Blue distilled alcohol

[lonlyway]

Hey folks. Hope your hobbies are serving you well.
I have some problem with my result today, so far I had multiple runs (~10) and it went okay until the previous one and current one.
I tried couple of new method and now I'm getting blue distilled alcohol.

These are what I used

6 kg of sugar
Still spirit turbo yeast
Carbon
Carbon clear
no DAP no Baking soda

I have used my own still,

5 Gallon ss pot with copper condenser.
I'm using my cooktop as heat source - not delicate control, but able to get 94% with triple distillations

Previously I have not used anything else but sugar and turbo yeast, but from previous run, I decide to try new method

First, add carbon and carbon clear on the process
second, add copper chips inside the boiler since I heard the copper reduce the oder of Sulfer - have 25 of copper pipe fitting part inside of the boiler.

I saw from parent site,

In fact, I've learned that it is just the opposite! Acid washes do not corrode the condenser (unless, perhaps, they've been allowed to sit far to long and have gone acetic), but neutral to alkaline ones DO. Heating an ALKALINE wash, particularly one with lots of nitrogen-containing compounds that have been put in as nutrients, liberates ammonia, which corrodes the heck out of reflux coils and dyes the distillate a distinct greenish blue.

The Upshot: if the WASH is turning blue, it's probably due to acid wash corroding a copper sheathed element or a copper boiler, but if the collected DISTILLATE is blue, (and probably ammoniacal, but not always), the wash should be acidified!

Turbos contain a lot of nitrogen-containing compounds, and at neutral to high pH, these can liberate free ammonia. At low pH, they are bound up with the acid as salts, and do not liberate ammonia. So, by adding nutrients to an already nutrient rich turbo, you can inadvertently push the mix over the line and get ammonia with your distillate.

so I checked my mesh ph level, and it is little under 6.0 - so do I need to make it more acidic?
I don't think my problem is the nutrient issue, since I never had the same problem before....

If you guys have any experience or thought about this, please share with me.

[NZChris]

Maybe you should email your query to Still Spirits.

[der wo]

pH 6 is high for a fermented wash. Did it ferment dry? How does it taste? Do you have a hydrometer for a FG measurement?

[Still Life]

You say copper condenser. A worm?
I would get the Blue Magoo from my copper worm because it wasn't "downhill" all the way.
The dead spots pooled liquid and turned the copper blue.
Reformed the worm so the liquid had nowhere to stop and pool --downhill all throughout-- a good hot water rinse, and that stopped the problem.

Also you have copper bits in the wash. See if those are clean, too.

This advice is in conjunction with Der Wo's questions, not in place of them.

[lonlyway]

Thanks for the help folks

pH 6 is high for a fermented wash. Did it ferment dry? How does it taste? Do you have a hydrometer for a FG measurement?

Well, unfortunately my stip scales from 2 to 12, with 5 level, so its hard to say if its exactly 6.
It's scale like this (not in this exact way, but something like this)

but for sure, it was under 6, but not under 4.
It taste dry, and FG rate as 0.998

You say copper condenser. A worm?
I would get the Blue Magoo from my copper worm because it wasn't "downhill" all the way.
The dead spots pooled liquid and turned the copper blue.
Reformed the worm so the liquid had nowhere to stop and pool --downhill all throughout-- a good hot water rinse, and that stopped the problem.

Also you have copper bits in the wash. See if those are clean, too.

This advice is in conjunction with Der Wo's questions, not in place of them.

Yes it is worm copper condenser.
That is actually quite possible.
I put 88% lactic acid on top, and most came out at the bottom with green colour and nasty smell, but that doesn't seems all of it.
For copper bits, it seems little darker so I have put it in CLR for a day and rinced it and put it in the boiler.

is it bad idea to put copper bits into the boiler? - just wondering

[der wo]

There are other more accurate pH strips. Perhaps when you want to make AG with backset, you will have to buy some.

Because of your new infos I now think the wash was all right and Still Life is right and you simply had a dirty worm. After cleaning a worm with an acid, you have to ensure that all the acid is flushed out after or you will get this problem again and again. Also after all runs you should flush the worm. And it should be dry when stored. For this it has to be downhill all throughout like Still Life writes.

I don't see a problem with uncleaned copper bits in the boiler.

[hamshine]

Took me forever to get my worm right.... took me 45 min to make a liebig. But one trick to make sure your worm is all down hill is watch when you fill it up with water so you can see it cover the pipe if it doesn't fallow the pipe as it covers their is your low spot.

[MDH]

Turbo yeast is made by adding large amounts of ammonia compound (usually diammonium phosphate) to assist the yeast in quickly reproducing and fermenting.

The problem is that volatile ammonia byproduct - regardless of pH - will make it into your spirit. And yes, ammonia will corrode the hell out of copper.

I recommend letting go of the turbo yeast washes. Instead, try boiling some wheat germ, or wheat bran, in plain water for some time and adding this to a wash of sugar and water, before fermenting with a regular yeast from your winemaking supply store if you are interested in just learning to make potable alcohol. Bran and germ from grain are a source of concentrated complex nutrients which will allow an efficient fermentation. Unlike Turbo yeast, they won't add very much volatile nitrogen compounds to your ferment.

[jb-texshine]

Build a liebig condenser and quit using turbo yeast.
Net that'll fix the problem.
Jb-tex

[der wo]

He doesn't use it for the first time. But suddenly has this problem. So why you are so sure the yeast is to blame for? Anyone who knows how much nitrogen is in turbo yeast? No? So where do you know it is more than in for example rads tpw + fertilizer washs?

