"barrel" aging in wine bottles?

[Schnitzer21]

I came up with an idea not too long ago that I've seen people somewhat attempt with mason jar lids but I think it would be easier with wine bottles. Ive seen people make a mason jar lid out of white oak and then use that to let their whiskey breathe. I made a batch of UJSSM and ended up with about a gallon of 75% that I'm lookin to age. I know I want to try out the Nuking method with a quart of it. Then probably keep a pint or maybe two white. Then I want to just age some in quart jars with charred/toasted sticks. Then my other idea for long term storage (hopefully 5+ years and even maybe longer) would be making my own "cork" for a wine bottle. I know a guy who has a CNC to run wood with and he could easily cut some "corks" out of a piece of oak board and then i was thinking sand the bottom down ever so slightly to have a little bit of a taper to it and then toast it and char the end that will go into the bottle. I would also like to put an oak stick inside of the wine bottle to just add a little bit more oak per sq inch. I'm just wondering if anyone has attempted this I've looked through a lot of the flavoring and aging section and havent found anyone with my idea yet and just wondering if some of the legends here would think it would work out?? or reasons why it wouldnt. Once i put my whiskey in the wine bottle and then added my stick and then inserted my "cork" I would probably put a little bit of wax around the edge of where the "cork" and the glass would meet to prevent any leaks and have the "cork" sticking out about an inch from the top of the bottle so I would be able to eventually get the sucker out when i needed to. I know a lot of people will probably just tell me to use virgin cork and let it stand upright and it'll age just fine but I was wondering if my method would be better because then it would mimic a real barrel due to it being able to breathe through the oak and the oak would actually be coming in contact with it as well. Sorry for the long post but just wanted to cover all the bases to avoid any confusion! thanks a lot in advance for any input someone might have. Cheers, Schnitz

[DAD300]

Nothing wrong with the idea.

If your going to have an oak stick inside, I would try to keep the wood stoppers as short as possible. It would allow them to breath easier. Getting them out may be a different story.

If you had a nice 1" thick board, is there a hole saw that would be close to the right dia?

Or a hybrid to avoid the wax? An oak wood dowel with a piece of cork wrapped around it to make it fit tight.

[bellybuster]

I see broken wine bottles in your future. I know.... I'm "that" guy.
Wood expands and contracts. Glass doesn't. Read Corenes post on wooden mason jar lids

[Schnitzer21]

bbuster you think it would expand enough to break the bottle in the neck? mightve just saved me from losing some of my first good batch which wouldve been a real shame so you think putting a small oak stick in a wine bottle and putting in a piece of virgin cork and letting it stand upright it would be able to age pretty much indefinitely? I just want a way that I can let it sit for a long long time for some special occasions. i know glass would be fine to let it age in because it wouldnt deteriorate but i guess i just think that after say 5 or 6 years even a plain cork would break down from the high alcohol vapors. Or am i thinking wrong? whats the best long, long term aging you guys have come across? I know PTFE is supposed to have basically non-existent reactions with alcohol but i feel like even if you had a bottle covered with that for one, it wouldnt be able to breathe, and for two i feel like it would eventually break down, but i could be wrong. Thanks again for the quick replies. love this place

[NZChris]

Oak it and age it in bulk, then, when you are happy with it, bottle it. If you age in a wine bottle, how would check it and still have enough left in the bottle for the big occasion?

[cranky]

I've thought about turning some long pieces of oak on my mini lathe to a little larger than the diameter of the neck on a gallon jug and long enough to reach down into the distillate, than toasting them, then finish sizing them to fit the neck with a bit of cork wrapped around but after considering it I think it's just better to age in gallon jugs with sticks cut like I think jumbo does with his apple brandy using a 1x1x5" charred oak stick in each quart jar although I might go a bit smaller if I really wanted to go a long time. I don't have to worry about broken glass that way and ruining all my hard work. I have started actually letting things sit in bottles on the clothes dryer for several weeks with nothing closing them up but a coffee filter. I find where I live evaporation isn't much of an issue so letting something sit with wood and breath isn't a problem and I figure what is lost this way is what I don't want anyway.

[Schnitzer21]

cranky, 1x1x5 is typically how much you use for quarts? what abv you putting them in? 60? 62.5 abv? I was thinking one that was 1x1x2.5 that is only toasted and one 1x1x2.5 that is toasted and charred so that I would get good color from the toast and filtering from the charred and all the smoky goodies from the charred/toasted. although I have been leaning towards the idea of just doing most of it dark toast dark char due to BoisBlankBoy's experiment that he did with all different char/toasting/non toasting levels and differences and he said that dark char and dark toast was the hands down favorite. might have to do a little experimenting myself. hobby just keeps getting better and better

[Halfbaked]

Yea I think there is a possibility if you use a piece of wood for a cork you might be cleaning up the floor. Why not make some smaller dowels and drop in your bottle and put a real cork in it. It could breath. Put your likker in wine bottles after it is already oaked if you want. Use a natural cork.

[Boda Getta]

UJSSM at 75% abv, wow. I hope you used a refux still. If you potstilled it and ended up at 75% I'm afraid you ended up with too heads. Nothing long aging hopefully fix.
BG

[cranky]

cranky, 1x1x5 is typically how much you use for quarts? what abv you putting them in? 60? 62.5 abv? I was thinking one that was 1x1x2.5 that is only toasted and one 1x1x2.5 that is toasted and charred so that I would get good color from the toast and filtering from the charred and all the smoky goodies from the charred/toasted. although I have been leaning towards the idea of just doing most of it dark toast dark char due to BoisBlankBoy's experiment that he did with all different char/toasting/non toasting levels and differences and he said that dark char and dark toast was the hands down favorite. might have to do a little experimenting myself. hobby just keeps getting better and better

I got that figure from this thread
http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... 9&start=60
on apple brandy but somewhere there was a thread that discussed the whole oaking thing and how many cubic inches of exposed surface and such but I'm not sure where that is but I recall it being one of those long threads. I haven't read that BoisBlaknBoy's thread so I guess I'll have to see if I can find it. I don't really oak that much, I do mostly neutral for the wife and fruit for me and cut it with fruit juice but sometimes use JD chips very sparingly or small Japanese maple dominoes from a 25 year old tree I had to cut down a few years ago which gives a nice maple quality if you don't leave it in too long but was thinking about following Jimbo's aoking instructions on this years apple runs to see how it goes.

[Schnitzer21]

http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =4&t=48480

Here's a link to the original post. Pretty awesome experiment cheers to BBBoy for having the patients for it

[Schnitzer21]

UJSSM at 75% abv, wow. I hope you used a refux still. If you potstilled it and ended up at 75% I'm afraid you ended up with too heads. Nothing long aging hopefully fix.
BG

boda I used a pot still but I did 5 stripping runs and then finally a spirit run of everything that i cut to 40%