Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

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Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Virandell »

Hi I made bourbon about 4 months ago, I know its not alot of time but I don't see really any improvement its tasting or smelling nothing like from the shop I would sag (I am not expecting exactly the same smell or taste but atleast similar) .
Also my bourbon turned quite cloudy I know its quite normal with whiskeys correct ? Is it any way to fix it ? Like freeze it maybe and filter it through coffe filter ?
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Stonecutter »

No, four months isn’t considered to be very long to most hobbyists.
Cloudiness can come from tails. If you proof up it may disappear.
What’s the current proof of your whiskey?
How did you proof it down?
How much are you aging and how are you aging your whiskey?
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Deplorable »

+1 to everything my Brother Stonecutter said.
Did you blend in cloudy jars from your cuts?
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Ben »

What was the distillation process, cut process and recipe?
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Virandell »

Stonecutter wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 10:36 am No, four months isn’t considered to be very long to most hobbyists.
Cloudiness can come from tails. If you proof up it may disappear.
What’s the current proof of your whiskey?
How did you proof it down?
How much are you aging and how are you aging your whiskey?
Current proof is 57% aging on oak in glass sometimes I am airing it or heating it up to 60Celsius and cooling it down, aging on american oak sticks I am aging 4L in 5L demijohn.
Recipe been 5% rye 5% wheat 66.6% corn 10% honey maly and rest Marris Otter malt.
I distilled it on flute column. Never had problem with dillution with gin or brandy always been nice and clear
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by ShineonCrazyDiamond »

Never taste whiskey until it is both minimum 6 months old, and spent a couple months in summer weather. July 4th that whiskey will great. You have it in the attic or shed, right? 72 degrees ain't going to force the whiskey in and out of the wood.

Posted same time as op.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NormandieStill »

I'm prepared to be corrected on this if someone knows better, but as far as I can tell, aside from a minor change in viscosity, there's no physical effect that would cause spirits to be pulled into or out of wood that's entirely surrounded by them in a jar. Unless you're imagining tiny air pockets inside the pores of the oak, in which case, the spirits would be sucked in in cold weather and pushed out in hot weather. In a barrel you have a potential for a pressure differential when the outside temperature swings lower than the temperature of the spirits.

To the OP. More time. I have no patience either for my currently ageing products and have actually marked dates in the calendar when I can (should?) taste them to see where they are going. I've marked 6 weeks, 3 months, and 6 months. I didn't expect anything miraculous at 6 weeks and I wasn't disappointed. Not hit 3 months yet, but based on my cuts, I think at least one batch is going to need a year or so.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by ShineonCrazyDiamond »

I can say from experience that 6 months of winter aging is nothing compared to 6 months of summer aging (I age in the attic). Jars and barrels.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NormandieStill »

ShineonCrazyDiamond wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 1:04 pm I can say from experience that 6 months of winter aging is nothing compared to 6 months of summer aging (I age in the attic). Jars and barrels.
I suspect it's a temperature thing relating to chemical reaction speed rather than relating to physical properties of wood. It's not about extracting chemicals from the wood but more about the reaction between those chemicals and the chemicals present in your spirit. I don't deny that the temperature is important, I just don't think it's to do with the wood. I suspect that if you could rapidly extract the relevant substances from the wood and then remove the wood, you'd still get the same effect over the course of a summer as you do with the wood in.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NZChris »

NormandieStill wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 1:18 pm I suspect that if you could rapidly extract the relevant substances from the wood and then remove the wood, you'd still get the same effect over the course of a summer as you do with the wood in.
I doubt that would work because some of the relevant substances are breakdown products of relatively insoluble substances, like lignin. That is why I don't bottle more than my needs and leave the rest on the wood.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Deplorable »

ShineonCrazyDiamond wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 1:04 pm I can say from experience that 6 months of winter aging is nothing compared to 6 months of summer aging (I age in the attic). Jars and barrels.
The local distillery in town would likely agree with you.
Their 53 gallon barrels of bourbon are headed into their 6th year and "not quite there". They were basing their target off of the 4 years Woodinville Whiskey Company takes for their spirits, but Woodinville ages in warehouses in eastern Washington where the climate is hotter, and dryer. Here on the wet side of the state where the summers are milder it's taking longer for their spirit to come of age.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by FullySilenced »

Don't ask me or I might say take a qt with some chips and microwave it...

