and a half in the carboy, then racked it to secondary, and let it sit for another month with an ounce of dark toast oak chips. The ferment got very quiet, the three piece valve sat down, no longer floated and there were no bubbles.

Planning to bottle, I put the manufacturer advised 1 camden tablet and 1/2 tsp KMS per gal, crushing it, then slowly stirring it in. I let it sit for three days before I had the time to bottle. On that third day, I saw that the valve had plenty of bubbles, it obviously wasn't done yet. So, I let it sit more. It went over a week still producing bubbles in the lock. I am guessing that stirring it up woke up the yeast, as it was pretty lively for a couple days. Also there were some interesting cold and hot spikes in the weather here that may have affected fermentation.

My concerns are that I don't want glass grenades, and I don't have that much refrigerator room to store the whole batch at once after bottling. I am in a small NYC apartment.

My questions:
  • How many days/weeks of no bubbling would you let it sit before bottling?
  • After I let it sit for that amount, will another shot of camden and kms ruin the taste or give awful headaches?
Thanks!
 
On other posts you have probably seen recommendations to use a hydrometer to measure the progress of your fermentation. This is because airlock activity is not a accurate enough method to determine if the fermentation is complete and a hydrometer allows you to calculate the specific gravity (sweetness/dryness) and % alcohol in you mead.

Using the Mead Calculator, I estimate that your original S.G. was approximately 1.093 with a 12.34 potential %ABV. The D-47 should take the mead completely dry (below 1.000), since it has an alcohol tolerance of 14%. Someone else on this forum might be able to tell you more accurately how low (below 1.000) it should get, but a complete fermentation might be 0.990 with your recipe.

I strongly recommend that you invest in a hydrometer. Otherwise, as you already experienced, if the sugar is not completely depleted there will always be the potential for fermentation to restart in the bottles.

I will need to let someone else respond to to the question of how much KMS is too much, but I would also strongly recommend that you add sorbate as well. You will find many posts stating that sulfites and sorbates should be used together if you use the search tool. It is not recommended to use sulfites alone, and this could be part of the reason that your fermentation restarted.
 
Thanks, danr. I should have mentioned that the OG was 1.09, as best as I could measure by hydrometer. Generally, since I only have a gallon at a time, I don't want to take more than one reading if I can get away with it ... I don't really want to put the samples back in the carboy. What's your take on it?

Otherwise, yes, I should get some sorbate.
 
Jim H said:
Thanks, danr. I should have mentioned that the OG was 1.09, as best as I could measure by hydrometer. Generally, since I only have a gallon at a time, I don't want to take more than one reading if I can get away with it ... I don't really want to put the samples back in the carboy. What's your take on it?

Otherwise, yes, I should get some sorbate.
Click to expand...
There is no problem putting samples back. Its not beer its mead. Honey has anti-fungal/bacterial properties that malt/grain worts don't possess. As long as you've sanitised the test jar/hydrometer/wine thief/baster etc then there's no problem.

Hence if you made a large batch then fine take a test and drink or bin it, but when you make 1 gallon batches a number of tests would reduce end product so inventiveness is the mother of necessity.

I make mostly 1 gallon (imp). I've never had any problems like this.....and no, I don't make beers........
 
danr said:
I strongly recommend that you invest in a hydrometer.
Click to expand...

Ditto.

You can't be sure what's happening unless you check the gravity. If it is less than 1.000 you're probably done. If it is above 1.000 you need to let it clear, then finish stabilizing by adding potassium sorbate (1 gram per gallon)

You have already overdosed it with KMeta. You added probably around 2 grams to your gallon. Typically you don't need more than the equivalent of 1-1.5 Campden tablets (440-660 mg) for each gallon. This may not have harmed your mead, however, KMeta alone will not reliably do the job, even with the overdose. You need the combination with sorbate to insure the yeast stay quiet. There has been document of unstabilized batches waking up again 2 or 3 years after fermentation "apparently" stopped.

After stabilization, you should recheck the gravity in a few weeks to insure that it isn't slowly dropping before you bottle. The biggest mistake you can make is to be in a hurry.

Medsen

P.S. 1 oz. of oak is often enough for 5 gallons. You may want to get it off that oak quickly or may find it tastes like you're sipping sawdust. :)
 
Thanks, gents. I've learned four things:

Gotta get sorbate.
Gotta check the gravity (want it less than 1.000)
It's alright to put a sample back, as long as I've sanitized.
I probably used too much wood.

Medsen -- regarding the wood - how much dark toast per gal, and for how much time would you use to mellow out the flavor? I made one batch before that had about an ounce for 3 weeks, and it tasted pretty good.
 
Jim H said:
Gotta check the gravity (want it less than 1.000)
Click to expand...
. . . and stable at that gravity for a few weeks. However, I believe if you get consistent readings of 0.990 in a shorter period of time, you can be confident that the sugars are all gone.

Also, I just came across the following explanation from wayneb regarding the use of sorbate with sulfite that I though might help:
The reason that most stabilization protocols call for both sulfites and potassium sorbate to be used post-fermentation, is that you are never 100% sure that all of your commercial yeast have been dispatched by the later sulfite addition, and they may "wake up" some time down the road to re-start the fermentation, if additional fementables are present. Sorbate keeps those hardy yeast stragglers in check by preventing them from reproducing - and in doing so keeps those few remaining viable cells capable of doing little to that remaining sugar until they naturally die off.
 
danr said:
. . . and stable at that gravity for a few weeks. However, I believe if you get consistent readings of 0.990 in a shorter period of time, you can be confident that the sugars are all gone.

