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WINEMAKING a P&L inclined conveyor, which leads to the Armbruster Rotovib destemmer (no crusher). From there, the destemmed fruit drops directly into the tanks. About half the red grapes aren't destemmed; the whole clusters go from the conveyor directly into tanks. Chardonnay is fed from the conveyor into a Willmes Sigma 4 press, and then moved by gravity into 60-gallon barrels for fermentation. The fermentation room has 120 custom-built 1-ton stainless tanks by Ideaz Services and Product Lines Unlimited as well as 10 1-ton Tonnellerie Rousseau oak tanks. The Rhys philosophy is to make site-driven wines, so it was important to have a lot of small tanks. In principle, Brinkman says, each tank handles one block from the vineyard. The stainless tanks are arranged in sixtank "pods" with hot and cold glycol systems and a catwalk connecting the tanks. After a five- to seven-day cold soak, the tank temperature is turned up to about 75º to start the red fermentations. (The oak tanks are moved outside to warm them up.) No cultured yeasts are used. All Pinot Noir punch downs are done by foot The crush pad at Rhys Vineyards (left) is inside the cave. The 1-ton stainless fermentors (center) are arranged in 'pods.' One of the presses (right) is a 2.25-ton basket press. beauty and WESTERN SQUARE I N D U S T R I E brawn S 1621 North Broadway • Stockton, CA 95205 Toll-Free: 800.367.8383 WesternSquare.com You can find Western Square on and Lean, Green and Made in America wine S & vine S M AY 20 13 49