Help With The Basics

All things to do with making of gin

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a-good61
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Joined: Thu Jul 09, 2020 1:45 pm

Help With The Basics

Post by a-good61 »

Hi everybody! This is my first time writing on the post. I recently found this amazing forum page. I´ve been reading and starting to learn about distillation so I can make gin with some friends. The idea is to have fun with the process but always trying to do things the right way and safely.
Two of my friends are electromechanic engineers so they are going to build the pot still, just for the fun of it!
I think I got the basics pretty much covered, but I wanted to make sure so we start off the right way in this amazing journey of sharing a hobby with friends (besides the drinking part). We want to try both maceration and vapor distillation so we can know first hand what are the differences in the making process and taste. In both cases we will be using as a neutral spirit a 96% tridistilled cereal alcohol that another friend gets for us.
The questions that I have are the following:

1) If I use that 96% neutral spirit, do I have to worry about methanol?
2) The neutral spirit should be cut down to about 40% ABV with distilled/purified water for safety measures before starting the distillation, right?
3) Do I have to worry about fractions with the neutral spirit?
4) Same question with the cuts, can I just let everything mix together? I know that with the cuts you can blend what you like and leave out what you don´t, but I was just wondering if I can leave everything and then change the botanicals proportions in my next run.

I hope I haven´t asked dumb questions and that this can be the start of a something nice. Thank you all in advance!.
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NZChris
Master of Distillation
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Joined: Tue Apr 23, 2013 2:42 am
Location: New Zealand

Re: Help With The Basics

Post by NZChris »

1) If I use that 96% neutral spirit, do I have to worry about methanol?

Only if it is poor quality neutral spirit.

2) The neutral spirit should be cut down to about 40% ABV with distilled/purified water for safety measures before starting the distillation, right?
3) Do I have to worry about fractions with the neutral spirit?
4) Same question with the cuts, can I just let everything mix together? I know that with the cuts you can blend what you like and leave out what you don´t, but I was just wondering if I can leave everything and then change the botanicals proportions in my next run.

2-4 are covered in the Odin's Easy Gin thread. viewtopic.php?f=14&t=48594&start=60
If you start there, you should be able to make pleasant product with your first batch, then tweak the method to better suit your tastes every time you do a run until you have developed A-good61's Easy Gin.
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