Airlocks are your best line of defense against oxidation and spoilage micro-organisms. It is very important that you carefully maintain your airlock and monitor it. This episode is all about how to do just that.
By far the most important thing you need to know about airlocks is that they need to have the water level properly maintained. When the water level gets too low the airlock ceases to protect your wine and leaves it open to the outside world.
Listen to this episode by clicking the play button above and find out more about using airlocks to keep your wine safe from oxidation and unwanted micro-organisms.
Airlocks Mentioned
The following airlocks were discussed during the show. The links are affiliate links, using them will help support Winemaker’s Academy.
Listener & Reader Questions Answered
- My airlock isn’t bubbling much. Is my wine okay?
- What is a sommelier?
- My recipe says to open the fermenter and stir the wine daily. Is this safe?
Matt’s Wine
Here’s the latest shot of my raisin wine after racking it. After 100 days it has finally fermented to dryness, a very long fermentation.
So far it is tasting pretty good though I can’t wait to back sweeten and finish it off so I can start enjoying it. I expect to give it another two or three months before doing anything else with it. Until then I only need to monitor the airlocks.
As you can see I’m using both “S” shaped airlocks as well as my preferred three-piece airlock. The head space on the 750 ml bottle is a little bit more than I would have liked but I will have to make do.
To displace the oxygen I agitated the wine after inserting the airlock to release carbon dioxide. I did this for about a minute and felt confident, based on the bubbling of the airlock, that I had gotten just about all of the oxygen out of there.