The Auswine Forum

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 4:13 am**

We opened a bottle of Penfolds 1994 St Henri Shiraz/Cabernet on the weekend and had a hell of a time getting the cork out. As I screwed in the Screwpull the cork just crumbled for about the top half. It wasnÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t loose or leaking, it just seemed to be really tight. Rather than open another bottle and experience the same problem I opened a bottle of Lindemans Limestone Ridge 1994 Shiraz/Cab. But this time I used an Ahh-So prong opener (see here), got the prongs in OK but as I pulled up the top half of the cork came away. I eventually had to push the remaining cork in both bottles into the wine and filter out the cork fragments. Both wines smelled like fine examples of aged shiraz with leather overtones of Cab, especially when they were being decanted, but upon tasting were clearly tired and past their prime and didnÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t improve over several hours.

Because the cork problem occurred in both wines IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢m wondering if this is a storage problem? Both wines have been stored in unopened 6-pack boxes in my air conditioned office which I try to keep in the mid-60Ãƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s (F). Hotter than optimal I know, but more uniform than any other place IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ve had until I bought a temperature controlled cellar which I run at 57 (F). They have been in there for about a year. Anyone experience any cork problem similar to this?

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 5:37 am**

Interesting! I have suffered the same cork problem as you described on a number of occasions with older wines but the wines have in the main been fine.

How long were the wines in your office? I have both the the St Henri and Limestone in my cellar and neither one are particularly leathery although the St H does have some of those characters.

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 6:15 am**

G'Day TORB:

The wines were in the office for a number of years, I'm guessing at least 6. (It was getting pretty crowded in here!) So their development would have been a lot faster than if they had been stored at 14C (57F) or less. But because it was a regulated temp that was less than 21C (70F) (I have to wear a sweater when I'm in my office) I was hoping that they would still be OK, at least for a few more years. Problem is I have '92-95 of the St Henri and I'm hoping that they all don't have this cork problem.

I guess the real question is - how do I get the corks out if the top half is prone to falling apart?

BTW, Enjoy your site.

Mike

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 6:25 am**

Mike,

Two topics here. Corks and ageing and they don't have to be related.

The majority of the corks should be ok but when extracting them, just make sure that the thread of the screw goes all the way through to the bottom of the cork.

As to the ageing factor, if it was a number of years then yes, the wine could have aged a bit prematurely. However it is worth remembering that daily fluctuations are more of a problem than slightly higher than optimal constant temperature. For example, if the air was off at night and over the weekend, then the constant up and down would have contributed more to the state of the wine than the slightly higher than ideal conditions.

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 8:25 am**

Mike,

Sounds to me like the Air conditioning is drying them out on the surface but as Ric said sticking the screw all the way in should alleviate the problem.

I think your real question, if you are worried that they need drinking, is who are your best friends? :wink:

Good luck,

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 8:46 am**

I had a not dissimilar experience with two bottles of 92 Mt Edelstone opened at Easter. The leverpull cored the first cork, which I eventually dug out with an Ah-So, but it was a bit messy. The second bottle I started with the Ah-So, and that was generally more successful, but even here the lower part of the cork was particularly fragile. Logic suggests to me that insufficient humidity may be the cause of this, but perhaps there's more to it. These bottles have lived in Sydney all their lives, and spent little time under 50-60% humidity.

It's always surprised me to read that little disclaimer in the Langtons catalogue about "the poor quality of corks used in all but a few Australian wines...". I can't recall that phrase being updated for a number of years, and I wonder if it's still relevant. And yet they specifically exempt wines earlier than 1970. Has there beena change in the general grading of corks supplied to Australian makers? I'm sure top-flight local makers buy the very best corks available (I remember Mt Mary claiming as much in a newsletter years ago), and yet rarely do I find a Bordeaux-length cork in an Australian wine. (Not that longer is necessarily better, but it suggests that different corks go to different markets.)

If I could swap every cork in my cellar for a screwcap I'd do it in a heartbeat!

cheers,
Graeme

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 8:47 am**

simm wrote:Mike,

Sounds to me like the Air conditioning is drying them out on the surface but as Ric said sticking the screw all the way in should alleviate the problem.

I think your real question, if you are worried that they need drinking, is who are your best friends?

