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Syphoning

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keepitlow

NewBee
Registered Member
Nov 27, 2009
119
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NE US
Tried syphoning for the first time. I sucked the hose and used a plastic clip to hold the flow. As soon as I clamped the flow, it stopped and needed to be re-sucked. I did not use the clamp again and just rushed trying to get the flow into the bottles. Got it all over the ground....pretty messy business.

Any tricks to syphoning in a neat and more relaxed manner?
 
keepitlow said:
Tried syphoning for the first time. I sucked the hose and used a plastic clip to hold the flow. As soon as I clamped the flow, it stopped and needed to be re-sucked. I did not use the clamp again and just rushed trying to get the flow into the bottles. Got it all over the ground....pretty messy business.

Any tricks to syphoning in a neat and more relaxed manner?
Click to expand...
For the neatest and most relaxed siphoning, get an auto-siphon. They run about $15 or less for a 1/2" version and under $10 for a 5/16" version, on-line purchase. Probably a bit more at your LHBS.

There is also a carboy cap that you can blow into, but you need a tight seal.

If you prefer the old-fashioned way, make sure the open end of the filled hose is lower than the end of the hose in the carboy. The larger the drop, the better the siphon.
 
What I do is first I siphon some of my sanitizing solution throught the racking cane/tube (I use iodophor), then I plug the end with my thumb (generally I dunk my hand to sanitize first). Then I lower the cane into the carboy/whatever and unplug the tube, letting it flow into the sink. Once I see mead/whatever start coming out the end I plug it again, move it into whatever vessel I'm transferring into and bam, done.
 
AToE said:
What I do is first I siphon some of my sanitizing solution throught the racking cane/tube (I use iodophor), then I plug the end with my thumb (generally I dunk my hand to sanitize first). Then I lower the cane into the carboy/whatever and unplug the tube, letting it flow into the sink. Once I see mead/whatever start coming out the end I plug it again, move it into whatever vessel I'm transferring into and bam, done.
Click to expand...

I do exactly this about half the time. Otherwise I have one of those carboy-cap-blow systems which are great for siphon starting.

As for your siphon failing when you clamped it, it sounds like there was a leak somewhere. If you have a way for air to get in, any interruption in the flow will kill the siphon. I use two hose clamps to connect the hose to the racking cane, one rotated halfway around compared to the other so that the gap you sometimes get by the screw is shut by the second clamp. I've never had leaks using the two-hose-clamp system (yet...).
 
keepitlow said:
Any tricks to syphoning in a neat and more relaxed manner?
Click to expand...
For carboy to carboy (racking) I swish with sulphites (ptooie!) and suck the end, then when I stick the end in the carboy I don't let it touch the sides...

For bottling, I use a bottle filler, best $3 I ever spent, it's a little wand that goes on the end of the siphon hose and has a needle valve on the end, when you press it against the bottom of the bottle it lets the wine flow. As soon as you lift it off the bottom of the bottle it stops the flow. The volume it takes up in the bottle is just about right for the amount you'd want to leave for the cork anyway. For starting it, I stick the racking cane in the carboy. Then I take the filler end and put it on the hose, take the other end of the hose and fill the whole tube at the tap, which takes a couple of repetitions to get the air bubbles out if you can't hold it in a completely straight line (or if I have my bottle washer, I use that to fill the thing with water, just have to open the valve till it's full. I wipe off any drips with the tea towel that lives on the cupboard so nothing crawls down the outside of the hose and gets in the wine... Then, keeping the valve end lower than the open hose end, I attach the hose to the racking cane and using a sanitized jar, let it flow till the wine comes through, then start filling my bottles. Easy-peasy. Now and then I run into a bottle that has such a deep indentation that the needle won't depress all the way and it fills at half-speed or worse, those bottles I mark and give away to people who I know won't return them :)

Edit: best thing about the bottle filler is you can stop for a moment in the middle of it and not lose your prime, I devised a way to stick the hose through a cupboard handle such that the whole filler end touches nothing and I can go take care of some emergency that requires two hands or is farther than I can get with one hand on the hose...

I tried one of those automatic fillers this summer when I bottled my brother in-law's first mead, and I loathed it with every fibre of my being. It wouldn't keep its prime and I took in a good lungful of sulphites (the only way sulphites bother me!) trying to get the damn thing primed. That, and its overflow wasted half a bottle of wine from each of the 3-gal batches, and I never let it overflow a bottle! Not acceptable losses!
 
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