Hi,

New to the list but have been reading it for a couple of days. We have a
Riesling from a kit ready to bottle and 5 gallons of blackberry wine from
fruit in the carboy which will need to be bottled after the first of the
year. I am in need of a corker and other bottling stuff, I think I am going
to order an Italian floor corker since I can get an attachment to bottle
beer at some future date. Where is the best place to order from? Is it due
to service or cost?

Other items I want to get a a siphon, a bottling tree, and a way to
sanitize the bottles such as a Vinator <sp> so any recommendations there are
appreciated as well.

Thanks in advance.

Dan

I have the Italian but modified it for sparklers; I don't use it often,
I use the Portuguese. The plastic jaws on it are easier on corks, the
brass jaws can score the corks. I have used Musca.com in Ottawa for
corkers but won't get corks there.

I use a spray bottlefor sanitizing, it's easier.

Joe

> Hi,
>
> New to the list but have been reading it for a couple of days. We have a
> Riesling from a kit ready to bottle and 5 gallons of blackberry wine from
> fruit in the carboy which will need to be bottled after the first of the
> year. I am in need of a corker and other bottling stuff, I think I am going
> to order an Italian floor corker since I can get an attachment to bottle
> beer at some future date. Where is the best place to order from? Is it due
> to service or cost?
>
> Other items I want to get a a siphon, a bottling tree, and a way to
> sanitize the bottles such as a Vinator <sp> so any recommendations there are
> appreciated as well.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> Dan

Well, Danny, I'm kinda new also, but purchase a lot of stuff online.
Here was my approach. Google has a FROOGLE option to search retail
stores - I found 3 good places searching for floor corkers (since I look
at postage as part of attractiveness, and a floor corker is just a
little lead weight. smile. so I looked at price plus shipping for 4
sites and choose the cheapest total price.) Then I found that eBay has a
wine making section, so i look there at times for bottles, and widgets
i'm looking to purchase.
In my opinion (my ebay score is over 400)there is no ONE site, as it
depends on specials, sales and shipping charges (some charge a LOT for
light items, and some charge little for heavy items (building business,
I guess).
With that all said: Here is where I purchased recently:
http://www.homebrewheaven.com/
http://www.homebrewers.com/
http://www.grapestompers.com/

I like the first two since they have lots of information, not just a
catalog.
I bought my floor corker at : http://www.northernbrewer.com/
(portuguese type, not italian).

But this is from someone working on their 2nd wine kit, and just
starting a 1 gallon "fig" wine next week.. so i'm a newbie. This
newsgroup has provided me much good reading and advice. thanks to all!
DAve

Danny wrote:
> Hi,
>
> New to the list but have been reading it for a couple of days. We have a
> Riesling from a kit ready to bottle and 5 gallons of blackberry wine from
> fruit in the carboy which will need to be bottled after the first of the
> year. I am in need of a corker and other bottling stuff, I think I am going
> to order an Italian floor corker since I can get an attachment to bottle
> beer at some future date. Where is the best place to order from? Is it due
> to service or cost?
>
> Other items I want to get a a siphon, a bottling tree, and a way to
> sanitize the bottles such as a Vinator <sp> so any recommendations there are
> appreciated as well.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> Dan
>
>

In looking around, it appears that many of the homebrew companies buy
equipment and chemicals from the same original sources (frequently with
just a slight difference in price), so that convenience and service
have been my guides to choosing where I buy items from.

My personal favorite is Beer, Beer and More Beer, as when I started in
this they were the most helpful and best supplied local homebrew store
to me (SF Bay Area). I've moved, and the local stores are OK and I use
them for emergency (what do you mean I ran out of Campden?) trips, but
if I plan ahead I mail-order/web-order from B3. Their new wine-only
site is morewinemaking.com, but their main site is morebeer.com

Rob

The grape and granary is pretty good, esp if you place a large order.

thegrape.net

I don't have any problems with the merchants listed in the preceding posts,
but I do like the quality of product from stpats (www.stpats.com). When I
bought a floor corker, I preferred their brass- jawed model and shipping
over other sites. I also recently bought a crusher/destemmer from them and
was pleased.

"Danny" > wrote in message
news:sp7Te.10077$tB5.8550@okepread06...
> Hi,
>
> New to the list but have been reading it for a couple of days. We have a
> Riesling from a kit ready to bottle and 5 gallons of blackberry wine from
> fruit in the carboy which will need to be bottled after the first of the
> year. I am in need of a corker and other bottling stuff, I think I am
> going to order an Italian floor corker since I can get an attachment to
> bottle beer at some future date. Where is the best place to order from?
> Is it due to service or cost?
>
> Other items I want to get a a siphon, a bottling tree, and a way to
> sanitize the bottles such as a Vinator <sp> so any recommendations there
> are appreciated as well.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> Dan
>

ebay has alot of winemaking kits and stuff. some of the items are half
of my local wine store . lucas

Another option is CraigsList (http://www.craigslist.org/). If you're
not familiar with it, it basically a free-to-sell online classifieds
site that is gaining popularity in most major cities. The site is
location-specific, so you might be able to find equipment in and around
the city you live in and avoid those high shipping costs associated w/
the larger pieces of wine equipment.

On the commercial side, here are my 3 current favorites:

St Pats - www.stpats.com - (pro) best prices on most items, great
service, speedy shipping, spare parts, short lead-time, shipping
confirmation emails sent, pre-order specials, good user manual archive
- (con) not a lot of beginner equipment, no frills website, shipping
prices not given ahead of time (though usually cheap if you live in the
SW or W)

More Beer - www.morebeer.com - (pro) decent prices, free shipping on
non-freight items, searchable website, beginner equipment, pre-order
specials, instruction manuals - (con) longer lead times (~1 week), no
shipping confirmation emails sent

Valley Vintner - http://valleyvintner.com - (pro) unique items (like
fermentor shower cap), wine testing service, sends instructions for
non-intuitive products

Happy Spending, -David

Gotta put in a plug for our local shop in Woodland Hills, California:
http://www.homebeerwinecheese.com/

John has a really good selection of stuff, right down to the very arcane.

Tom S

That's a nice site; the info is great and those French barrels are
pretty reasonable...

Joe

That's a nice site; the info is great and those French barrels are
pretty reasonable...

Joe