Also, I just came across the following explanation from wayneb regarding the use of sorbate with sulfite that I though might help:
The reason that most stabilization protocols call for both sulfites and potassium sorbate to be used post-fermentation, is that you are never 100% sure that all of your commercial yeast have been dispatched by the later sulfite addition, and they may "wake up" some time down the road to re-start the fermentation, if additional fementables are present. Sorbate keeps those hardy yeast stragglers in check by preventing them from reproducing - and in doing so keeps those few remaining viable cells capable of doing little to that remaining sugar until they naturally die off.
Click to expand...
danr, thanks.

Last night I racked it off the oak. Checked the gravity, it was 0.996.

I have ordered sorbate. When established that the gravity is stable below 1.0, do you recommend that I add more camden. I am guessing that since I added a double dose already, I don't need more with the sorbate, correct?

By the way, it tasted great, not woody at all even after a month on the chips. Maybe because the wood was heavy toast?
 
Jim H said:
When established that the gravity is stable below 1.0, do you recommend that I add more camden. I am guessing that since I added a double dose already, I don't need more with the sorbate, correct?
Click to expand...

Jim, I believe that you are correct that only need to add the sorbate since you added the sulphites recently and they should not have dissipated yet, but hopefully someone more experienced than me will answer. On my first batch, I initially added sorbate without sulfite, following the directions on a kit. I was told that this can cause an unintentional maolactic fermentation and geraniols. The answers to my questions in this thread may help you: LINK

I am glad that your mead is doing well.
 
Reading up on KMS dissipation online, mostly in winemakers forums, it seems like with a lot of stirring, it can dissipate within 24 hours, and airlock activity means it isn't done yet. It's dissipated when it goes quiet.

So, since I added KMS last week, racked it yesterday and the airlock is still active, by the time I receive my sorbate, I should be able to add KMS and the sorbate. The determining factor will be the hydrometer test.

I've learned a lot with this question. Thanks for the help.
 
I'll be darned!

I will wait until the weekend to check the gravity on this mead, but looking at the airlock over the past several days, it is clear that the yeast is still chugging along. In the three-piece, the floating piece (the "bob"?) is pushed right up against the top, and a new bubble forms about every minute and a half. The starsan fluid in it has many large bubbles near the top.

To think I was going to bottle that stuff. It clearly isn't done yet, after a double shot of KMS.

I purposefully did several readings, spinning the hydrometer between each reading, to verify. How could it have been 0.996?

I'm really surprised.
 
You can get some bubbling from de-gassing, especially if the temp is warming up without continued fermentation. But if fermentation is ongoing, the gravity will drop gradually.

If you are planning to leave this batch dry, you really don't need sorbate. If you plan to backsweeten then you'll need it.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2
 
Well, I took another gravity reading, and it is down to 0.993, bringing the ABV to 12.821% according to the calculator.

And, by the way, this is a tasty batch. It's dry, but not tannic dry (just honey, water, yeast, and nutrients). I don't think I'd want to backsweeten it.

I am thinking that I would like to spike it with sorbate and kms this coming Thursday and bottle on Saturday. It's taste is just about perfect, and I like it as it is. Five days ago it was 0.996, now it is 0.993. Is it stable enough, or am I asking for trouble? ... after all, D-47 can go to 14%.
 
Let the gravity stop. It probably won't go farther but let it remain stable for a couple of weeks to be sure. You don't need sorbate for a dry batch and you've given it more KMeta than it needs.. Also, you may want to give it time to let it clear or you'll end up with a lot of sediment in your bottles.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 4 Beta
 
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Sulfates don't dissipate on their own ... ever! You will smell and taste it for many years. The carbonation of fermentation, air lock activity, will not take it out either. Only oxygen will bond with it and come out of solution. That is risky too. Oxidizing changes the flavor.

Be careful over using sulfites.
 
I believe they only dissipate if they have a path for escaping into the atmosphere. If you bottle while you can still smell them they won't have anywhere to dissipate to, but with an airlock in place and given adequate time you should be fine.
 
The sulfate molecule needs an oxygen molecule to become evaporative. That is why corked bottles will never loose it. An open carboy has a limited amount of oxygen and at some point the air space will be saturated with sulferic smelling gas, but there may still be plenty left in solution.

I moved a decimal point once and added 10 times too much to 30 gallons of wine. :-( I let it sit for 3 years. Never got better. Took an aquarium pump and stone and pumped air into it. It took 3 days for 15 gallons of it to stop releasing sulfer aroma. I then did the other half of it for another 3 days. Blended it all together and added some fruit for a few days. Bottled it and drank within a couple months. Took a bottle everywhere we went. ;) It won an award in the first month, but in the second month, it was getting kind of vegatable flavored and had hints of sewage starting.

I am very careful about using sulfates. A little goes a long ways! :eek:
 
SO2 will dissipate over time. Much of it will bind to other compounds in mead like acetaldehyde, gluconlactone and sugars. Some of it will bubble out the airlock entrained with CO2. Some of it will be permanently consumed by compounds created by O2 exposure. Backsweetening can consume a lot of SO2. Normal racking will gradually reduce SO2. It will slowly dissipate even after bottling.

However, once you've given a large overdose, you probably don't need to add more, at least not without measuring the level of free SO2.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 4 Beta
 
Thanks for the replies, everyone.

Since I last hit it with KMS, I racked it once into a separate carboy, but then I didn't disturb it at all after that, except for a gravity reading. No stirring or degassing.

After I let it sit for another couple of weeks, it will hopefully be stable. I am going to assume that it doesn't need any more KMS... I hope the flavor is good and it doesn't need backsweetening.
 
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