Zork closure

...or driving an Austin Chummy to work.

Graeme,
Okay, I'll be the one to ask; what exactly is an "Austin Chummy"?

From memory it was an especially compact body given to one of the forms of Austin 7, England's shrunken version of the T-Ford in the late 20s. A very basic mode of transport indeed, that was something of a challenge for a 6-footer even to fit inside!
cheers,
Graeme

They're just not reliably good enough at delivering the wine in the condition it ought to be in. What about TCA? What about oxidation? Do these bother you?

Not exactly.

Uh huh.....

...and he asked the waitperson to open a 1988 Borduex Gran Cru he brought in from home. As she did this the cork split, but pulled out anyway. The concern at that point was the wine must be tainted....

Mmmmmm......

A screw cap would never have done the job aesthtetically and my friend would concur the aging process would have been fatally flawed.

Would have been....? On the basis of ... what?

But I know the truth and the truth is corked wine does the job and marvelously well....some 17 years later.

However, I relish the ritual of uncorking a beautifully hand crafted bottle of wine almost more than I enjoy drinking it.

Yeah, I kinda thought that.
Signing off. This is like banging your head against a vicious circle...
cheers,
Graeme

Once again it would appear that when you don't agree with someone you either put them down or ignore them or both.

Nice.

I wish you well, my friend.



Peace.

Absolutely right, Graeme. There are a number of devoted collectors, including one in my town. Check out http://www.vintagebearings.co.uk/austin7.htm

Two lovely examples were on display at our annual auto show a month ago.

Regards, Bob

Maybe it's time we just move along from this topic? There is no discussion here anymore from what I can see. There are opinions, peoples positions are known, there is occasional smattering of fact, there are questions asked but many unanswered. The wall has been hit from both sides.

As Bucko might say, "Move along folks, there is nothing to see here".

Maybe it's time we just move along from this topic? There is no discussion here anymore from what I can see. There are opinions, peoples positions are known, there is occasional smattering of fact, there are questions asked but many unanswered. The wall has been hit from both sides.

As Bucko might say, "Move along folks, there is nothing to see here".

I concur.

Nice post, Bill.

Oliver,

Since you are involved in the wine making business, I have a question for you: What do you believe is the National average for product loss?


Just curious and thank you in advance.

Somewhere between 5% and 10%, if you count 'not tasting as good as it should' as the standard (ie not just TCA but also random oxidation).

Tim, as far as I am concerned the idea that the cork is as important (or even more important) as the wine makes no sense whatsoever. That's like saying the nice wrapping paper cheese comes in is as important as the cheese itself. I will miss the 'fetish' of the cork, but I am here for the taste of the wine, not the packaging.

In that context, it's only sheepish behavior by consumers (hiding behind tradition is just being someone's fool) that has kept the cork manufacturers in business.

1% sucks.

This is wrong, IMO. The average consumer doesn't know what the word 'corked' means, they just know the wine tastes off. They don't know that the closure is the problem, therefore (not unreasonably) they blame the producer. This is a very odd product defect in that it is not understood by the people who experience it.

I was talking to an acquaintance once, and asked her how her recent party had gone. She said 'Fine, but we should have got the wine from you. We bought this Chardonnay from (famous CA winery) and it tasted horrible.' I asked her if it tasted sort of moldy, and she said yes; she had absolutely no idea that it wasn't the winery's fault, but the cork-producer's. Except that in the last analysis it IS the winery's fault; they have an alternative, they aren't using it.

This is why producers are worried about acceptance: they know there's a problem, but they know the consumer doesn't know, and won't understand the switch. Hell, I once asked a group of 20 waiters at a fancy restaurant what the word 'corked' meant, and ONE of them knew. If the trade doesn't know, what hope is there?

Oliver,

Since you are involved in the wine making business, I have a question for you: What do you believe is the National average for product loss?


Just curious and thank you in advance.

Somewhere between 5% and 10%, if you count 'not tasting as good as it should' as the standard (ie not just TCA but also random oxidation).

Tim, as far as I am concerned the idea that the cork is as important (or even more important) as the wine makes no sense whatsoever. That's like saying the nice wrapping paper cheese comes in is as important as the cheese itself. I will miss the 'fetish' of the cork, but I am here for the taste of the wine, not the packaging.

%^)

Hello Oliver !

IF the Zork closure held up to long/longer term storage, would that closure fit the old saying of "having your cake and eating it, too" ? It would take care of Tim's "romance" with cork ... is the problem that the Zork closure is STILL made out of cork ? Would it perhaps give the industry the same problem with TCA as a regular cork closure ?

Clink !

