Critical Process Filtration In search of a New Filter Solution for the Micro Winery on Kimball
With the Micro Winery building on Kimball ( see previous posts) It became apparent that a new filtration solution was needed. We had been using an Enolmatic Tandem Filter Housing to do our final filtering before bottling. We also were using a Buon Vino Super Jet Plate Filter for larger volumes. One of the big issues with the Plate Filter was the time it took to filter a barrel. Waiting around ate up valuable time besides changing filter pads in mid stream was a pain. Don’t get me wrong at the time it was the best small non commercial winery filter one could afford and it still does a great job.
My search for a new solution started at the Eastern Winery Show I attended last Winter where on display I saw a variety of Cartridge Filter Housings. Frankly I was a little surprised that Plate Filters did not seem to attract the attention I would have expected and there was a definite focus on Cartridge style filtration.
Keeping this all in mind I called Critical Process Filtration on a different matter. If you own a Enolmatic Filter Housing you know how much certain distributors charge for the filter cartridges. Some are gouging period. There is no need to pay outrageous prices for what are really low end line filters. Critical Process Filtration is not a distributor they are a manufacturer of filter cartridges. They make these for a wide variety of industrial uses and pharmaceutical uses. What I learned was there are quite a few choices of cartridges that will fit in a Enolmatic Housing. Some of these filters are rated absolute, others use a different filtration material. Putting it simply a fiberglass media is easy to wash and lasts longer and has better thru-put than the standard poly propylene ones we have been buying for years and paying too much for in the bargain. As a result of my phone call I was able to order some of the cartridges that I wanted to have on hand but it was then the call took a different turn.
If you go to their web site you will find it takes a bit of getting time to get acquainted with not only all the filters they produce but as I found they also make filter housings. I discovered they make quite a few different housings. I was able to order a housing that accepts up to four 10 inch cartridges. The best part besides the price ( much better than St Pats) is I can choose to use any amount of cartridges from 1 to 4 and the input and outputs are fitted with 1 ½ TC connections to work with my impeller pump. The housing is fitted with a bleeder port, drain port, and pressure gauge port. I converted the Gauge Port to accept a 1 ½ Sanitary Pressure Gauge. And the Housing comes in beautiful polished stainless steel. As you can see in the picture I mounted the housing to a plastic furniture dolly. This housing is heavy!
Critical Process Filtration at work
This weekend we finally got around to bottling and I used two 1 micron cartridges in the housing using special plugs for the other unused ports. We started with a 60 gallon volume and filtered from barrel to tank. It took 5 minutes! We then filtered another 75 gallons with the same 2 cartridges in minutes with barely a movement on the pressure gauge. What a pleasure! I keep saying to myself why didn’t I do this years ago. Then I remember , how one little pump can change life.
Brent Arbogast of Critical Process Filtration is extremely helpful and told me he welcomes amateur winemakers like us. He did indicate that you should know what you want to order before you call. So don’t be a pain in the ass. If you are calling for a replacement Enolmatic filter cartridges please see the other post on this blog for all the information you will need.
A big thank you to Brent and all the Folks at Critical Process Filtration.
does filtering a wine do anything other than make it look prettier?
OH NO! Not this Conversation. That question is like throwing red meat in a cage full of Bears.
But I have to agree that it looks prettier when something is not floating or sunk in the bottom of your glass. Especially when the person drinking it already has issues with “Homemade”.
Dan, It also increases bottle shock and removes flavor.
Ok, I’m mostly jabbing Gene. But I’m curious, how long do you age your wine before filtration? I have a friend who filters and his wine always seems to have more sediment than my unfiltered wines. I have assumed this is due to his 1 year aging time and that the wine drops sediment after filtration.
“Dan, It also increases bottle shock and removes flavor.”….Hey, after all of that work, who wouldn’t want that??
Me???…I’m always looking for an excuse to NOT do something.
Beware the Dude that throws the First Bomb. LOL
As a rule my wines are not usually bottled before 2 years.
To your question One year in glass now tanks and then 1 year in barrels. But I am moving to good percentage of 2 year stints in 60′s. As far as your theory I would question if your friend or you use the same prefermentation tannins, wood , etc, and racking frequency. Sediment and trowing sediment to the sides of bottles has all been eliminated here since the use and employment of various tannin additions at the outset.
