What Is a Wine Thief?

A wine thief is a tube shaped tool that you can dip into your carboy, primary fermenter, or barrel and extract a small amount of your developing wine carboy.

Wine Thief Styles

There are typically 2 styles for the home winemaker.

• The first style is a small glass tube approximately 12 inches long. This is a nice size for 1 gallon containers and to take a tasting sample. Due to its low volume capacity, it will require several dips if you are trying to fill a test jar with it.
• The second style is typically 24 inches in length and made of food grade plastic. It has an opening on the top for easy testing access, and a valve at the bottom that stops the flow of wine as it is removed from the fermenter. The flow is restarted when the valve is depressed into a container.

Both styles are inexpensive ($6-$12 USD) and work well.

Test Your Wine, or have a Taste

Wine making requires a variety of tests to ensure that your finished product is exactly what you hoped for.

Each of the following test efforts will require a bit of your wine to be drawn from the batch:

·                Monitoring specific gravity readings during  fermentation

·                Testing Acid and pH levels

·                Checking sulphite concentrations

·                Tasting your wine

Pouring wine directly from a carboy or primary fermenter into a test jar can be messy and cumbersome. With a 6-gallon carboy, tilting to pour is nearly out of the question.

Having a wine thief and test jar available will make your testing easier and less time consuming.

Using Your Wine Thief

Using your wine thief is a very simple process:

Step 1: Clean and sanitize your wine thief. As always, it's very important to clean anything that will touch your wine

Step 2: Insert the wine thief into your wine container, allowing it to fill, and then carefully withdraw it.

Step 3: Dispense the sample into a test jar for your tests.

Step 4: If the wine is still good, return it to the batch.

Do Home Wine Makers Really Need One?

While optional, a wine thief significantly simplifies testing and tasting. It's included in our Deluxe Home Mead, Cider, or Wine Equipment Kit for a reason—it's invaluable for accurate hydrometer readings and sampling your wine.

It will serve you well in your testing efforts by making your job a whole lot easier, and most importantly allowing you a taste of your wine every now and again!

• Use a 3-Piece airlock for primary fermentation—it’s easy to clean and versatile.
• Use a Twin Bubble airlock for secondary fermentation and aging—it requires less maintenance and slows evaporation.

What Is an Auto Siphon or Easy Siphon?

An auto siphon, also known as an easy siphon, consists of two pieces:

• Racking cane:  to which standard plastic tubing can be attached.
• Wider sleeve:  into which the racking cane slides.

These components are made from clear, rigid plastic and can be cleaned and sanitized with common wine and beer making solutions.

Sizes of Auto Siphons 

Easy Siphons come in 3 sizes

• Mini: With a 3/8” or 5/16” diameter and 12 inches long, perfect for 1-gallon jugs.
• Regular: Also 3/8” or 5/16” in diameter but 24 inches long, ideal for reaching the bottom of a 6-gallon carboy for transferring and bottling.
• Large: With a 1/2” or 7/16” diameter and 25 inches long, this moves liquid 2.5 times faster than smaller models. Suitable for quick transfers but not recommended for bottling due to the speed and difficulty in controlling flow between bottles.

All sizes are relatively inexpensive, ranging from $10-$14 USD.

Using Your Auto Siphon

While auto-siphon works well for most transfers, it can clog with oak chips or thick hop trub. One solutions is to sanitize a fine mesh bag and place it around the tip of the auto siphon to filter out particulates.

Here’s how to use your Auto Siphon:

1. Setup Transfer: Position the carboy or pail containing the wine or beer on a higher surface.
2. Place Receiving Vessel: Arrange the sanitized vessel where you're transferring to about 3 feet lower.
3. Assembly: Place the inner racking cane inside the wider sleeve, allowing it to slide freely.
4. Connect Tubing: Attach the tubing to the inner racking cane.
5. Sanitize Inside: Siphon sanitizer through the device. Place the siphon tip in sanitizer, then pull up and push down on the cane to start the flow. Usually, one or two pumps are enough.
6. Sanitize Outside: Spray the outside with a sanitizer from a spray bottle.
7. Transfer: Insert the Auto Siphon into the vessel from which you are transferring, taking care not to disturb the sediment at the bottom.
8. Place Tubing in the Receiving Vessel: Arrange the tubing end so it will not fall out when you begin to pump.
9. Start Siphoning: Pump the Auto Siphon a few times until the wine or beer flows freely.                                                                                                                          
10.  Use a Siphon Clamp: For hands-free operation.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

Do Home Wine Makers Really Need One?

While optional, an auto siphon significantly simplifies transferring. It's included in our Deluxe Home Mead, Cider, or Wine Equipment Kit for a reason—it's invaluable for sanitary, mess-free transfers!

Without one you could:

• Suck on the free end of the tubing to get the liquid flowing, but this isn’t very sanitary. If you start a siphon this way, you risk contaminating the batch with microbes from your mouth.
• Gently lower the tubing into the beer in the upper container so that the tube fills with liquid as you submerge it. Then place your finger over the free end like a straw, put the free end in the lower container, and take your finger off. This is effective in a pinch but can be messy, and you run the risk of disturbing sediment on the bottom of the source vessel.