When were glass corks first used?

The reason I ask is that I'm currently sipping a pretty decent, mature Rheingau Riesling from 1989 that has a glass cork. I thought they were more recent than that?

Interesting. Didn't buy this from Hardy Rodenstock did ya?

As you suspected, the interwebs seem to indicate that this is a much more recent development. From the SF Chron:

The small glass closure came about in late 2001 and early 2002 when Dr. Karl Matheis, a German physician, noticed a similar stopper on a bottle that needed to stay sterile for medical operations. Why not use it for wine as well?

Twenty patents later, he sold his idea to Alcoa, which ran trials for a couple of years before mass-producing the Vino-Lok in late 2004.

Any chance they did an estate reclosure?

[David M. Bueker]

First time I saw one was a 2002.

The current class stoppers are called a VinoLok. Their WebSite doesn't say xactly when they were invented.
Glass stopper w/ a Teflon collor. I recall first encountering them in the early '00's. So a wine stoppered is an '89 kinda
surprises. Does it look exactly the current VinoLoks??
Tom

It looks like VinoLok to me. I just noticed the AP number: it ends in 08. Doesn't that indicate the bottling year? Why would it have been bottled that late?

It looks like VinoLok to me. I just noticed the AP number: it ends in 08. Doesn't that indicate the bottling year? Why would it have been bottled that late?

Then that makes sense, Otto. The 08 in the A.P.Nr indicates which lot and the yr the wine was submitted to the authoriities.
So '08 was well after VinoLok was introduced. Why the wine was held onto for that long before bottling, I haven't a clue.
Tom

[David M. Bueker]

Who is the producer? A few old guard Rheingau estates have large stocks of older wines they could not give away back in the '90s. The 08 on the AP is the year the wine was submitted for evaluation. It could have been held in tank/cask that long, but I doubt it. Probably a new stopper once they finally decided to release it.

Barth Riesling Spätlese 1989 is what it was.

[Jenise]

While we're on this topic, how many producers are still using glass? I see it very very rarely so am convinced it didn't catch on, though I don't know that for a fact. Were German producers particularly receptive? A reisling we opened last week had one.

[Robin Garr]

All these replies, and no one yet has snarked about "glass cork"? You guys are slowing down!

bump

Question for David (Les, Peter, or any other “Riesling and Rocks” wine Geeks). If the whole idea behind the German AP numbering system is so that consumer could” identify” and find a particular wine, I would think that the testing and evaluation of a given “batch” would be done when a wine is still in “bulk” or just recently bottled (it doesn’t necessarily have to be released) -No? David correct be if I’m wrong, I can’t see a producer taking a “batch” of wine from bulk, bottling it, and placing it in their library and than 19 years later submitting several of those bottles for testing and evaluation. No way could this be a “fair” way of identifying (or evaluating) the “original” batch. (Unless of course the producer goes from bottles back to “bulk” before submitting a sample for testing and evaluation).

Salute

Jenise, I like them. But the original design requires proprietary bottles to go with the proprietary closures. A new design of vino-lok does not. However, it requires proprietary automatic equipment to use on a normal bottling line, modifying the corker, and a special magazine, or else it can only be installed by hand. While it really is a great closure, there are just too many proprietary steps. And they cannot be sterilized with hot water or steam, simply chemically. A different elastomeric seal that could withstand sterilizing temperatures, or a company which would sell them already sterile, would eliminate a host of potential problems.

Qualitätswein and Prädikatswein must pass a sensory test accompanied by a laboratory analysis and receive an AP number before it is sold to consumers, be it in bulk or bottle. The system is not intended to help consumers identify a bottle of wine, but to help the authorities (Wine Control) to enforce and prosecute fraud.

As to why this had a 2008 AP Nr, one can only guess. One explanation might be that it was put aside in unlabeled shiners in some corner of the estate for years and forgotten (it happens). Likelier still would be a rebottling to vino-lok bottles (maybe to get rid of said bottles and stoppers!) with a fresh SO2 addition, which would require a new AP number.

Vino-Lok is essentially dead (Excepting for folks who invested in expensive bottling-machine equipment.)

Cheers,
Bill

[Robin Garr]

bump

Please don't do that, Bob.

If you want to add something substantive to a post, fine. but don't just "bump." It doesn't advance the discussion and suggests that you have nothing to add.

OK, its not a question that I have nothing to add! I am trying to get some answers before the thread goes to page 2. That will advance the conversation I think.

[David M. Bueker]

Ok bumping this a little with some additional info to Victor - there are estates that hold back wines for later release. There have often been Prum wines from a given year with AP numbers much later than others from that same vintage. I have 3 different AP number 1997 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spatlese - all with the last 2 digits from different years. Two are only one year apart, but the other is a few years removed.

It's not a question of being fair about the original batch, as the different batches have different AP numbers.

I received a reply from Barth:

That bottle is one of just a few bottles we rebottled and closed with a glass stopper instead of just recorking it.

You are right that the glass stopper is a newer invention. We started using it for most of our wines from 2003-2011.

Since the availability and the price are a problem with this closure we switched to screw cap with the vintage 2012. But our premium sweet wines in small bottles still have the glass closure.

Thank you Bill and David.

Do the unlabeled shiners have to be tested and evaluated before laying them down? Does just re-corking require a new AP number?

Salute

Thank you Bill and David.

Do the unlabeled shiners have to be tested and evaluated before laying them down? Does just re-corking require a new AP number?

Salute

Here is how it works:

Sample bottles are sent to a wine-lab shortly before bottling but after SO2 dosing and filtration. There are several wine-labs in each region. They are privately owned, but legally responsible for the work they do. For each bottle submitted, the winery fills out a form declaring:
Where the wine came from (region, village, or vineyard depending upon which information will appear on the label)
Quality level (Qualitätswein or which Prädikat, Kabinett, Spätlese, etc.)
Residual-sugar level (Trocken, Halbtrocken, etc.)
Other info such as if it is estate-bottled, the winery address, the desired AP Nr, the volume produced…
The lab does an analysis of sugar, alcohol, extract, SO2, and other parameters and signs off on them.

The winery submits the bottles (2 of each wine) with their analytical data to the regional wine agency (there is one for each of the 13 Weinbaugebiete) and it receives an Agency Testing Number based on the info submitted and the score it receives from judges working with the Amt. If the wine scores particularly well, it can win a medal (Gold, Silver or Bronze) and one can use this to advertise with customers. Many high quality producers actually score pretty badly which is a source of pride as the highest scores are normally given to supermarket-style wines which are usually extremely formulaic.

The Amt sends the producer back one bottle of each wine sealed under plastic which the producer must keep until the wine is sold-out (no longer in circulation) so that it can be tested against the original data should a claim of fraud ever arise.

But to your question, there would be no need to submit the shiners unless they were offered for sale, and no reason to resubmit any wine unless the analytical data were compromised. So, it is very probable that these wines that Otto drank were re-dosed with SO2 before being bottled under Vino-Lok. This practice is standard for re-corked wine, but not often discussed.

Cheers,
Bill

Thanks again Bill!

Salute