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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NormandieStill »

NZChris wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 2:23 pm
NormandieStill wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 1:18 pm I suspect that if you could rapidly extract the relevant substances from the wood and then remove the wood, you'd still get the same effect over the course of a summer as you do with the wood in.
I doubt that would work because some of the relevant substances are breakdown products of relatively insoluble substances, like lignin. That is why I don't bottle more than my needs and leave the rest on the wood.
I doubt it as well but I was talking theoreticals. You can rapidly extract tannins, but if that were the only requirement the whiskey industry would have been ageing in heated stainless vats with oak tea for a while now. :wink:
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by bluc »

57 proof is pretty low to be ageing i normally age at 130 proof..
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by bluc »

ShineonCrazyDiamond wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 10:59 am Never taste whiskey until it is both minimum 6 months old, and spent a couple months in summer weather. July 4th that whiskey will great. You have it in the attic or shed, right? 72 degrees ain't going to force the whiskey in and out of the wood.

Posted same time as op.
I think all grain american whiskey is great even white. If it aint great white it aint gunna be great brown...
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Deplorable »

bluc wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 1:46 am 57 proof is pretty low to be ageing i normally age at 130 proof..
That's subjective. Aging proof depends on what you want to pull out of the wood, and the spirit you're aging.
Bourbon in Virgin wood, has a different barrel entry proof than single malt Scotch in a used barrel.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by Ben »

NormandieStill wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 12:10 pm I'm prepared to be corrected on this if someone knows better, but as far as I can tell, aside from a minor change in viscosity, there's no physical effect that would cause spirits to be pulled into or out of wood that's entirely surrounded by them in a jar.
Sure there is, we know everything (specifically water and ethanol) expands and contracts with heat. We know that wood is made up of bundles of capillary tubes (that's how it pulls water from the ground up the tree). As the liquid expands and contracts it moves inside those capillary tubes. It must or the wood would split into a million pieces :) No matter how perfectly split your oak is there will always be exposed tubes, its even more pronounced in a jar, where you have all of the end exposed. This is why coopers split staves instead of cutting them, when splitting you are severing the wood (as much as possible) between the tubes. They don't want product migrating in and out of a barrel any more than is unavoidable.

10x of red oak end grain
0408200934_HDR.jpg
:)
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NormandieStill »

Ben wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 8:20 am
Sure there is, we know everything (specifically water and ethanol) expands and contracts with heat. We know that wood is made up of bundles of capillary tubes (that's how it pulls water from the ground up the tree). As the liquid expands and contracts it moves inside those capillary tubes. It must or the wood would split into a million pieces :) No matter how perfectly split your oak is there will always be exposed tubes, its even more pronounced in a jar, where you have all of the end exposed. This is why coopers split staves instead of cutting them, when splitting you are severing the wood (as much as possible) between the tubes. They don't want product migrating in and out of a barrel any more than is unavoidable.

10x of red oak end grain
0408200934_HDR.jpg
I'm a carpenter by trade and well aware of the grain structure of oak. :wink:

I'm actually working out a protocol to test the effect of end-grain surface versus split (ish) surface. When I managed to put it into action, I'll post the results.

But while your statements about wood structure and thermal expansion are correct, in a barrel the process is working from a pressure and temperature differential between the thermal inertia of the liquid in the barrel and the external temperature of the warehouse. When you've put that oak in the jar, and capillary action has wicked the liquid inside the pores of the oak, there's only really diffusion left to move stuff back out of the wood. The saturated wood is also going to expand and contract and the amount of "flow" is going to be nothing compared to the diffusion down the chemical gradient. If it's extraction that you're after then regular shaking will probably do far more than summer temperature swings (which would also depend massively on your climate). The average summer temps however will massively increase the reaction rate between the wood and the spirit.

