Norskersword said:
This clears up alot of confusion for me, but I'm still a little confused. So if someone is shooting for a certain dryness/sweetness, that's when they shoot for a certain gravity? How do they know exactly what gravity to shoot for in this relation?
What's the routine you use for checking the gravity? How often do you do it and at what stages? What would one do if the gravity was too high or low?
Last question first. I check it when I make the must. When I bottle, and I check it every time I rack... this lets me drink the hydrometer sample and see how things are going
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Ok, this is where accuracy diminishes. Lets take an example of my favorite yeast. K1-v1116.
http://consumer.lallemand.com/danstar-lalvin/refchart.html
http://consumer.lallemand.com/danstar-lalvin/k1v.html
OENOLOGICAL PROPERTIES AND APPLICATIONS
The K1V-1116 strain is a rapid starter with a constant and complete fermentation between 15° and 30°C (59° and 86°F), capable of surviving a number of difficult conditions, such as low nutrient musts and high levels of SO2 or sugar. Wines fermented with the K1V-1116 have very low volatile acidity, H2S and foam production.
The K1V-1116 strain tends to express freshness of white grape varieties such as Sauvignon Blanc, Chenin Blanc and Seyval. The natural fresh fruit aromas are retained longer than with other standard yeast strains. Fruit wines and wines made from concentrates poor in nutrient balance benefit from the capacity of K1V-1116 to adapt to difficult fermentation conditions. Restarts stuck fermentations.
Will show this yeast is competitive, taste nuetral, and quickly ferments from 12-14% ABV (in my experience this is fairly consistently 12.5% with a small variance). Also note it is a robust yeast in low nutrient and or high gravity musts... (i did pitch it successfully in must of 1.17)
So to target a residual sweetness of around 1.025 for instance (i like my cyser sweet)... I check my hydrometer... says that is a potential ABV of 3.? %. If i want to end with 3+% potential, and the Yeast is going to make 12.5% potential ... i need 15.5% potential to start (if i don't want to sweeten at the end, but we aim a bit low so we can add if needed, tough to take sugar out at the end.) Again refrencing the hydrometer..... We will make the O.G. of the must 1.114 and pitch k1-v1116.
The results should be about 1.02, but if this yeast goes to 14% we will end at 1.008 or so. In my case, I'd sweeten with Apple Juice concentrate, and possibly some honey if below 1.020
Hope this helps.