Home Distiller

The hiatus is over. I grew discouraged when 36 hours of labour only produced 6 liters of my favourite scotch. (Mine) I have a stainless beer keg now and the space to run it. 50 liters I think. And as of Wednesday I will have a Tig to make it all happen. Copper CAN be welded to stainless ! Probably g...

Apple brandy is a great drink for us ...I make boatloads every year. I like calvados too and sure would love a boatload of it. Even a small boat would be nice. I am just making my somple scotch again and again. I change things up a bit but keep it simple so I can compare. Lately I have been using 3...

Does anyone know of a reason NOT to turn my shop microwave over 90 degrees so it will take a gallon jar? Coyote Posts like this ? wow. I was searching CL for a larger microwave as the half gallon mason jars I bought are about 10" tall and don't fit. It is not easy to find tall microwaves. Mine...

Likewise.. Thanks for posting that. Very interesting.
I am nuking all my runs now and would love to have a large enough microwave to save myself some time.

So Rad. Yeah. I been mulling things over since I read your post. I knew the black pipe wasn't the best idea but I was in a hurry and Home Depot didn't have any 1" copper couplings. I grabbed it off the shelf and screwed it on. Then I turned around and behind me was the abs... an even worse idea...

Thanks for the advice. I think I need to be clearer about my intent. This will be not be a permanent and attached heater connected through the boiler wall. Yes Cackalacky; but I am only needing it for the initial boil. Here is a picture of it unfinished. heater1.jpg I have not finished the assembly ...

It's not going through a boiler wall rad. It is an element intended to be dipped into the water.

Just be sure that you connect the ground to the boiler. Dont try to use one of those cheap 2 wire extension cords for your heating element. Make sure you use a good heavy 3 wire cord with the ground pin. ... You can use a 220v element with a 110v source, but the heat output would be 1/4 of the elem...

So, why are so many here, as demonstrated in this thread, crawling into a hole ... so many are running scared ... fight the fight .. "fight"? The "fight" .. crawling off somewhere .. stand and fight for you .. I suppose I shouldn't expect to enter into a fight without being able...

I gave up on waiting and ran it.
Volume wise it was not a spectacular result but I ended up with one bottle of very nice liquor after http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... lit=nuking.

All the wine and raisin flavours are there.
Plums too.
Not bad for backset .

Still bubbling away every 15 seconds or so. It just won't quit. I am a little afraid to taste it for sure but I think I will be pleasantly surprised. Perhaps later today I will do SG and taste at the same time. I'll need to rerack it first because I don't have a long enough tube to make it past the ...

noobshine wrote: wasn't really that obscure if you've been paying attention to whats going on for the last 30 yrs. specially if you like making alcohol

Sure whatever. I am glad you are so hooked up.

It's been almost exactly a month since I decided to follow Dnderhead's advice. The very next day I bought 15 cans of Welches frozen concentrate. After that, things pretty much went downhill. :roll: Note to other winemaking newbies: a couple of days is all that is needed to let the must (wine mash) a...

I wonder if we would be having this very same discussion or one very very similar just before Jimmy Carter fixed ONE problem to all of us on October 14, 1978. Did you need to be so obscure ? I had to Google it because I had no idea what the hell you were talking about. For those who also are comple...

Previously TTB rules clearly (but perhaps not intentionally) exempted manufacturers of kits / parts because the products did not meet the definition of a functioning distilling apparatus. ... I just checked the TTB's definitions .. and noticed that they changed. Here's how the "Manufacturer of...

I have been sitting on my second batch of all grain barley for for about ten days now and reading most of the posts on this thread. Tonight I decided to give the nukular thing a try. Nothing blew up. Whew. Like many others I was apprehensive and thanks to the trailblazers and of course the OP I felt...

Thanks to all on this thread. I am following it with interest as I am also concentrating on all grains specifically with an interest in scotch. I think the best thing I could build would be a wort cooler as I am about 9 hours into this recipe waiting for things to cool , but everything looks smells ...

Yes. And I believe my stove element is around 1200 watts at Max. Your initial heating times to hit boiling point will be longer.
And also yes, you will find that you need less heat to boil the alcohol.
Good luck with your first run.

Funlovingfool wrote: A newbie helping a even newer newbie.

Or we could say the blind leading the blind.
I do hope it helps.

Spirit run My first spirit run was not done very scientifically and I won't bother to get detailed. But I ran close to 4 litres from the previous stripping runs @ 30% ABV Two hours and twenty minutes later I had 2 litres of 60% scotch. (which I am very happy with still) I have put it out to some co...

I feel very underqualified to answer this Funlovingfool as I am still new and probably making lots of mistakes. Also since I have only run it twice with the barley (four times including stripping) I would have trouble talking about an average but I do have some records kept from my last stripping an...

Ah. thank you. Cold crashing. Another new concept for me. I finished my second run of whisky a couple of days ago and I think it will be better than the first. I am starting to learn to make cuts. (I think I had beginners luck with my first one ) But anyways, I have never brewed beer before and I th...

Yuppers. That sounds like a good idea. I have seen lots and lots of info here and elswhere on the concentrated grape juice wines. I have never done a wine ferment so it will be fun and interesting. I think the flavour mix from plums and concord grapes would be plum good. Thanks for the suggestion. M...

Add water to it. I had considered that but I wasn't sure if I did if I could still pull a decent percentage from it. Could I ? How would that work ? It sort of feels like one step forward, one step back. If I add water I guess I would only add enough to... (sorry, I just don't know enough) but mayb...

Thanks for the tips. I didn't realize something so low in alcohol could be a wine. So yes; it probably started out weak and got even weaker ! That appears to be a calculator for specific gravity without using the hydrometer. Am I right ? If I weigh 5 gals of mash and it weighs 3.6lbs then it is 9% p...

A shoutout to a previous post that helped me with my still. Thank you myles for your great post. It helped me when I realised my 3/8" diameter copper was going to be too restrictive. I remembered seeing your pictures and I ended up building a worm with two coils. I am just getting started and w...

Yes Richard. That sure looks like the one. I don't recognize those exact pictures but he probably posted some others. Thanks for sending that. I will have to post a congrats on his post.
I wish I had seen the idea for the drain tube. That was a cool idea.

Thank you thunderbolt. I got the idea from this forum of course. I saw a photo from someone else's effort ( sorry I don't remember who) and decided I needed to do it to get more flow from my small diameter pipe. It may have the advantage too of forcing more contact with the copper. I really need to ...

I tried that dakota. It ended up really weak. That's why I am considering what to do next.
I do think I will run it through again, although it's such a small amount I am worried about scorching the bottom of the boiler.

Thanks halfbaked and I did have fun doing it.
I just realized I posted a couple of pics I didn't intend to and didn't post a pic of the completed worm.
And sitting in the bucket.
That's the 3/8" copper double wound in two coils.