A dilution/sampling apparatus to continuum process monitoring

This paper reports an automatic apparatus to sample and to dilute samples of must/wine coming from a fermentor utilised in winemaking, to describe the evolution of composition of must/wine during alcoholic fermentation. This new analytical apparatus would allow to individuate rapidly when a reduction of rate or a stuck of fermentation could take place. After an accurate description of the apparatus used, preliminary results connected to its calibration are also reported and discussed. As the evolutions of experimental data collected using this new apparatus do not differ significantly from those obtained by traditional way, the suitability of this new analytical system was tested.