Good luck,

You know simm, I think you just might be right! :idea:

I just PM'ed TORB some more detail on how the corks broke down, and that thought was in the back of my mind as I was typing. They have been in the wine cellar for about a year, but maybe being inside an unopened carton until this weekend has slowed any moisture getting to the cork compared to the other vintages of St Henri which are on the racks.

Regarding who to drink them with? Anyone is welcome to help me drink these, but as I live in California that might be a bit of a deterent to some. Up until this cork problem I did see a vertical tasting in the future - just need to get a bottle or two of the '96 and '97, and maybe the '99 and I could do '92-99 for the SH.

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 11:07 am**

KMP,

I haven't had much luck with corks in St Henri. Every bottle in a six pack of '91, had crumbly corks. The best cork(structurally) I've had was a '95 St Henri. I haven't been game to open any of my '94s. Quality wise, the '91s drank beautifully. Just the odd bit of cork that needed to be strained out.

Cheers

Jamie

Posted: **Tue Apr 20, 2004 12:06 pm**

Hi Mike

People seem to have covered most of the stuff here, FWIW, the air conditioning has played havic on a couple of previous corks that I know about - also just think how dry the lips are after a 12 hour flight overseas.
I also knew a flight attendant a few years ago who said that many of them suffered badly dried out skin due to the constant AC.

Just one thing, I use a mini-bottle filter if I ever have probs with crumbly corks, tartrate, large sediment.

You can see one at this link (after quick google search):- http://www.internetwines.com/rws19008.html

Posted: **Wed Apr 21, 2004 1:07 am**

How about something like "cork pops"?
Theoretically that should push the cork out evenly rather than just pulling on the centre...
There's also a manual-pump version besides the gas canister one

Posted: **Wed Apr 21, 2004 7:26 am**

Thanks for the coments folks. I'm afraid I have to report that I opened a bottle of the '92 St Henri last night and the cork was again crumbling, though not as badly as the '94. My evil twin JohnP asked me to comment on some Syrah we tasted recently and I've added some on the St Henri's here.

Jamie: I hope you're right about the '95. I'll be opening a bottle later in the week to see if the cork is holding together better.

Mike

PS. As a long time maker of expensive vinegar I recently invested in one of these, and today I bought one of these. They had better work! At the present rate I'll be too old to even know what (or if) I'm drinking when it come to opening 2002's in 20 years!

Posted: **Wed Apr 21, 2004 9:01 am**

KMP wrote:PS. As a long time maker of expensive vinegar I recently invested in one of these, and today I bought one of these. They had better work! At the present rate I'll be too old to even know what (or if) I'm drinking when it come to opening 2002's in 20 years!

Why, oh why, have we nothing in that price range here in Aus? $1595US for 500 bottle capacity? That'd almost be worth buying; I wonder if there's an Australian distributor?

Posted: **Wed Apr 21, 2004 9:12 am**

Anonymous wrote:
KMP wrote:PS. As a long time maker of expensive vinegar I recently invested in one of these, and today I bought one of these. They had better work! At the present rate I'll be too old to even know what (or if) I'm drinking when it come to opening 2002's in 20 years!

Why, oh why, have we nothing in that price range here in Aus? $1595US for 500 bottle capacity? That'd almost be worth buying; I wonder if there's an Australian distributor?

Their web site is here. Doesn't look like Oz has anyone, but you might want to contact them and make sure. One reason why its fairly reasonable is that its self-assembly - says something like 2 hours but took me the best part of 6, mainly because I wanted to make sure it was airtight.

Mike

Posted: **Tue Aug 10, 2004 9:54 pm**

KMP wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
KMP wrote:PS. As a long time maker of expensive vinegar I recently invested in one of these, and today I bought one of these. They had better work! At the present rate I'll be too old to even know what (or if) I'm drinking when it come to opening 2002's in 20 years!

Why, oh why, have we nothing in that price range here in Aus? $1595US for 500 bottle capacity? That'd almost be worth buying; I wonder if there's an Australian distributor?

Their web site is here. Doesn't look like Oz has anyone, but you might want to contact them and make sure. One reason why its fairly reasonable is that its self-assembly - says something like 2 hours but took me the best part of 6, mainly because I wanted to make sure it was airtight.