%^)

Bill,

It seems to me that using a given closure because it 'pops' when open, as a cork does, is a cargo cult, not a solution to the problem. If it's the best solution, great, if not, let's find out what is.

I will very much miss corks; I remember the first great wine I drank, a half-bottle of '64 Latour in the first wineshop I worked in, back in '78 or so, the anticipation of cutting the capsule, the sound...but it's ruining the damn wines, so let's focus on that.

In that context, it's only sheepish behavior by consumers (hiding behind tradition is just being someone's fool) that has kept the cork manufacturers in business.

1% sucks.

A big part of the problem is that the consumer very often doesn't discover the problem until years after the date of purchase. How many of us keep receipts on file in case a bottle ends up corked? And in the case of the last corked bottle from my cellar, the retailer I bought it from isn't in business anymore, so I couldn't return it even if I wanted to.

Also, wine has histirically been a notoriously unreliable product. The restaurant wine-serving ritual dates back to the bad old days when the rate of bad bottles was very high. The ritual insures that only the host of the party gets offended by a bad bottle.

These days, truly bad bottles (due to improper vinification) are extremely rare, but the TCA problem persists, and IMO is unacceptable, given that there are alternative closures.

-Paul W.

Well, I will have to disagree with you here, Paul.

Firstly, there are no 100% flawless products to be found on this or any other planet and 1% is phenomal given the inherent falablity of man made products.

Additionally, it would be a 1% failure rate if the tire company only makes 100 tires a year....I'm guessing the likelihood of that frequent an occurance of failure is somewaht exaggerated. A "1 out of 100 tires" would be more like 20-30% failure rate for an average tire company. Not the same.

Secondly, a tire is not a consumable item, it is a car part....we don't eat them Besides, something as serious as bodily injury or death has not, at least to my knowledge, ever occured with TCA, but I get your point: It would not be a good thing.

Again, there are no 100% guarantees on anything we buy.

Most volume manufacturing industries speak of achieving "six-sigma" defect rates these days. That means fewer than one defective part in one million. Three-sigma, routinely achieved level of quality in manufacturing, is a 0.3% defect rate.

I don't understand your comment concerning the failure rate for a tire company. One out of every 100 made works out to a 1% failure rate, no matter how many tires are made. A 1% defect rate means one could expect 10 defective tires out of each lot of 1000 made, or 100 defective tires out of each 10,000 made, etc.

And tires are consumable items. They wear out and have to be replaced.

I dont' recall what the failure rate was on the Firestone SUV tires involved in that big recall some years back, but I think it was several orders of magnitude better than 1%.

Yes, TCA never killed anyone, but fine wine is one of the few consumer products I can think of where defect rates this high are tolerated. My own profession, software, has an even worse track record, of course. Not only do we have a worse defect rate than even wine closures, but we have the gall to make the consumer pay for fixing the defects. What a racket.

-Paul W.

Paul,

Actually the first definition of "consume" is to eat or drink, but I get your point.

Just so you know, my point about the tires was that a 1 in 100 failure rate occurs with much greater frequency than a 100 in 10,000 failure rate.

One's a near sure thing the other is a long shot.

Make sense?


To All,

It would be wonderfully nice if wine was kept in an eclosure which keeps it fresh, but the rommance would be gone if the cork is gone and the wine becomes just another adult beverage.

I think wine deserves more respect than that and I will forever stand for the ritual/aesthetics of wine. Now if you in some way equate this statement with 'I'm making wine equal to or less important than the cork' you would only be fooling yourself. It is not and I am not even suggesting that.

How about we talk about something else? I'm not going to convince you and you aren't going to convince me.


Let's move on, OK?



Peace.

Just so you know, my point about the tires was that a 1 in 100 failure rate occurs with much greater frequency that a 100 in 10,000 failure rate.

One's a near sure thing the other is a long shot.

Make sense?

??? I left this discussion long ago and to a degree think the cork problem can be fixed but moved on as to not fan the fire. The above statement is not related to cork and to me does not make sense. What is the difference between 1 in 100 and 100 in 10,000? Am I missing a zero somewhere? Did I have too much to drink over the holiday? As a point of interest we had a huge wine geek weekend where most know a lot about wine and open the best of their cellars. Opened about 50 wines and had one corked wine, about 2% and even though I am not TCA sensitive many of the others are. The bottle in question was really bad, one even I could recognize almost from across the table.
Walt

Walt,

Just scroll back a bit and you will see where this originated.


Peace.


TimMc

Just so you know, my point about the tires was that a 1 in 100 failure rate occurs with much greater frequency than a 100 in 10,000 failure rate.

