Wine is essentially made from fruit juices and goes through the fermentation process to produce a broad range of wine category. Wine making can be simplified into several simple steps if you are considering making your own wine from grapes or other fruits. Wine making supplies can be bought from a variety of places from your local grocery to specialized stores that cater all brewery equipments and ingredients.

You can also get specially designed wine-making kits that comes complete with the basic equipments and ingredients to get your started right away. You can get these kits according to the type of wine you wish to make, for example, red or white wine kits or just basic wine kit that can be used with any types of fruit.

 

Wine making supplies ranges in price and to purchase a complete set can be prove to be quite an expensive hobby, but to produce wine as a business it is a great investment to have the complete kit so that you can produce an acceptable quality of wine.

A complete wine making kit is meant for production of wine within legal limits for non commercial uses. These kits have all the common equipments and ingredients for the amateur wine maker that comprises of:

• A primary Fermenter
• A Glass Carboy
• Airlocks and stoppers
• Siphon hose
• Racking cane
• Bottle filler
• Nylon straining bag
• Acid test kit
• Triple scale hydrometer
• Hydrometer test jar
• Handled corker
• Corks
• Lodophor sanitizer
• Campden tablets
• Carby brush
• Wine bottle brush
• Wine making guide

Meanwhile a specially packaged kit to make red or white wine will not have all the mentioned equipments above, instead red or white wine kit contains pure concentrated and stabilized grape juice according to your choice of varietals. These juices are made ready to be added with the rest of the ingredients without going through the process of skinning and crushing the grapes to extract the juice. The juice extraction process is an definitive step towards producing an acceptable wine or an amazing wine. Most amateur wine makers prefer to go on the safe route by purchasing these kits.
The list above is considerably almost complete for an amateur wine maker; however they are designed to produce wine in small volumes each time. A variety of each equipment is available separately for wine makers who are looking into producing wines on a larger scale. Below is a list of individual wine making equipment and their varieties that are necessary in the wine making process:

Wine Tasting Equipment

• Hydrometer - Used for determining gravity and alcohol levels. Tells you when it's safe to bottle.
   
• Wine (Sugar Scale) Hydrometer - This hydrometer indicates how much sugar is necessary to add to achieve a given alcohol percentage, it also measures alcohol percentage, from 2 to 20%.
   
• Brix Refractometer - Used to measure sugar content of a juice in degrees brix (0-32).Useful for determining ripeness.
   
• Digital pH Meter - Electronic pH meter to measure acidity in a wine
   
• VinoFerm Iodic Solution - Measures free sulfite in juice and wine
   
• Vinometer - A vinometer is used to measure alcohol in finished wines.
   
• Wine Thief - Draws sample allowing you to take hydrometer (and other) readings.
   
• So2 Test Titrates - For the determination of sulfite in wine.
   
• Grape crushers, Fruit presses & Oak Barrels
   
• Fruit Press - A mechanism to apply additional force to your fruit juice extraction.
   
• Oak Barrel
   
• Soda Ash - For barrel cleaning and conditioning.
   
• Sulpher Strips - Used for sanitizing wood barrels. Strips are hung in barrel and burned.

Wine Yeasts

• Ferments fruit juices to dryness for all white wines, some reds, dry white, mead, port, dry cider and for fruit juices.
   
• Sake Kit (Koji-Kin) - to make sake (14%-19% alcohol).

Wine Additives

• Grape Tannin - Adds astringency or "zest" to juice, meads. Found in skins and stems of grapes. Also aids in the clearing process. Tannin occurs naturally in red wines which are fermented on the skins, but must be added to white wines and to many other fruit wines.
   
• Pectic Enzyme - Helps break down fruit prior to fermentation and aids in clarifying. Increases juice yields and color by breaking down the cellular structure. Also eliminates pectin haze from wines made from pectin rich fruit.
   
• Yeast Nutrient - Acts as a food for the yeast and promotes rapid starting and complete fermentation.
   
• DAP (Diammonium Phosphate) - A pure form of yeast nutrient. Contains fermentable nitrogen and phosphorus.
   
• Yeast Energizer - Provides vitamins, trace elements, nutrients, B-vitamins etc. to yeast. Helps restart a stuck fermentation. Use to make wine with a high alcohol content or for fruit lacking in nutrients.
   
• Campden Tablets - Sodium metabisulfite in tablet form. For inhibiting harmful bacteria, add to juice 24 hours prior to fermentation. As a stabilizer, use at bottling along with potassium sorbate.
   
• Potassium Bisulphate - An antibacterial agent identical in use to sodium metabisulfite.
   
• Sodium Bisulphate - Equipment and bottle sterilizer. Kills wild yeasts and bacteria.
   
• Acid Blend - A blend of citric, malic and tartaric acids that is used to increase acidity of juice.
   
• Malic Acid - Slightly milder than other acids. Found in apples, peaches, plums and other fruits. A good choice for adjusting "hot-climate" white grapes of the fruity variety.
   
• Tartaric Acid - Used for raising acid levels in wine. The principal acid found in grapes, it is the best choice for making adjustments to grape juice. Also the most stable acid.
   
• Citric Acid - Used to correct the acidity in acid deficient wines. This is the acid of lemons and other citrus fruits. Use sparingly in white wines only. Dry, granular form of citric acid.
   
• Ascorbic Acid - Anti-oxidant used in wine making. Add just prior to bottling
   
• Bentonite - All purpose clarifier used in wine industry. Also useful in primary fermentor.
   
• Potassium Sorbate (Stabilizer) - Inhibits yeast reproduction and fermentation in sweet wines at bottling. Also called wine stabilizer. Not meant to stop active fermentation.
   
• Sparkolloid Powder - Clarifier that does not strip wine of flavor.
   
• Calcium Carbonate - Calcium Carbonate is used to lower the acidity of wine. Use before fermentation.
   
• Potassium Carbonate - Potassium Carbonate is used to reduce titratable acid in wine.
   
• Bocksin - Contains a solution of silicum dioxide to remove hydrogen sulfide odors (rotten egg smell) and related off-flavors in wine.
   
• Anti Foam Agent - Prevents overactive fermentation, clogged airlocks. Works by reducing surface tension, so that bubbles cannot form.

Wine flavorings and spices

• Cinnamon
• Clove
• Orange Peel
• Fennel
• Vanilla
• Anise
• Juniper
• Oak essence
• Oak chips

Professional wine making equipments are mostly custom made and are under the most stringent quality control monitoring by each country’s government agencies.

Wine Article From: Wine-Blog.Net - Information About Fine Wine
Webmasters: Learn About Republishing Our Wine Articles