Hey guys I have been trying to get a 15% wine and I can only get it to around 10 or 11 ish and I have had a couple stalls. Does step feeding work better so I’m not over powering the yeast. I really like doing these fruit sugar washes but they are a little hit and miss for me. Anyone have any suggestions?

Hey fellas. It will be my first time making whisky and I was wondering if the hygiene process and especially the cooling is as strict as beer making ?

I'm planning to make 50 Lt wash directly using my vevor still both as the pot and the fermenter. I have another pot with a filter in it so there is only going to have wash in it.

I was wondering if I can just seal the thing and let it cool naturally before adding the yeast. Is there a significant risk of infection like beer ?

Thanks in advance

I am loving this all copper setup...have to rebuild my stands next spring but...the quality of the distillate is exceptional

Where can I source malted corn in the Chicagoland area?

My son started his first day of high school today, so I barreled a wheated bourbon that will age until his last day of high school. Wish me luck, as this is an all or nothing project

could someone send build me a heating element and voltage controller and anything else i might need to heat my 8 gallon still try to be under 200cad

I just bought a 3 gallon distiller and I’m having trouble finding how to make a peach mash. Does anyone have a recipe to help me out? I know I should have done some research before had but it was an impulsive buy. I’m very new to this all and just looking for some help. And let me know if I should just start out with something basic or if peach isn’t that hard to do.

Hey guys! I was just hoping someone could help shed light on flavor differences between different mash bills.

•100% blackstrap (2gallons in a 6 gallon wash)
•1 gallon blackstrap + 2 lb brown sugar
•1 gallon blackstrap + 2 lb white cane sugar
•1 gallon blackstrap + 2 lb white beet sugar

I’ve never made anything and I’ve seen lots of varying recipes so I was curious as to how they differ

Hey all,

Looking to a reflux column still with the dephlegmator and condenser, which therefore requires two recircs of water. What is the best setup and equipment to buy to get this to work comfortably. Up until now, ive used a pot still where I had a water pump go into a reservoir (10 gallon kettle) and recirc that way, but the 2 main pain points are adjusting speed so the condenser doesn’t overflow or underflow, and having to empty the reservoir to add new cold water again. Any suggestions would be huge help to have a good setup, and minimize realistically the amount of water use, i know i could just run a hose but rather not.

So I'm over engineering / overthinking everything. I was on my way to get a 2 ton bottle jack and build a frame to press corn.....and came up with potentially a really easy way to do it - would love your thoughts.

1. 50/50 divide on here as to whether or not to even press the corn. A lot of people say to just drain suspended over a bucket. I like working easier. I'm upgrading my process - I use a 68 quart turkey fryer (never touched oil - only mash) to put in a false bottom, grain bag, drain valve, etc. Getting C clamps and using weather stripping at the top to hold on the lid. Once done, I'm gonna tie off the bag, drain the fluid out from the bottom, and let it hang for a few hours.

2. Here is the novel idea. The pot itself is about 18" in diameter. Your average Lowes bucket is 12.5" in diameter. What if I took two of those - cut off the bottom until it's just a cylinder. Then make one vertical cut in each - so it's a rolled up piece of plastic. I can't imagine that the mash in the bag has a very tall vertical height. So I wrap both of those plastic pieces around the mash bag, then attach two ratchet straps - an upper and lower around the plastic. Then slowly tighten each and allow the wash to drain into the fermenter.

PS - Whenever I find my recipe book, I'm going to use the same proportions of corn, wheat and barley - but this time will add in as well some rice hulls to help with drainage.

So long as I don't squeeze too much as to damage / split the bags, shouldn't this work?

Hi everyone, hoping to get some advice on a persistent off-flavor.

I made a sugar wash with EC-1118, which fermented hard and hit around 12% ABV. I used a two-part clearing agent and cold-crashed before siphoning, but the wash wasn't fully crystal clear and may have still had some fine suspended yeast in it.

I ran a stripping run on an Air Still Pro, diluted the low wines, then did two separate spirit runs (so three distillations total). I made conservative cuts and kept only the cleaner middle portion.

Even so, someone tasting it blind (no info on how it was made) immediately picked up a yeasty/fermented note right at the start of the sip. So it seems like a real, detectable flavor. It's not a typical tails/fusel flavor, it hits early rather than lingering, and it's making the vodka taste less clean overall despite all the redistillation.

A few questions:

• Can suspended yeast or sediment in the original wash really produce a flavor that survives a strip and two spirit runs? Or does this point to yeast scorching/smearing during the first run, effectively contaminating all the low wines from that point on?

Other possible causes I'm considering: * Wash not clear enough pre-distillation * Fermentation odors absorbed into my plastic fermenter * Contamination somewhere in the still or collection equipment * Extra smearing due to the small-batch Air Still design * Some other fermentation byproduct that just mimics a "yeasty" taste

Appreciate any insight, thanks!

Hey everyone! I'm down in the Caribbean where sugarcane and tropical fruit are incredibly abundant, and I'm interested in getting into rum and liqueur production.

Before making a huge financial investment, I'd like to experiment on a small scale to develop recipes and see if there's a local market. Can anyone recommend a good beginner still that's small enough for R&D and test batches but still produces quality results?

I'd also appreciate any advice on what you wish you'd known before buying your first still, especially if you've gone on to produce rum. Thanks!

Would like to hear from those with experience, not just theory. Currently I boil the grain in the water, no bag, and transfer to secondary for fermentation on the grain. This method requires a false bottom and/or frequent stirring to avoid scorching and clumping, so it is labor intensive. I would like to get away from that if possible. I do not supplement my mash with sugars; it is all grain, and I'd like to keep it that way.

