In message >
Mark Lipton > wrote:

> On 1/25/17 5:34 PM, graham wrote:

>> Many thanks! Mine is also a passive, uninsulated, concrete basement. The
>> storage area usually maintains a fairly stable temperature in the 14-15C
>> range (57-59F) in the winter and 16-17C (61-63F) in the summer. Several
>> knowledgeable wine buffs have been telling me to drink up my 2004
>> clarets, but they are still not ready, and they are a mix of 1st to 5th
>> Growths. I don't buy privately but occasionally there are obvious
>> joblots of wines that the agents can't shift, being sold at bargain prices.

> My cellar is also passively cooled, below grade and insulated. Living
> in a region that experiences enormous temperature swings (lows of
> -10°F/-23°C, highs of 100°F/38°C), I was concerned about temperature
> stability in the cellar, but an excursion thermometer shows that in the
> coldest winter the lowest cellar temperature is 45°F/7°C and in the
> hottest summer the cellar will reach 63°F/17°C, which is within my range
> of comfort, metaphorically speaking.

> Dale and I some years ago participated in a trial where we stored
> several wines in temperature unregulated locations (in my case, a closet
> on the top floor of our house) for several years and compared them to
> bottles of the same wine stored in our cellars. The results were
> interesting in that the effect was less pronounced than I think anyone
> had anticipated, but the cellar-stored wines were marginally fresher and
> fruitier.

> In examining bottles stored long-term in our cellar, I've found them to
> be in good shape and comparable in most ways to bottles of the same wine
> stored in "temperature-controlled" conditions, though mine often show a
> bit more mature than wines stored at a constant 55°F/13°C. Since I'm
> not getting any younger, this "problem" bothers me less and less

> Mark Lipton

I agree that temperature variation per se does not seem to make to
very much difference. Much of my wine is kept in a brick outbuilding
with some insulation and the better wines either kept in their orginal
wooden boxes stacked together with an insulation jacket round the
stack or in clay land drains stacked on top of each other against an
inside wall. In the latter, with a bottle in it, temperatures range
between over the seasons between about 42F and 67F - so slightly wider
than Mark's range. However comparing maturity of some of the same
wines inherited from my father, who had kept them at a constant wine
fridge temperature, although mine are a little more advanced. Like
Mark I too am getting to a stage where I mind that less than I might
once have done. I think the key may well be that any change in
temperature is very gradual over the year so that it has less effect
than, say, keeping a wine in a room which regularly flutuates in
temperature between day and night. (I have noticed that even lesser
wines brought up to drinking temperature naturally are better than
those which, on occasion, I have immersed in a bath of tepid water
when I have had to deal with an emergency need for a bottle. I don't
know if there is any scientific supprt for that or if it is just me
fearing I have offended the bottle and expecting a difference.)


Tim Hartley