One's a near sure thing the other is a long shot.

Make sense?

No, I'm sorry, it doesn't make sense. If you have a failure rate of 1%, you can expect that, on average, every sample of 100 items will contain one with a defect. Sometimes you'll get no defective ones, sometimes you may get 2 or even 3, but on average you'll get 1. Similarly, that same defect rate means that if your sample size is 10,000, you'll on average see 100 defective items.


Frankly, I don't see anything either charming or romantic about cork closures for wine bottles. At best they're hard to remove. At worst, they ruin the beverage that they're supposed to protect. Now that we've got better alternatives, I say let's start using them.

-Paul W.

OK, Paul....whatever works for you.


I'm moving on.

However, I relish the ritual of uncorking a beautifully hand crafted bottle of wine almost more than I enjoy drinking it. Call me old fashioned, call me an idiot. I do not care

I think wine deserves more respect than that and I will forever stand for the ritual/aesthetics of wine. Now if you in some way equate this statement with 'I'm making wine equal to or less important than the cork' you would only be fooling yourself. It is not and I am not even suggesting that.

Short memory there, Tim.
Graeme

I said "almost" Graeme, you know...as in not equal to or not quite the same value...lower than, less than, not comaparable to, um...see the distinction? They are not the same thing in value or stature.


I don't have a short memory, Graeme, but I honestly think you just might be reaching for something that simply is not there.


Time to move on, my friend.



Peace.

I remember the first great wine I drank, a half-bottle of '64 Latour in the first wineshop I worked in, back in '78 or so, the anticipation of cutting the capsule, the sound..

And those capsules were soft heavy pliable lead, easy to neatly cut with the blade of a waiters-friend. Now capsules are plastic or some alloy thats difficult to make a clean quick cut in.

The packaging has moved on -- the wine inside is the important thing

[David M. Bueker]

OK, Paul....whatever works for you.


I'm moving on.

Tim,

Since you clearly do not understand math, why act as though Paul does not. 1 in 100 and 100 in 10,000 are both 1%. There is no difference in the likelihood/probablility.

1 in 100 and 100 in 10,000 are both 1%. There is no difference in the likelihood/probablility.

As an Engineer and math instructor I know my "cyphers" and "guzzintas" real good. I can say definitively that Paul and David speak the truth. In fact, further research shows that 1,000 in 100,000 and 10,000 in 1,000,000 also constitute a 1% probability. The sequence can be extended to infinity with no difference in likely outcome.

As much as I would like to think that your motives are as pure as you claim, Tim, I am beginning to have my doubts. Arguing against well proven mathematical principles is not going to lead to a fruitful discussion.

[James Roscoe]

Gentleme,
You are beating the proverbial dead horse here. Screw caps rule! I doubt Tim will ever get it, but the rest of us do. The question is whether zork closures offer an alternative to screw caps. Does anyone have an answer to that? It appears not. Let's move along to making fun of Joe P. in his masterful post.
Cheers!
James

OK, Paul....whatever works for you.


I'm moving on.

Tim,

Since you clearly do not understand math, why act as though Paul does not. 1 in 100 and 100 in 10,000 are both 1%. There is no difference in the likelihood/probablility.

Probability is fine....on paper.

It does not, however, translate to an exact occurance every 100 tires. It can't. Life doesn't work that way.


My point is and was that the smaller the number the better the odds of a mishap. The larger the number the higher the odds. In other words the more tires manufactured and sold decreases the chance that you or I would be affected adversely simply upon the basis of thousands more people are involved now. The defects are spread out over a much larger population and the odds are against you or I having a problem.

I don't have to tell you that the percentages we are talking about are averages and numbers which are formulated and crunched to give you a given probaility of failure. It does not mean that there are 99 good tires and the 100th is bad, 99 more and the 100th bad, etc. It just means that given the total number of failures against the total number of tires made gives you that particular percentage figure.

A better and more useful statistic is in pin pointing where the greatest frequency of failures occur and how they occur. Perhaps the bad tires are coming from a particular factory in say, Newark. Then you go figure out what the difficulty is and fix it. A figure of 1 in every 100 percentage doesn't mean it happens to evey 100th tire or that it is happening in every single tire factory. And it certainly doesn't mean we should all stop buying tires and leave our cars parked in the garage for fear of a blow-out.


I understand statistics and percentages and I know how to properly utilize them...it is part of my job, you see.

[David M. Bueker]

I understand staistics and percentages and I know how to properly utilize them...it is part of my job, you see.

Amazingly enough it has been part of my job for 16 years. What you are doing is classic statistics marketing. I'm done here.