Make wine like a beer wart why notAnswers below: Yes alcohol will preserve the wine from many infections and will prevent anything really bad from happening to your wine. After all...
Yeast Explosion FactsHi Matthew, Ummm... Yes and no. I have no idea what 2l plastic bottles are meant to hold pressure...
You know it's a hobby when it starts consuming all your daydreaming thoughts (see below).
Gene
DAve Allison
Shoot, I just put a small light bulb in the spare bedroom closet where I do my fermentations... 50W to slowwwwly raise the temperature after cold soak. Once my zinfandel fermentaion is underway, I use 75-100W bulb during day to push temp to 70-80F (and 100-125W at night to keep temperature from dropping; 25W difference day-night is all it takes to hold temperature constant in my closet winery).
For whites, I use no heat, but instead surround the fermentor pail with closed 5 gallon jugs of tap water (for big thermal mbutt), then cover the whole shebang with blankets.
These combos hold the fermentation temperature within 2deg F, and it's all run on outlet-type timers.
You could buy an el cheapo digital indoor-outdoor temperature gauge (with wire-remote thermistor sensor for the 'outdoor' temp reading). I attached the 'outdoor' sensor of mine to the outside of my fermentor pail (near the bottom), then covered the sensor with 'shipping peanuts' insulation, held onto the pail with masking tape. Can see what temp my fermentor is without even opening the closet door, LOL.
Come to think of it, I could insulate my open-top 10 gallon fermentor by standing it up off the bottom inside a 33 gallon garbage can, wrap the fermentor with two strings of miniature christmas lights for heat... Off Low(~10W ) Med (~25W) High (~35W) as needed and fill the empty space with more shipping peanuts. ...wonder if that's too much work --- I'll think about it for the next batch.