[jb-texshine]

Not saying it is or that it's the worm condenser.i will say that I read through every post I could find pertaining to blue distillate. Discounting the ones that were only slightly tinted on stripping runs, the common denominator is worm condenser and turbo yeast. The history bears out that changing both will clear up the problem.

[der wo]

I didn't respond to you jb. Everything fine with your post.
Now you say it's always turbo yeast and a worm. That's not wrong, but we should not forget, it's always newcomers working with turbo yeast and a worm. It's very likely that they do a mistake (like not rinsing the worm for example).

[Pikey]

I would expect blue or green to mean copper salts through not cleaning well enough.

[Rng4]

I've had blue distillate every time I used feed molasses from my local farm supply store to make rum.

[der wo]

I've had blue distillate every time I used feed molasses from my local farm supply store to make rum.

Worm? Turbo yeast?

[lonlyway]

der Wo and still Life, thank you verymuch for yourhelp. I got the fitting to clean the worm with tap water and re touch my worm so every liquid in the worm will comeout and dry
So far, It seems like its working. When I first washed with water, nasty shit came out like crazy.....
It took me couple hours to re solder the whole system, but now its good to go.

I recommend letting go of the turbo yeast washes. Instead, try boiling some wheat germ, or wheat bran, in plain water for some time and adding this to a wash of sugar and water, before fermenting with a regular yeast from your winemaking supply store if you are interested in just learning to make potable alcohol. Bran and germ from grain are a source of concentrated complex nutrients which will allow an efficient fermentation. Unlike Turbo yeast, they won't add very much volatile nitrogen compounds to your ferment.

MDH Thanks for recommentation. It seems interesting, I will try later.
I have asked the turbo manufacturer, they claim it should not create ANY ammonia, unless I added to the recipe, so it should not be caused by turbo.

Not saying it is or that it's the worm condenser.i will say that I read through every post I could find pertaining to blue distillate. Discounting the ones that were only slightly tinted on stripping runs, the common denominator is worm condenser and turbo yeast. The history bears out that changing both will clear up the problem.

Thanks jb, before I post this, I pretty much read every post that says they have blue distilled alcohol, and I followed most of them but none of it fixed the problem - well I wasn't really focusing on worm until der wo and still life pointed out.

According to my chemist friend, it seems like the blue is copper sulfite, and I would have to get rid of it....
he said its prob corroded due to low ph level - forgot to mentioned, one time I ran a batch with only 4kg of sugar, and that would had high ph level, which corrode the copper -
or it would've caused by my laziness....

Thanks everyone for help, especially still life and der wo.

[jb-texshine]

I didn't respond to you jb. Everything fine with your post.
Now you say it's always turbo yeast and a worm. That's not wrong, but we should not forget, it's always newcomers working with turbo yeast and a worm. It's very likely that they do a mistake (like not rinsing the worm for example).

Sorry,I mis understood

[Yodaspike]

My alcohol is coming out blue, ran only tails no problem, only with this mash, its molasses, no sugar, just wster yeast and molasses, had a few glasses, tastes fine, dont feel weird.
Now, my question is, if i redestill it, would that take the colour out?

[Cristof]

Yes. But first clean the condenser.

[Yodaspike]

Thank you

I did with the first run it happened, took it appart scrubbed it rinsed it etc.

[Yodaspike]

And what if only the tails come out yellow?

[Prairiepiss]

Clean still and get rid of the damn turbo yeasties.

[Yodaspike]

Lol, we only use brewers yeast, never any turbo

[The Baker]

Yoda, once you said blue and once you said yellow....

Geoff

[SomethingObscure]

Yoda, once you said blue and once you said yellow....

Geoff

My dads colour blind too? [emoji16][emoji848]

[Yummyrum]

Yoda, once you said blue and once you said yellow....

Geoff

My dads colour blind too? [emoji16][emoji848]

Good question Geoff and SO , that makes a lot of sense .

It sure would explain it iff’n it was yellow being that Yoda was running a Molasses wash .

10% of blokes are colour blind . Thats a lot if members here . And it kinda explains why there are so many strange. blue distillate threads .

[The Baker]

I worked with a fellow who bought a pair of bright red shoes for a job where he had pretty much to wear a tie.
Years ago when clothes for that work were more dressy.
Colour blind, his wife took them back.

Geoff

[Slivovitz]

Onion head with blue film inside.

This is good information


I have have a 10 gallon copper pot with copper worm and my first run was nice and clear. The 2 runs after that were tinted cloudy blue.

I was foolish and let it sit with hot must for almost 24 hours each time because I was at work. I cleaned it with a sponge and hose water.

Today I used TarnX and a cloth to wipe.dowm the inside of the pot and onion head.

I scrubbed with a scrubber sponge also. There is more blue residue but most is gone.

I poured TarnX down the worm which was much needed.

I have some blue Crystals in my glass proofing parrot also.

It was a no sugar peach must with k1-v1116. The PH was 3.55 when put into a barrel.

Thoughts on how to clean this mess up?

Can I salvage this 3.5 gallon cloudy peach ?

Cloudy bluish stripping run was cloudy like this from jar 1

[JuneyBoyFloyd]

Well. this is really cool. I'm having some Breaking Bad vibes with the blue stuff. I better try this one.

[Bee]

Slivovitz,
I think you can distill it again and leave the blue behind. At least it gets less noticeable.

Watch the pH of your washes. I don't think they are acidic enough.