Mike

Hello Mike,

Having noticed these selling for what seems to be a very reasonable price on eBay, with global shipping offered ( http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll ... 94815&rd=1 ) ...I'm a little curious; how has your cabinet been performing? Do temperature and humidity levels remain reasonably stable? Any info on your experiences appreciated; most of the local offerings are either ugly, uh, I mean utilitarian

or small and very expensive...third-party cellarage already has me loath running errands, so I'm contemplating the addition of a decently sized cabinet to my list of reasons why the car can do without petrol and 2-minute noodles are a balanced diet in themselves :lol:

Cheers,

Jakob

Posted: **Wed Aug 11, 2004 8:58 am**

I am also very interested in this cabinet and some further details on performance, suitability to Australian conditions, ease of putting together etc etc ect

Posted: **Fri Aug 13, 2004 11:28 am**

Hi Guys:

IMPORTANT NOTE: The Vintage Keeper does not control humidity, only temperature. (Of course if you are a "wine coinsurers" that point may not matter!!) The manual says 2 hours to put together. I took 6 but I was very careful about it and used silicone to make sure here were no leaks between the panels.

Well right now its 82.6F and about 60% humidity in the remodeled garage/office (with insulation Ãƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â€œ thank God I donÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t work in here on a regular basis) but the cellar is humming along below 60F and at 60% humidity. And I can tell you that over the last few months of a very unusually hot southern California summer its taken quite a beating and rarely goes above 60F. We made a serious mistake of installing two very large skylights in the garage that not only let in a lot of light but also a lot of heat! As the summer began it was not a problem but as it got hotter it became obvious that it was getting very hot in the garage. So I installed thermo-hygrometer monitors in the garage and in cellar to keep a check on things. IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ve checked them on a very regular basis over the last few weeks, and have never kept the cellar open for more than a few minutes at any time during the day. Plus we actually have the garage door open a few inches to allow some ventilation. So the current situation is not perfect, and yet the unit does not seem to be over stressed. The only concern I have is that I have the temperature set at 55F which is supposed to be the air temp in the cabinet. However the thermo-hygrometer monitor (attached to the left inside wall of the cabinet) reads between 57-59F, and higher if the door is open. If the thermo-hygrometer monitor is attached to the front of the cooling unit then it reads more like 56-58F. So I think the temp probe for the cooling unit is not well exposed to the cabinet air. Certainly the digital readout of the cooling unit changes very slowly compared to the monitors, but I think that would be a problem only if you had the unit in a room that was always hot and you were opening and closing the doors frequently; the manufacturers donÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t recommend that.

In a perfect world I would put the cellar in the room next to the garage; yes the coolest room in the house. However its also the only other bedroom and its a small room. All the other rooms are large and have lots of windows! So I am now in the process of organizing an exhaust fan to be inserted into one of the skylights to pull air out of the room, and IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢m going to put at least two Tru Temp Bottle Probes in the cellar as a better guide to the temp of the wine in the bottles. Within a month or two I should have a much better idea of how constant the temp of the wine actually is!

All in all I'd have to say that for the price I payed I'm very happy. Of course the real payoff will only come in 5-10+ years when I pull out some of the wine that has been aging in there and find it to be drinking just perfectly, thank you very much!

IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ll keep you posted,
Mike

Posted: **Fri Aug 13, 2004 12:28 pm**

A few weeks after release, I bought a bottle of Penfold's St Henri 98 from cellar door. To be consumed that night, to my dismay the cork crumbled!

My experience with crumbling corks prior, had been exclusively with older wines and wines that had been stored in dry places positioned in the vertical.

A winemekar tried to tell me that a percentage of corks fail in this way ie: crumbling corks on release. Had not heard this before.

Posted: **Sat Aug 14, 2004 2:27 pm**

Thanks for the great info Mike! The lack of humidity control doesn't worry me too much, as on average it's probably high enough naturally around here, so this one stays on the list. It doesn't look like there's an Australian distributor, and I haven't recieved replies to emails I've sent to Vintage Keeper, so the next questions to be answered are freight and duty costs with the eBay dealer :roll:

Posted: **Fri Sep 24, 2004 9:57 am**

Well, here's the scoop on shipping, for anybody interested: $653.94US takes the 500 bottle model to Sydney Airport, or $790.44US gets it to your door. That just added 50%+ to the cost, so it's ceased to be the bargain it was, but maybe still good value?

