Cabernet Sauvignon

• Friday, October 1st;
• Purchased 2 lugs of Cabernet Sauvignon grapes from Lodi region via Bacchus and Barleycorn for $57 per lug.
• Had grapes de-stemmed and crushed by Bacchus and Barleycorn
• Put grapes through wine press at home and got out total of 5.5 gallons of pure juice
• Split juice into two buckets: originally labeld them bucket 1 and bucket 2.
• QS each bucket with hot water to equal 6 total gallons
• Specific gravity of bucket 1 was: 1.05
• Specific gravity of bucket 2 was: 1.042
• Added 2.25 cups of cane sugar to each bucket
• Put 1 packet of Stavin French Oak Chips: Medium plus Toasted 3oz in each bucket
• Put 1 packet of Light toasted Oak chips 4oz in each bucket
• Bentonite  granules, 1 tablespoon in each bucket
• Added 2 crushed tablets of Camptan to each bucket: let sit for 24
• Saturday, October 2nd
• Added 1 packet of EC-118 Sacchromyces bayanas to each bucket
• Beginning to ferment in bucket 2
• Tuesday, October 5th
• Was a knucklehead and put air-locks on primary fermenters on Saturday.  Removed them today and added 1/2 packet of EC-118 to each bucket.  Hope I didn't mess the whole batch up!!
• Saturday, October 9th
• Checked Specific gravity on both buckets;
• Bucket 1: 0.996 (originally 1.05)
• Bucket 2: 0.997 (originally 1.042)
• Batches seemed quite a bit lighter than expected
• Transfered bucket 1 to new carboy (plastic)
• Transfered bucket 2 to old carboy (glass)
• Used left over sediment from buckets and transfered to home-made primary fermenter and toped up to 5 gallons.  Added a dusting of yeast energizer.
• 2nd run wine very sedimenty and estimation of specific gravity was 1.02.
• Might have had 1-2 drops of potassium metabusulfite drip from air lock into bucket 1.
• Will check  2nd run wine on Sunday, October 16th
• Will check bucket 1 and 2 on Tuesday or Wednesday, October 19th or 20th.
• Checked 2nd run on Saturday.  It was not fermenting but rotting so threw out.
• Thursday, October 21st, 2010
• Bucket 1: Specific gravity
• Bucket 2: Specific gravity
• Tasted wine and it was very dilute.  Will probably be a very normal table wine, not a knock out. 
• Friday, October 22nd, 2010
• Bucket 1: Specific gravity
• Bucket 2: Specific gravity
• Added 2 crushed Campden tablets and 1 tablespoon of potassium sorbate to each bucket and stirred hard.
• Split one large packet of Chitosan between two buckets and stirred hard
• Replaced air locks and will check in 8 days.