In addition to the daily drinkers < $50, what I predict will happen is that you also use the space for
(1) wines pulled from offsite you plan to drink reasonably soon
(2) mature wines bought at retail or auction that you plan to drink reasonably soon
(3) wine that arrived or you bought and haven’t taken into offsite storage yet
And that should be completely fine as well.
It would be fun learning for yourself and for us if you ran an experiment — put a couple bottles each of the same $50ish ageworthy red into each place, try them blind at age 3 and age 5. See if there is a difference and if so, which one is better. I’d love to hear the results.
I have read that higher long term temp, as well as aging the wine quicker, may accentuate some faults a wine (or bottle) might have.
Def agree with comments here to focus on not going over 75 , and relatively constant temp, and reasonable humidity (unless you like extracting crumbly corks).
Thats what I was thinking. A short cut to not use sheet rock or vaper barrier. Simply put up ridged insulations, cut a hole for a cooler, paint and job done! Very interesting.
When I first started buying “nicer” wines (which at the time were still fairly ordinary california red wines), I built a small storage rack that I put in the closet where I access the crawl space under my house. I figured that was the coolest space I had. Any bottle in there for 2-3 years was definitely more developed than it would have been stored at 55-60. They were drinkable, but not as good as they should have been. Shortly after that I rented my first locker in a commercially storage facility.
While I would not worry about 72, I’d be worried if it had already reached 72. I have a passive cellar (southern NY), and my warmest temps (about 70-72) are in Sept. It’s probably 66 now. NE corner, no direct sun, thck stone walls, insulated walls If you are using the ground as a heat sink the end of summer is the hottest period .
July is the hottest month here but I’m not sure about the ground temps. I irrigate the lawn 3 days a week and daily in September, does that help with the ground temps?
The issue isn’t the hottest month, it’s the length of time the average mean air temperature is well above the deep soil temp. Cellar (or basement or crawl space) creeps up gradually and cumulatively . July and Aug are hottest months here, but my cellar temps are higher in Sept than July,
I’d be shocked if irrigating lawn cooled a crawlspace.
Having AC in the house greatly depends on US vs Europe, probably other regions as well. The latter barely uses any ACs especially if it’s an older house.
Then again, no idea what countries are represented here. Probably heavily leaning towards US majority.
Did anyone mention Brett concerns? I think allowing temps to reach the low 70’s is fine, except that in my mind, anything above 60 is a concern with regard to allowing the potential for brett blooms.
My cellar is at 65 right now and will peak out around 70. I haven’t had any issues with Brett. I put the cellar in roughly 20 years ago and am fairly diverse in holdings. Either I don’t have wines at risk or these temps are not a concern.
Is this the type of insulation you’re referring to? What type of glue did you use to attach them? I’m thinking to build a cooler box with this and monitor the temps. If it works then I can use it to section off the entire NE corner.
Yep— Brett can slow down at lower temps, but to really avoid a bloom you need to be below 55F, and I recall hearing an interview that found certain Brett strains can thrive at much lower temps. Sigh. Same with oxidation— you need to be lower than 59F to start reducing oxidation potential (25% reduction for every 1F lower than 59F) according to Clark Smith for example. This is the main reason to shoot for 55F if possible. But keep in mind that cork quality and integrity have improved dramatically over the years (we get “guaranteed” low oxygen transfer rates from producers) and this is not as big a concern as it was 30 years ago.
At any rate, not sure there much difference between 60, 65, 70F (etc). That said, I haven’t looked at research for what might be considered “high” temp storage limits…