Posted: **Fri Sep 24, 2004 10:24 am**

Anonymous wrote:Well, here's the scoop on shipping, for anybody interested: $653.94US takes the 500 bottle model to Sydney Airport, or $790.44US gets it to your door. That just added 50%+ to the cost, so it's ceased to be the bargain it was, but maybe still good value?

So what is the total now? About $3,000 in Aussie dollars with shipping. What is the cost of cooling units and shelving over there? It would seem that a good handyman should be able to put something of similar size together for that price. Afterall its only a 500 bottle box - a spare built-in wardrobe would be a good starting point.

Mike

Posted: **Fri Sep 24, 2004 8:41 pm**

I opened a 80 grange that had been cellared really poorly, as I was a long time student and the bottled travelled alot between digs. The cork virtually crumbled upon opening in 99. However, the wine was sound (good to excellent) and certainly not corked or oxidised. Another instance that really surprised was a 76 or 77 Hill of Grace (Opened in 02) that had been stored for many years in a low temp cellar (Alpine Snowy region) the ullage was below shoulder and the closure showed evidence of leakage. However, whilst the wine was past its best it was still palatable the cork was a tad crumbly to say the least.

Posted: **Sat Dec 18, 2004 5:46 pm**

KMP wrote:Hi Guys:

IMPORTANT NOTE: The Vintage Keeper does not control humidity, only temperature. (Of course if you are a "wine coinsurers" that point may not matter!!) The manual says 2 hours to put together. I took 6 but I was very careful about it and used silicone to make sure here were no leaks between the panels.

Well right now its 82.6F and about 60% humidity in the remodeled garage/office (with insulation Ãƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â€œ thank God I donÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t work in here on a regular basis) but the cellar is humming along below 60F and at 60% humidity. And I can tell you that over the last few months of a very unusually hot southern California summer its taken quite a beating and rarely goes above 60F. We made a serious mistake of installing two very large skylights in the garage that not only let in a lot of light but also a lot of heat! As the summer began it was not a problem but as it got hotter it became obvious that it was getting very hot in the garage. So I installed thermo-hygrometer monitors in the garage and in cellar to keep a check on things. IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ve checked them on a very regular basis over the last few weeks, and have never kept the cellar open for more than a few minutes at any time during the day. Plus we actually have the garage door open a few inches to allow some ventilation. So the current situation is not perfect, and yet the unit does not seem to be over stressed. The only concern I have is that I have the temperature set at 55F which is supposed to be the air temp in the cabinet. However the thermo-hygrometer monitor (attached to the left inside wall of the cabinet) reads between 57-59F, and higher if the door is open. If the thermo-hygrometer monitor is attached to the front of the cooling unit then it reads more like 56-58F. So I think the temp probe for the cooling unit is not well exposed to the cabinet air. Certainly the digital readout of the cooling unit changes very slowly compared to the monitors, but I think that would be a problem only if you had the unit in a room that was always hot and you were opening and closing the doors frequently; the manufacturers donÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t recommend that.

In a perfect world I would put the cellar in the room next to the garage; yes the coolest room in the house. However its also the only other bedroom and its a small room. All the other rooms are large and have lots of windows! So I am now in the process of organizing an exhaust fan to be inserted into one of the skylights to pull air out of the room, and IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢m going to put at least two Tru Temp Bottle Probes in the cellar as a better guide to the temp of the wine in the bottles. Within a month or two I should have a much better idea of how constant the temp of the wine actually is!

All in all I'd have to say that for the price I payed I'm very happy. Of course the real payoff will only come in 5-10+ years when I pull out some of the wine that has been aging in there and find it to be drinking just perfectly, thank you very much!

IÃƒâ€šÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ll keep you posted,
Mike

Posted: **Wed Mar 30, 2005 11:54 am**

Hi folks,

Have just discovered this discussion after doing my own research on purchasing a home cellar. Suspect that the Vintage Keeper is what I'm after and am having all sorts of trouble getting hold of one. Prices from an eBay dealer are good, but shipping is prohibitive ($630US for 110 or 220, $1100 for 500) and then add the cost of converting the electrical supply.

I'm about to open an upscale homewares shop in Hobart and have emailed the manufacturer asking if they want a dealer in Australia.

Has anyone had any further success finding anything out?

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