Home Distiller

If you've spent a couple of days trying to figure out what that occasional ping sound is across the house, that sounded like a little puppy giving a very very short little bark, only to discover it's the disks on your mason jars popping as the house temperature changes. I had a bunch in jars on oak,...

My wife and I did the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, and while we were out, we hit other distilleries as well, 10 in total. The majority of them used continuous column stills, huge, 50 foot high, 20 feet in diameters (or bigger) . They said they feed the entire wash, grain and all, from the top (or the mid...

I'm another one who can't sit and read unless it's technical or related. I'm a software engineer, I design medical equipment, medical systems, I've been in the field for about 25 years. I can read data manuals, engineering stuff, or "how to" books, but I can't get through a page of a novel...

For starters, the packing above the reflux return is doing nothing. That part of the column is one way vapour traffic upwards only so packing it is like mounting a sprinkler on the underside of an umbrella..... The length of the packing under the reflux return is what is important. What you have is...

Yes, my ABV readings are done with temperature corrections from the calcs page in the parent site as mentioned in my original post, and to confirm the temperature corrections I also chilled a sample down to 60F (the calibration temp of the hydro) and it confirmed the readings. When I was pulling hea...

Correct, I will never pull 100% straight spirit, the azeotrope is 96.5%, and I agree 180 proof is plenty high, and I will end up cutting it down anyway. What I'm trying to understand is that with 31" of packing, with a 2" column, and an 85% reflux, the equipment should perform better. And ...

I have a offset head (Nixon-Stone) reflux still with a 2” column and 31” packing space below the reflux return tube, and another 10” of packing space (if I chose to use it) above the reflux return and below the T going to the condenser, which could still provide fractioning. I’ve done spirits runs o...

Here's a thread on it...

http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =2&t=39820

Most all of your questions could have been answered by reading 7 pages of the heat controller thread. I have a couple of questions about the amount of heat to use. I used the Google search looking for "the heat controller thread" and I got a few hits: "Electric Heat Control Questions...

I at times smell the mash when I'm distilling? Does that mean I definitely have a leak? Theoretically, if you have a closed system (which ours is not, I know), and you had a raging boil going on, and all of the steam hit a cool enough surface to condense them back to a liquid, then you would never h...

Thank you all very much for the information. I will do a few things. First I will clean my equipment better, I thought I'd cleaned everything well, but I'll do even better. I have Star Sans so I'll give everything an extra once over. Second, I'll put the wheat in at a hotter temperature, it's not ma...

The heat required for stripping runs is more than during the spirit run. I use Propane as well, and during my first spirit run I heard gurgling, and I also noticed the boiler and column was rocking ever so slightly (my burner doesn't sit perfectly flat on the concrete). After a little bit of this, I...

I'm guessing it's mold? There're no off odors (kind of smell like baking bread), everything looks fine (other than this weird stuff). It looks like the surface of another planet. The first time this happened I was doing Uncle Jessie's recipe, it was my 5th or 6th batch. For this batch, I had tried g...

Great, thanks for the info cooker. I just ordered my trap from Pex... http://www.pexsupply.com/Cello-WDFSJ-24-1-1-2-Copper-DWV-Fitting-Trap-Adapter-FTG-x-Compr" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow And my glass from McMaster-Carr (8477K24 1-3/4" by 1/...

Thanks for the input cooker. I have a 2" column, so I'm thinking either a 1 1/2" or 1 1/2" trap fitting for my site glass. What size column/site glass do you have? Did you use a trap fitting or an easy flange? On this thread, he went with an easy flange, but I've seen trap fittings an...

Butterman, I'm curious if you've completed your build and if you could actually see the reflux through the site glass. I want to do the same thing on my column still, but I wasn't sure if the site glass would be covered with steam all the time and whether I'd be able to actually see the reflux drip....

You're very welcome.

Here's information that I found useful.

http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =2&t=39820

and used some scrap copper that I pounded out flat to make a bottom. What did you use to solder the bottom to the pipe? I see that you have connections very close to each other, how were you able to make those connections without melting the bottom off of the pipe? You have the beak on one side, an...

That was my mistake cooker. I called it my boiler and also called it my cooking pot. What I meant was I have two kegs, one is intact and is the one in the pictures, it will be my boiler and only my boiler, no solids will go in that one. The other one someone cut the top off already. I will use that ...

Thanks for the feedback cooker, and thank you for the links, I'll definitely read through them. I made the modification and moved the valve... New mod.jpg I always drill my brass fittings all the way through so that the copper tubes can butt up against each other. That way there's very little, or no...

That's a great suggestion, thank you, I'll do that. I guess the volume of the take-off tube isn't so great that it would hold a lot of fluid and therefore delay any indication of ABV which could affect when I do the cuts. Some simple calculations, the tubing is 1/4" OD, and I don't have the tub...

Thank you for the feedback bowhunt. I've heard of the unibits, and I actually bought my father one years ago, I just forgot all about them. When I was about to try to drill the holes with the spade bit, I knew before I started that it was the wrong tool for the wrong job, and a bad idea. :) But the ...

Your parrot looks very nice. That's the next thing on my list. Just built my first still, and now I want to make a Parrot... but I haven't even started my first mash yet. I guess I really need to get on the ball with getting something out of all of this work.

The Keg I started polishing the keg. I used the Gator Grit Surface Cleaning Disc Medium and then the Fine from Gator Grit. I used polishing sticks from Home Depot, but broke some rules, I used multiple compounds per buffing wheel, you're not supposed to do that I learned. So I'll need to get new on...

Liebig Condenser I didn't use a straight 1/4 tube running through the cooling water, I coiled it a little so that there's more surface area the liquid will come into contact with as it makes the bends, and more distance. The main body tube is 1" in diameter and 7 inches long. I tested it with ...

The Condenser I used 20 feet of 1/4 inch outside diameter tubing. I first tried to use rebar because I read someone else used 1/2 water pipe, rebar as a 1/2 inch outside diameter. Not only is rebar too small, but the texture on the surface will cause indentations on your copper tube. 1/2 water pipe...

The Valves I bought stainless steel needle valves off of E-Bay. I ended up with 1/8" instead of waiting for any 1/4" inch to show up, but I don't think it will matter too much since I think 1/8" should be enough to handle the flow. I drilled out the brass fittings connected to the SS...

I wanted to post my first build in hopes of getting feedback. I want to contribute to the forum, so I'm also posting my lessons learned during the build. I've never posted pics before so I hope this comes out correctly. I'm going to post each part of the build in a separate post since it all won't f...

I just wanted to say hello and introduce myself. I've been reading this forum for quite some time and have a dozen or more bookmarks into various pages and discussions (there's a lot of good stuff on here). I've made beer and wine in the past and I'm almost done building my first still, thanks to a ...