Is total darkness really necessary? - bottled and secondary cider

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johnnyseko

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My cidery has been evicted from the closet... I put all of my gallon carboys and bottles on racking out in a room. I hadn't considered my batches being exposed to light until now that I am admiring my gallons in secondary out on a shelf.

Anyway, these are in a north facing room - no direct sunlight. If I can get away with not wrapping these gallons in some protection I'd prefer to leave them exposed so I can watch them. o_O

Think they'll be ok?
 
As far as cider is concerned, light isn't going to affect it much in the short term (unless you decide to put hops in it). Light will impact the color and possibly taste in the long term. Especially with anything that has red hues. This is noticeable as a browning/darkening effect. This takes quite a while to occur but it will happen.
 
Cool. Then I should be ok. Good tip on the hops - I'll be hopping a gallon this week. I'll make sure to keep that one covered.
 
(Years ago) my wife was going to toss out some of my old (and now smaller) T-shirts. I took the dark ones and asked her to sew the neck together and leave a 3" gap in the middle. I turned the sleeves inward.

I use these on my carboys.
 
(Years ago) my wife was going to toss out some of my old (and now smaller) T-shirts. I took the dark ones and asked her to sew the neck together and leave a 3" gap in the middle. I turned the sleeves inward.

I use these on my carboys.

Perfect!! Although the sewing request might not get a good reaction here. Especially now that my brews are on display in the house like a trophy case! lol
 
UV is far more important than visible light.

Glass blocks UV and the visible light spectrum will skunks hop compounds beers, so I'm not certain your statement is accurate or applicable to cider.

My ciders sit in the garage in glass carboys and I keep the window shades down most of the time. I don't worry about occasional exposure to overhead fluorescent lights. No issues even with ciders aging for over 1 year.
 
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Glass blocks UV and it's visible light that skunks beers, so I'm not certain your statement is accurate or applicable to cider.

My ciders sit in the garage in glass carboys and I keep the window shades down most of the time. I don't worry about occasional exposure to overhead fluorescent lights. No issues even with ciders aging for over 1 year.

Glass blocks UVB, unless it has been treated it does not block UVA. UVA is closer to the visible spectrum than UVB, and within the visible spectrum the damage is far more significant from the adjacent blue side frequency. The visible spectrum is 700-390nm. If you are keeping beer/cider out of direct sunlight, you are largely controlling for the problem. The thiol that produces the 'skunky', 3-methylbut-2-ene-1-thiol, is produced by the isohumulones in beer when it is struck by light of 500nm or under, to somewhere around 300nm. The rate of thiol production appears to increase as the spectrum approaches 300. The UV spectrum starts at 400nm. Clear glass doesn't do anything to block that spectrum. Brown glass blocks the blue light from 500nm and down, green blocks the beginning of the UV spectrum 400nm and down. Most normal glass blocks somewhere around 310nm, depending on the material other than silicon dioxide, and therefore the bandgap of the material.

That thiol is very similar to one that is in fact found in skunk musk. In theory, cider should be more resistant, because the isohumulones in beer are largely from the hops, but I am not aware of anyone actually doing the testing for cider and the photo-sensitive compounds the apples bring to play, but the physics are going to drive toward the same side of the spectrum.

Overhead fluorescents have nowhere near the light intensity to begin with, but even the 'cool' or 'full spectrum' ones have a fairly small amount of energy in the 500nm and below range, the vast majority of the light is in the 530-630 range, and your beverage will barely notice it.

tl:dr - daylight plus Corona ->always skunky, daylight plus Heineken ->sometimes skunky, daylight plus brown bottle takes a lot longer to skunk. Cider probably a little less sensitive, keep it away from sunlight anyway.
 
Thanks for the detailed info, I was sort-of right about UV :p

I think the moral of the story is that there's little reason for concern about cider becoming light-struck unless you add hops or perhaps leave the the carboy in direct sunlight. Based on my experience, 1+ years of sitting in "garage lighting" causes no ill effect. Perhaps the thick coat of dust on my carboys helps a bit ;)
 
In England and other cold sunless places it seems to be fairly common for craft cider makers to age their cider in IBCs left out in the sun. I live in Australia and to me this seems quite crazy, you would never get away with that here, your IBCs would become brittle and your cider would get hot, but it seems to work for them. It shows that light doesn't really harm cider very much.
 
Thanks for the detailed info, I was sort-of right about UV :p

I think the moral of the story is that there's little reason for concern about cider becoming light-struck unless you add hops or perhaps leave the the carboy in direct sunlight. Based on my experience, 1+ years of sitting in "garage lighting" causes no ill effect. Perhaps the thick coat of dust on my carboys helps a bit ;)

I have contemplated experimenting with UV for pasteurization to achieve the elusive 'naturally sweet bottle-carbonated' cider. Yeast is far more sensitive to UV than even the hops.

Haven't ended up doing it because the light source for that kind of UV ends up being more complicated and expensive than just using a keg.
 

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