Well, Hi!

[CletusDwight]

I just want to say hello and a quick thanks to all the members of the Forum for posting such a wealth of hard-won information.

I've been distilling for a few months now and I'm only just starting to produce something I can reasonably compare with commercial spirit.
I had no idea it would be so difficult. It looks so easy on paper: just brew up some beer, toss it in a still and collect the result (remembering to throw away the first few cc's.)

Anyways, all the silly mistakes are behind me now . I've made ammonia, nail varnish, nail varnish remover, stuff that removes nail varnish remover, extract of old sock, refined puke, an' some stuff that attracts flies better than a three week corpse... I figure that all that's left is good ol' alcohol...

Take care Y'all.

[FLquacker]

Anyways, all the silly mistakes are behind me now . I've made ammonia, nail varnish, nail varnish remover, stuff that removes nail varnish remover, extract of old sock, refined puke, an' some stuff that attracts flies better than a three week corpse... I figure that all that's left is good ol' alcohol...

MAN.....if you've done all that in a few months, you MUST be on the Rosetta Stone Spirit Distilling curriculum

[rad14701]

Welcome to the forums, CletusDwight...

We all got a bit "skun up" during the learning curve, and sometimes even after that... It's an ongoing learning process and if you say you've learned it all then that's just a sign that you've become set in your ways...

Good luck...

[plonker]

CletusDwight, you make me laugh..
"stuff that removes nail varnish remover" I snorted over that!!!

[CletusDwight]

Thank you Plonker.

Truth is, I'm having a hard time producing something drinkable.

First half dozen runs, I worked out the smell/taste of tails, helped by the temperature/abv but couldn't taste separate heads. It all seemed to be a gradual slide from nasty to not, just in time to hit the tails.

In the end, I went out and bought bottles of my favourite whiskeys and some unfamiliar ones to see if I could educate my palate a bit better.
I sat down with carefully matched samples of my own and the store whiskeys and settled down for some serious tasting.

All I got was that the good whiskeys now tasted every bit as foul to me as my own.

Not sure where to go from here...

[LWTCS]

Wonder if your running to much heat?

Are you airing?
What about aging?

[scarecrow]

I've made ammonia, nail varnish, nail varnish remover, stuff that removes nail varnish remover, extract of old sock, refined puke, an' some stuff that attracts flies better than a three week corpse...

There's nothin' we can teach ya then.......it's all downhill from here.

Been there, done that. I'm almost at the stage where the likker fumes don't remove nose hairs on the way to the mouth.....almost.

Welcome.

scarecrow

[plonker]

Hey CletusDwight, I have found there is a steep learning curve with this hobby.. I was lucky in that I started with a reflux still, the cuts seem to be much easier to pick with the high purity stills. I have since gone to a pot still, and I'm having to learn how to pick the cuts all over again...

Having said that, I can now pick the heads and tails in commercial likker!

I guess what I have learn't from this place is to try to get everything working for you to get towards a good product. So I try to make sure my wash is as clean and tasty as possible. If the wash tastes bad, then your product wont be too flash either.

Then try to run the still nice and slow, the slower you run it the easier it is to make cuts.. Then air and age.. I run an aquarium pump through the spirit for a day which seems to clean it up nicely... The I try not to drink it straight away..

[olddog]

Running an airpump is only required for about 10 minutes a day for a few days.

[CletusDwight]

Might give the aquarium pump a try! I've noticed a distinct improvement if I leave it alone for even a few days.

Bit worried about contamination though - I've got a fancy piston type aquarium pump but that would be sure to put oil vapour in the bottle.
I guess the cheap diaphragm type would be clean enough though... Bit of drilled copper tube for the injector?

And yeah, it's all about learnin'. There's so much more to it than at first sight and some close guarded commercial secrets too.
Pushin' the still too hard is a definite trap and I guess every still is different. I think I got that sussed now, I have to just tickle the heads out then hold the heat just steady while I watch for the drop-off in rate that means tails is coming up.
Now I do a stripping run first, I'm getting clearer separation.

It's getting there, but different washes seem to act different. The grain washes fer whiskey end up with a lot of trub in the fermenter that's difficult to avoid. An' I think you got it spot-on Plonker, keeping solids out of the still seems to make a big difference. Then again, some people claim to distill on-the-grain.

[plonker]

Bit worried about contamination though - I've got a fancy piston type aquarium pump but that would be sure to put oil vapour in the bottle.
I guess the cheap diaphragm type would be clean enough though... Bit of drilled copper tube for the injector?

I use the cheapest one I could buy, definitely a diaphragm job, then about 12" of 1/4" copper pipe. And olddogs right, you shouldn't need to run a lot of air through it, but I know his cuts are better than mine...

And yeah, it's all about learnin'. There's so much more to it than at first sight and some close guarded commercial secrets too.
Pushin' the still too hard is a definite trap and I guess every still is different. I think I got that sussed now, I have to just tickle the heads out then hold the heat just steady while I watch for the drop-off in rate that means tails is coming up.
Now I do a stripping run first, I'm getting clearer separation.

I smell and taste everything.. If it smells bad I wont taste, if it tastes good, I'll put it in a jar, if its been tasting good for a while I call it hearts..

[HookLine]

Might give the aquarium pump a try! I've noticed a distinct improvement if I leave it alone for even a few days.

Bit worried about contamination though - I've got a fancy piston type aquarium pump but that would be sure to put oil vapour in the bottle.
I guess the cheap diaphragm type would be clean enough though... Bit of drilled copper tube for the injector?

Reverse the direction of air flow. Make the pump suck instead of blowing. So it is sucking fresh air into the spirit, not rubber diaphragm contaminated air.

It requires some easy mods to the pump. There is a thread on it somewhere, originally on one of the Yahoo forums.

Here are some pics from the original builder:

http://s266.photobucket.com/albums/ii265/mavnkaf/