3L headspace in 5 gallon? (help!)

[DocShay]

Hey guys,

Really new at this - and just make a bad mistake. Trying to figure out how to fix this.

I started in a 6 gallon glass fermenter (thought it was 5...only made 5).
Figured for primary thats okay - on secondary i will move it to a 5 gallon carboy.

So today I siphoned it to a 5 gallon secondary - however I kept having issues with approx the last 3 liters of it. Kept loosing suction.

In a kind of panicky way (mistake 1) - My wife suggested pouring the remaining to an easier container. So...naturally I did. Into a juice container it went, sediment and all.

Realizing it was now all floating around in this container, unairlockable - I put it in the fridge.

Now I am left with a huge head space in the secondary (approx 3 litre). My understanding is you can "top up" with other apple cider - but 3L is quite a lot, no?

What am I to do? Am I able to reuse the remaining that I put into a non-air lockable container, thats currently "settling" in my fridge?, then top up with apple cider from there?

Or should I go buy 3 litre's worth of hard cider?

Or do I just...leave that enormous headspace and risk it going stale/whatever?

Thanks guys!

 

[DocShay]

Just to get an idea what i'm working with right now...

 

[bembel]

Just top if off with more apple juice or cider and add maybe 1/4 of a crushed campden tablet to be safe.

 

[bembel]

And by top off I mean all the way, you want to leave no more than an inch between the bottom of your airlock and the top of the cider in the neck. The stuff in the fridge has been exposed to too much O2 and other bacteria from your fridge. Drink it after it settles. It's quite tasty at this point imo. Adding 3 liters of fresh juice will just delay your final cider by a 2-3 weeks at most and will probably add some aroma and flavor to the final product since it will not ferment as vigorously as the initial , but don't worry, There are still tons of hungry yeast ready to ferment the newly added sugar, they will just do so with at a slower rate. I always top off my ciders with fresh juice and it's been working out pretty well for me. [emoji6][emoji519]

 

[Evilgrin]

Why would you want to add campden to bottled juice or cider for topping off? Its already been pasteurized. I top off with bottled juice all the time and never add campden at this point.

Just get a gallon jug of Musselmans or even make some up with FAJC. It will be fine. Give it a little extra time to ferment the additional sugars.

 

[bembel]

Why would you want to add campden to bottled juice or cider for topping off? Its already been pasteurized. I top off with bottled juice all the time and never add campden at this point.

Just get a gallon jug of Musselmans or even make some up with FAJC. It will be fine. Give it a little extra time to ferment the additional sugars.

The small amount of campden is not for the top off juice, its for the cider already in the carboy, mixing it in with the top off juice is just an easy delivery method.
When you rack you expose your cider to oxygen ( unless you close-pressure transfer) and that is not good, Thankfully, small amounts of sulfite will insure that nothing bad happens, since this cider has already been exposed to a good amount of 02 due to the headspace that was left, k-meta @ 20 PPM should prevent any potential volatile acidity flaws, either Aceto or Ethyl Acetate, that you otherwise are at risk of. It's just insurance.

 

[DocShay]

Just a small update - Went out and picked up a 3 gallon and 1.5 gallon carboy - All is well!

On a side note - The "Bad" cider that was left in the fridge? Tried it out a day later.
That was a mistake.
A very bad one.

...Remind me never to do that again

 

[Maylar]

Bummer. We all get "dumpers" once in a while.

Where'd you find a 1.5 gallon carboy?