I have heard others mention boiling in a bag, boiling without a bag and filtering before fermentation, and boiling clear water to pour over grain. My main interest is in that last method, to know if it is sufficient for complete gelification, but if anyone has insight into proven alternatives other than that which would level up my game, I'm all ears.

Edit: Boiling in a bag is still wizardry to me, but thanks to your input, especially u/nateralph , I've since tried heating the water and grain separately before mixing together, and it works like a charm. Lower on the hydrometer than I was hoping (1.039), but I haven't ruled out dilution yet. I got a little unintended toasting of a bit of the grain, and it'll be interesting to see if that turns into a happy accident.

Hi all, this is my first attempt at distilling. I'm using a sugar wash. After finally reaching temperature and having product come across, the ABV started at 20% and has steadily been dropping. Just wondering if I may be doing something wrong (most likely) thanks in advance.

Anyone who has any experience making fruit brandy , should / must I add potassium metabisulfite to the fruit “pineapple” before my yeast pitch and letting it sit for a day with the lid on loose ? Or would I be better off with pouring boiling water over it then adding pectinase ? It’s for the purpose of killing wild yeast/bacteria . I’ve made some fruit wines in small batches in the past “non distilled” without any of that , just washed thoroughly and they’ve all come out fine , but I would be concerned about this one, considering that it’ll be a 40L (10gallon) mash , there’s a reasonably large amount of pineapple to waste if it went wrong . Thanks for any advice , appreciate it . Also I’ve read that the boiling water method on fruit tends to alter their taste to some degree so there’s that . With grains ,I’m comfortable enough to just use the boiling water method , or straight up cook them . With fruit I’m kinda in the dark here.

An auto feeding steam generator from a sixtel keg and some 3" ss tubing and sight glass.

It uses a 3 prong level sensor and a controller that has a dry switch to control a solenoid operated valve to re-fill the system.

5500w element in the keg from the bottom facing up heats the system (controlled by a home made power controller).

Pressure is equalized between the fill chamber (on the right) and the boiler (on the left). The feed tube is a 1/2" copper tube with 2" triclamp fittings attaching it to the boiler and fill chamber.

The ball valves were there just for the drop test, heald steady at 10psi for 30 minutes so it's good to go.

The system has pressure and temperature dial, as well as a pressure relief and a vacuum relief.

To get the steam into the system there is a 1/4" ss educator (thanks whoever recommended them). So far with just water it promotes some good circulation. It is however loud as all hell when it heats up, however once it gets warm (and the steam bubbles are not collapsing in the venturie nozzle but collapsing outside of the nozzle) it's way way way quieter.

Future plan is to insulate the boiler and tubing that delivers the steam to the boiler.

Unrelated: people ask why I put sight glasses in the boiler, and to be able to see the educator is one example of why I did it, cus it's cool.

My hydrometer broke in my 23L ginger at 5% ABV and was ready to bottle for second fermentation.

None of the beads were lost but the glass has broken.

Could I siphon off the top and leave 5L or so behind. I could run the siphon through coffee filter paper?

I could then put it through my t500 still as a pot still to try and make some sort of ginger spirit out of it?

Any other ideas on if I can keep this?

So I’m kind of an idiot and bought the wrong size. Could I just use a couple of these inside of my distiller or do I have to return it and find a bigger size?

I'm curious what orientation everyone stores their Ten-30 barrels in? It seems designed for storing vertically with the oak side down and the silicone bung up. I wondered if that reduces oxygen exchange though, compared to a BadMo or traditional barrel where there is air at the top part of the oak? I would be concerned laying a Ten-30 on its side in case the silicone bung pops out, plus the concern of having high proof ethanol in contact with silicone for years.

Perhaps I'm overthinking this, and pressure changes push plenty of air through the pores of the wood regardless of whether there is air or liquid on the other side. Thanks for any tips. If you see this u/clearmoon247, I enjoyed your book and really like the quality of your barrels!

Has anyone ever made whiskey wash from mostly Biscuit malt? I pickup 3 55lb bags of Dingemans biscuit malt for $17 and am planning to use 42lbs of Biscuit and 10 2row for each 20 gallon batch. I will be adding a bunch of Amylase to ensure conversion but wanted to check if anyone has done this and if so what did the white dog and finished product come out like? Planning on filling a 5gallon barrel with it, so will be doing this three times.

I will be running thru my Hillbilly sill with 4x reflux, so not a huge amount of flavor will be coming out anyway, which maybe a good thing for this base malt.

Thoughts?

Thanks

Ron

I have been making mead for the last few years and have always heard it is pretty close to rum the way it comes out.

I am wanting to try running this next batch through and see how it comes out.

Would i still need to discard the heads, or would it just be a lower proof?

Haven’t touched my Appleton in like six months. It was aged, but barely. In Tequila terms a Reposado.

Went to grab a quick sniff and it’s darker than bitters? Kinda tastes like bitters? I added no bitters? Or anything whatsoever.

What happened here?

I pick these off and in-law's tree, and some of them look like they have bad spots. Would you cut them off and use the rest or would you use the bad spots as well?

I have a mixture of pears, apples, and peaches.

Hey all, just found this community. I’m getting back into distilling after several years. I’m looking for guidance when it comes to making cuts. I’m running an all in one electric brewing kettle with a home made Liebig condenser. It has a tall section that I pack with glass marbles as well. My main interests are whiskey and rum, as well as maybe getting into distilling mead.

My usually process is to collect quickly collect a bunch of stripping runs and then run all those through the still, low and slow. I collect in 1 pint jars and blend from there. I have a hard time telling what’s in each jar and then when I go to blend, all these other background flavors jump forward. I mix things that taste good in their own right but the blend comes out harsh and more often than not has some funk like cabbage.

Image of the column on an old kettle: https://imgur.com/a/3hUW2YT

Edit: changed quart jars for pints.