REAL CORK OR SYNTHETIC

[onered05]

i was wandering witch type of cork to use for bottling my wine and came across this, hope it is useful to people who cant decide and sorry if this has been posted before.

Real Cork or Synthetic?
This is a bit of an issue for the home winemaker. Most of the corks you can purchase at the supply store are made up of tiny bits of cork all pressed together (called agglomerated). The same way chicken scraps are pressed together to make chicken nuggets. These are the bottom of the barrel as corks go. Wineries that still use corks only use the corks made from a single piece of the cork oak bark, not pressed bits. You can get the agglomerated corks for about 20¢ a piece. The winery quality corks are more like 75¢ each. I have personally found that agglomerated are more prone to leakage and tainting of the wine.

Did you know that the wine industry has about 5% loss of wine due to cork spoilage. That means one in twenty bottles. Imagine that one out of twenty cans of soda was no good when you opened it. Those kinds of losses are just not acceptable. Cork spoilage or cork taint is caused by a fungus found in cork. Now you know why so many of the wineries have switched to either synthetic corks or screw tops. Don’t laugh, it’s the high end wines that are making the switch to metal screw tops, corks are on their way out.

I’ve been buying synthetic corks for some time now. They cost about 20¢ each in bulk (in lots of 1000) and they have some added advantages. First, they don’t have a problem with cork spoilage. I love that I don’t have to lay bottles down or invert them. Synthetic corks don’t have to stay wet, they are just as happy sitting right-side up. They can also be stored for a very long time before use, there is no issue with the humidity level of synthetic corks. You don’t have to soak them or sulfite them, just grab a cork and seal the bottle.

There is one down side to synthetics, in particular to the home winemaker. If you have one of those hand corkers, you are not going to enjoy trying to insert them into your bottles. You can’t create enough pressure by hand to squeeze the cork down while inserting it in the bottle. You need a floor corker.

There are a few name brands out there; Nomacork, Neocork, Supreme Corq. I’ve been very happy with synthetic corks, I have absolutely no reason to look back.

If you are curious, the process of making corks is rather fascinating. Do a Google search for “harvesting cork.”

hope this helps.

[Horden Hillbilly]

Did you know that the wine industry has about 5% loss of wine due to cork spoilage. That means one in twenty bottles.

I've been making wine for about 25 years & my losses to cork spoilage? A big fat ZERO.

[onered05]

Did you know that the wine industry has about 5% loss of wine due to cork spoilage. That means one in twenty bottles.

I've been making wine for about 25 years & my losses to cork spoilage? A big fat ZERO.

iv opted for cork and sleeves to go with them purely for the experience of it and if i loose a bottle of wine now and again then its no biggy..

[Dr. Dextrin]

Did you know that the wine industry has about 5% loss of wine due to cork spoilage. That means one in twenty bottles.

I've been making wine for about 25 years & my losses to cork spoilage? A big fat ZERO.

Same here, but maybe a few more years in my case.

[rootsbrew]

This is still something of a topic in the wine industry, though it's quietening down now that people have become familiar with screw tops. The OP has a point about the quality of corks available.
A lot of producers outside Europe are closing their bottles with Stelvin and equivalents because the supply of good corks goes to producers in areas like Bordeaux, Burgundy, etc. However, it should be noted that the condition is called cork taint because corks are sometimes the cause of problems, but TCA contamination is possible in wines closed with screw, crown and faux-cork. How to avoid TCA is a whole other discussion!

I have sold a lot of wine over the years and, yes, taint exists. 5% of all cork-closed wine? Mmm, not sure. Mostly, ithe effect of TCA and other taint is quite subtle and has the effect of dumbing down the fruit and flavour, while exentuating the acidity, even if the damp cardboard isn't detectable.

Most of the problem is poor storage. Cork does dry out, so the bottles need to be a bit over horizontal to keep the cork plump. Cork, as a material, is sensitive to its environment (temp, humidity, etc.), which needs to be provided for, during storage. Also, being pourous, aromas can permiate through cork. This last bit is the most common cause of problems. Now that alternatives exist, the purpose of cork is to allow very small, very slow gas exchange - synthetic ones are airtight but more difficult to apply than screw tops, so why bother? This very slow oxidation, at low temperatures, can really help with lots of bits about a wine, including the release of CO2 coming out of solution (it will also cause the wine to go "over").

IMHO, synthetic "corks" are just wierd! If you don't want cork, use Stelvin (or some unbranded screw top). Just my view.

Out of interest, does anyone who makes just the occassional wine, but mostly beer, bottle wine in beer bottles, with crown closures? Apart from making sure to degas, is there anything I should be careful of, if doing this?

[Mitchamitri1]

Wine is fine in crown closed beer bottles but dont put beer in wine bottles obviously!
I used to use normal cork, then had a backlog of bottles with screwcaps I used.....
With corks if they blow out you get a mess.
With bottles if the screwcaps cant blow the bottles blow up and make a bigger mess.
Swings and roundabouts really.
So...because I consider myself a purist i prefer real corks.
In my experience synthetic corks are great for bought wine and still cider but difficult for homebrewing.
Dont forget that the neck of a screwcap bottle is a lot thinner than a cork bottle so it is quite risky (but possible) to put a cork in an old screwcap bottle.

[Kev888]

I've used quite a few different varieries of cork or bung for wine - I have no problem with the performance of synthetic ones, but I much prefer real cork. I also find it sad to hear of the demise of many oak/cork plantations and the wildlife that they support (though I don't suppose home winemaking would be able to do much about that).

I've had several types of synthetic cork in the past - some were a sort of soft foam core in a cork-coloured outer tube that worked quite well, others were soft plastic formed to look like cork; some of those were fine too but others seemed too hard to go in easily, especially with the range of slightly varying bottles I've got.

That said, the OP is quite correct; some of the reconstituted corks I've had have been pretty poor quality - weak crumbly things that seem too porous. Not sure if its perhaps how they've been stored in the shop or if they were just poor to begin with.

Cheers
Kev

[danbrew]

I'd say real corks are preferable for the homewinemaker who doesn't usually have the facility to age in oak barrels which allow long term very slow oxidation which benefits the wine. Because we store in glass, ageing takes longer so the advantage of cork over synthetic would appear to be the ability to slowly oxidise in the bottle (especially for me as I tend to age in bottles longer than I do in 'bulk', prefering to free up demi johns/ carboys for fermenting, clearing etc...)

[LeeH]

I soak my cheapy corks in starsan for an hour. Never had any problems with them yet

[rval]

Wine is fine in crown closed beer bottles but dont put beer in wine bottles obviously!
I used to use normal cork, then had a backlog of bottles with screwcaps I used.....
With corks if they blow out you get a mess.
With bottles if the screwcaps cant blow the bottles blow up and make a bigger mess.
Swings and roundabouts really.
So...because I consider myself a purist i prefer real corks.
In my experience synthetic corks are great for bought wine and still cider but difficult for homebrewing.
Dont forget that the neck of a screwcap bottle is a lot thinner than a cork bottle so it is quite risky (but possible) to put a cork in an old screwcap bottle.

I worked for years wine making for a large producer in Alsace France. We always crown capped in house and only used cork when getting ready to ship.
We removed the crown caps much in the same way as they do with the fizzy stuff, however that would not be needed for home made wine.

The main reason for using crown caps was that they worked so well at keeping everything fresh and the cost is so small.