“2 year stints in 60′s”….what does this mean?
I usually anticipate and so far keep my wine that goes in 60 gallon barrels for a 2 year period.
I don’t normally use tannin or oak pieces in my wines and rack seldom. I think racking less may actually do a better job compacting lees since you don’t keep stirring them up. 2 years aging and you still need to filter sediment? I’m not really against filtration just haven’t found the need with reds or whites.
There is no doubt that filtering did nothing to prevent throwing color against the sides of bottles 3 years later. But to be sure VR Supra and VR Color in two half additions one at the of formation of cap and the latter at 18 brix has cured the problem. I was dealing with this for years. One other thing however could have been the cause was one of two enzymes we were using. We changed to only one enzyme as per Scott Lab’s consultant and started the Laffort products at the same time.
There is no doubt that I could bottle the wine as is. There wasn’t really any sediment in the barrel at the end either. But there is always that little crud that could find its way into a glass from a few errant bottles . The filters after 150 gallons were remarkably clean ( just tinted) and there were a few specks remaining in the housing. But you know how I feel about that visual impact of those specks in a glass I pour.
Now as far as this filter for Whites, even though some very smart wineguy I know thinks a slight haze adds a certain panache. This filter will make for Crystal Polished Whites so much easier to obtain in a short amount of time than using the plate filter.
I have been thinking about my abandonment of the plate filter for the cartridge filter system. At the end of the day the Plate Filter affords great filtration with some definite advantages. For the Amateur the plate filter means albeit slow filtering and loss of wine, the filter media is cheap and throwaway but clean up is quick. The Cartridge System provides very quick filtering, the possibllity to use and obtain Absolute Filtering for Sweetened Wines or non MLF wines without the use of Sorbate or Lysozyme, and has no loss of product. Clean up of the housing is quick but cleaning cartridges is a time consuming process that has to be done correctly.
On that note I have found this was the first time I used the fiberglass media and it cleans up much more easier than the polypropylene variety.
I also find that the tannin additions do improve the level of sediment thrown later on, as the color/tannin complexes are better retained at least theoretically. I used to get alot of anthocyanin plating the bottle walls, not so much as sediment but a coating, and I no longer get that either.
But also CRR is right about length of aging and few rackings. Most of the sediment ends up incorporated into the tartrate sediment in the aging vessel, and if it makes it to the bottle it stays at the bottom.
Anthrocyanin Coating! We have a name for it! Thank you Puppy. That is been a plague for a very long time and no amount of filtering would eliminate it. Sediment from it has never been a real problem unless you shake off some of the coating before pouring. As far a Regular Sediment it has not been a problem for me with my racking procedures. Which leads Dan to say “Why Filter” LOL
Jack Keller had pointed that out in a thread that I had started, when I too called it tannin deposition, but I’m pretty sure he was correct in the actual terminology and composition. Anyhow, much less of it even in the carboys since using fermentation tannin and oak.
Jack Keller OH NO! Please let yesterday’s knee surgery and today’s Martini keep me from a rant. I have no energy for it Please!
On point I never had a speck in a carboy, only after bottling mostly one year in carboy glass nothing , one year in barrel , then bottled . THEN two years later the problem. All gone now!
Laffort to the rescue. But that other enzyme issue lingers as the real problem..
Post-Op Martini. Are you drinking it, or using the IV drip?
I would have thought the wise-guy got knee-capped ages ago, LOL!
Wise Guy huh…. Orally works fine unfiltered I might add.
Which enzyme do you use now, and which enzyme caused the problem?
When we first started using enzymes we used 2. Rapidaze Ex Color and Vino Super. The thinking at the time was the Ex Color was for maceration and the Vino Super was for settling and compacting lees. We then became aware that Vino Super was designed primarily for whites. But we continued to use it. I had a discussion with a Scott Labs Consultant and she related that the Vino Super was a pectolytic enzyme and its action was used for depectinization. She believed that the enzyme should not be used and it could be causing the problem. She also recommended tannin additions.
Taking her advice we stopped using the Vino Super and began using Scott’s and Laffort Enzymes ( I like EXV by Laffort) and also added tannins to the protocol. The problem has been put to rest. Truthfully I cannot not say for sure if one of gthe changes solved the problem. Probably a little of both. I still like Ex Color but I buy almost all of my products with the exception of Laffort from Scott Labs.