70cl or 75cl?

[LGTrotter]

Being the kind of man who says one thing and does another I have not been rushing out to buy mountains of 83, I have been looking at some 1970 ports, the Graham in particular. I notice that they are advertised in two sizes, the more usual 75cl and 70cl.

I wonder what advice anyone could give me as a potential buyer. Is one known to be better? Is there some difference in the history of these two sizes? Is one more likely to have been stored in the UK (and therefore preferable) than the other?

Or are the sellers merely erring on the side of caution by saying 70cl? I fancy not, as I have seen 70cl port bottles which look smaller and have some madeira clearly marked as 70cl. The Graham I spied in 70cl has a new label and a clean bottle, which suggests Portuguese storage and (horror of horrors) recorking.

So what is the advice, 70cl or 75cl?

[jdaw1]

The larger size has the positive quality of being larger.

[AW77]

Perhaps you could try one of each before you decide which size to buy.

[PhilW]

Might 70cl just be a listing error?
Do you have an image, or link to an image, of a bottle of G70 (or indeed any other VP) available in 70cl rather than 75cl?

[DRT]

I think you will find that both are almost exactly equal to "a bottle". A high fill 70cl and a low fill 75cl could cause a dilemma of choice, but both would be "a bottle".

In Yorkshire parlance, stop whittling.

[jdaw1]

From the thread entitled Bottle sizes ≈¾ litre.

Bottle size

In common with the rest of wine merchants, the Society continues to use 70 cl content bottles for most of its own bottlings of fortified and table wines. The 1976 and 1975 clarets, bottled in 73 cl content, are exceptions. The reason for this is that 75 cl content bottles, which we hope will eventually become normal, have been very difficult and expensive to obtain in this country, since there is little demand for them from the larger firms. The Australians, Californians and South Africans use 75 cl content; and some French, Italian, and German bottlers do, as marked in the list, although 70 cl is more common in Italy and Germany and 73 cl in Bordeaux, Burgundy and the Loire. Our Alsace wines come in 70 cl content bottles and the standard Champagne bottle holds 75 cl, Eastern Europe and Spain usually bottle in 70 cl, unless indicated. Whisky, Gin and Vodka will be bottled in 75 cl fractionally less than the old 26⅔ fl.oz size; Cognac is bottled in 70 cl, the old 24 fl oz, as is traditional.

NB: 26⅔ Imperial fluid ounces = 1⅓ Imperial pints ≈ 75.768 cl; 24 Imperial fluid ounces ≈ 68.191 cl.

[LGTrotter]

Might 70cl just be a listing error?
Do you have an image, or link to an image, of a bottle of G70 (or indeed any other VP) available in 70cl rather than 75cl?

I do not have an image but I shall try to get one next week. In the meantime I would direct your attention to Berry's "biddable wines" on BBX, you will need to be able to sign in, find Graham 1970, then press the "make a bid" button and in the box there are two listings. One for 75cl bottles and one for 70cl bottles.

And I am not "whittling" (I hope) I was just wondering.

[Glenn E.]

I don't believe that I have ever seen Port in 70cl bottles, so that would be a +1 for a 70cl G70 just for the curiosity factor.

The case that I bought (and also Miguel's, I assume) were 75cl bottles.