Bouchard and Fevre (both owned by the same company) have completely switched over to Diam corks. They phased it in over a few years, starting with their lower end wines…based on the feedback/results they completely switched. I’m assuming that if extracting the Diam corks were a significant issue, they would have gone a different direction. Perhaps with Ponsot’s closure. Hey Stewart…you should look into those!
I’m strongly leaning towards using Diam corks as well. If you’d like, I’ll bring a Fevre Chablis (with Diam cork) to the next Marin tasting and we can test the extraction issues.
Im seriously thinking of using Diam now based on these posts. Of course its not something I have to deal with for 12+ months but that doesn’t stop me from obsessing about it now.
I love me some homework wine!
We dont have any trouble extracting them but when there young they do not like to go back in the bottle. The corks on our 2011’s have finally been in bottle long enough that they can be flipped and reinserted just like regular corks.
I just bottled a second vintage of our whites (SB,SEM, Vin Gris) with the Diams. The minimum order was such that it was 2 years worth of white production for us. For my '13 whites I now need to decide whether I plan to continue to use them or not. We have seen some seepage up the cork which I attribute to the 45* edges they have. The seepage has only been about halfway up the cork on the worst ones and seems to stop where the bottle is narrowest for the top 2cm or so.
Other than the seepage, which I have not found with regular natural cork on our past whites from the library, we have been very happy with them. Not a off bottle yet, very consistent flavors and developments from bottle to bottle even on the delicate whole cluster pressed vin gris. No negative customer or restaurant feed back. My mind is not made up yet weather I will continue to use them or not. I plan to email DIAM directly and see what there comments are regarding the seepage.
We are using the DIAM 5 as they stated it was the closest to the density of regular corks. They also noted that the 10 drops oxygen transmission to virtually zero.
I have some qualms about going with the 10s for this reason. I don’t think I’m looking for screwcap-like closure. I just want clean and consistent cork-like performance. On the other hand, I was told by the CA distributor that the 10 is designed to retain its structural integrity longer than the 5s – presumably 10+ years. I can’t really stomach the idea that the cork might fail before the wine does, so I’m leery of the 5s. If you check the DIAM site, it looks like the corks designed for shorter aging can be ordered at varying levels of permeability – so you can get a 5 year cork at either low or medium permeability. I wish that a similar option existed for the 10s.
I use DIAM exclusively and have never had a client (private, restaurant or retailer) complain or even comment really. I am very happy with them. Many more Burgundy domaines are moving to them, especially with premox as an issue, Simon Bize for all their whites as of last year and De Montille as well, both red and white.
They emailed me back about the “wicking” and stated they updated the coatings in Jan 2013 to prevent it.
I know they recommend that the number correlates to aging in years. However when they first came out there was only one type, similar to the now 3 I think, and I have seen what it looks like after about 7 years and it looked like it could go 7 more. I think its a recommendation they make as a CYA kind of thing not a hard and fast rule. If i decide to reorder I will ask as I did in the past what is closest in density and permeability of the real thing.
A review in the most recent issue of Burghound stated that a wine was severely reduced and went on to note that it was bottled under DIAM. That caught my eye, and I emailed to ask if that was a trend he had noticed. I got this response from Allen Meadows (via his wife) today
“The Diam cork provides such a tight seal that I do notice more reductive characters under this cork than I do with natural cork. Now whether this tendency can be remedied with using a different (read lower) free SO2 level I am not sure but it could be that producers are using the same level as with natural corks. There is also often a noticeable difference between the Diam 5 and 10 corks where the latter is more prone to have higher reduction levels.”
I’ve used DIAM as well as Rich Xiberta Micro-Agglom and have had no complaints with either (other than getting them back into the bottle!). I’ve used these on mostly white or more early-drinking reds but I’ve found them to be a reliable (no TCA) and effective closure. Is it a more reductive closure than cork? Maybe, but a bid less oxygen ingress makes up a whole lot for a LOT more TCA issues. Corked bottles drive me crazy so “cleaned” micro-aggloms or Oxygen-permeable membrane screw caps (Vinperfect is an example) are of interest to me.
I drink a ton of Edmunds St. John red wines that have been bottled with DIAM. No issues with reduction or anything else to date. Only goes back to the 2009s, but I bought so much that I will be following the wines for a long time.
I saw the comments in the last issue as well. Thanks for following up with Mrs. Bughound for the additional info. I bottled 5 wines over 2 vintages ('11 Vin Gris, '11/'12 SB, '11/'12 Semillon) under DIAM. The minimum order as enough to those wines and have a bag left over. This years bottling of the '13’s I am going back to regular cork from a new supplier for the SB and Semillon. My winemaking is fairly reductive and 3 of the 5 wines did show a little reductive early on. We just let them age in the bottle and they all recovered with not ill effects.
Im not off them for good and will re-evaluate down the road. However between the seepage up the cork (which they claim to have to have fixed with a new coating) and the reduction delaying release as well as the minimum order being enough for 2-3 vintages of my white production were not using them this year.
I’ve been using DIAM for about 5 vintages. I started with just the short life-span wines but now do everythign except my top ageworthy reds.
I’ve never had any problems with seepage or TCA. Very occasionally (<0.25%) a bottle comes out that tastes a little dirty, tannic and closed but I put that down to the bottle, not the closure.
I’ve worked with DIAM 3 and DIAM 5. They now offer a range of porosity for those seeking faster oxidation.
I would suggest that this reduction issue is best solved by fixing the reduction prior to bottling and certainly not dosing up the SO2 to a reduced wine and expecting the porosity of the cork to fix it. If the cork is that porous, the unreduced period is just a short stop on the way to oxidation. Better to speak to an oenologist that a wine writer for advice on wine making procedures IMO.
The only issue I have with DIAM is that the wine takes more time to come alive after opening the bottle compared to the ones I seal with natural cork.
Next January I am thinking about a trial with DIAM. Maybe bottling half of a wine with it and half with out it and see what folks think. My biggest issue they can be hard to get out of the bottle, but it is worth a trial.
I have not heard anything about removing the corks and I did not experience that. Just like regular corks if they were just bottles it may be a bit tougher. They are harder to get back in the bottle after you take them out though.
We did not have any comments positive or negative from the trade or consumers. We did just to them on whites and one of the reasons was a vintage with above average corkage on whites we were doing BTG. We just were not getting the same percentage of bottles returned we were getting in the tasting room and could not stand to know how many glasses were served that were compromised.