Again, I'm not saying summer temps don't play a role, but I suspect it's the temperature far more than the swings. Which should be easy to test if someone can afford to stick a jar in a water bath with an aquarium heater for a couple of months. I don't have enough product to do the control right now or I'd get an aquarium heater and prepare myself for the questions from my other half.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

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NormandieStill wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 1:47 pm When you've put that oak in the jar, and capillary action has wicked the liquid inside the pores of the oak, there's only really diffusion left to move stuff back out of the wood.
So what happens when that liquid changes temperature and expands or contracts?

I don't think its just "stuff happens faster at higher temps", that is absolutely true, and its also true that diffusion happens, but if the liquid couldn't move within the wood it would never dry, a tree would be unable to have any height, or leaves. Water must be able to constantly transfer from the wet part of the tree, to the dry part. And as a carpenter you know wood moves, a lot, with temperature and with humidity. You also know, if you have ever built a solid door how much stress a piece of wood can undergo when one side is in a different environment than another, and you know moisture transfers with every movement

I am sure in your carpentry career you have seen a piece of lumber carelessly laid on wet grass, on a warm day that piece of wood is cupped and twisted in no time flat. That is capilary action. It is neither slow, nor weak. It takes a LOT of force to cup a 2x12.

How about steam bending? The steam is the heat transfer method, it allows you to heat a piece of lumber, softening the lignin and allowing you to form it like an al dente noodle, how does the steam move through the lumber? Capillary; again this isn't slow, steam bending is a couple hours to steam the lumber to perfection. The moisture condenses at the fiber, is pulled into the wood and becomes a conductor for the heat.

In a barrel you have 2 environments pulling on that piece of wood, there is a ton of strain that is constantly being relieved, so what happens to the liquid that is trapped in the wood as the stresses and strains are applied and released as the outside environment changes?

In a jar you have the same thing happening, the density of the fluid outside of the wood is changing at a different rate than the fluid inside (even if the difference is tiny). If the wood is saturated the liquid has to go somewhere when it expands due to heat, where does it go? The expansion rate of the wood is not the same as the liquid. We don't see staves inside the jar splintering out, so it isn't staying in the wood.

How does whiskey evaporate from a barrel if the liquid stops moving as soon as you hit saturation? Barrels don't leak, they seal really well. It doesn't, it is constantly being moved through capillary action, then evaporates from the outside of the barrel. That's why in a really dry climate you can keep a fairly high alcohol content as things evaporate, and in a humid one your alcohol content slowly drops, the alcohol is able to bond with the humidity, and there is no place for water to go in saturated air, so it isn't wicked away.

So please explain how you can dismiss capillary action as a moving force. I would really like to know, I just cant reason it out. There is something I am missing and I want desperately to see it.

Lets not forget, its not just the wood that is doing "stuff" with the whiskey. Chemical reactions happen over time, evaporation takes time in the semi sealed environments we create, oxidization takes time, tannic reactions take time. You can get the oak flavor into wood quickly, just use chips or sawdust... it will still taste like young whiskey. This takes less time when you add heat, heat is a nearly universal accelerant to chemical reactions.

Heat may not be a benefit in the home distiller size barrels, evaporation and over extraction are real things. If you want to put a 10l barrel away for a while it might actually be better off in a cool location. You have to weigh the pro's and cons I guess. That chemistry is over my head.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NormandieStill »

Ben wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 6:21 pm
NormandieStill wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 1:47 pm When you've put that oak in the jar, and capillary action has wicked the liquid inside the pores of the oak, there's only really diffusion left to move stuff back out of the wood.
How does whiskey evaporate from a barrel if the liquid stops moving as soon as you hit saturation? Barrels don't leak, they seal really well. It doesn't, it is constantly being moved through capillary action, then evaporates from the outside of the barrel. That's why in a really dry climate you can keep a fairly high alcohol content as things evaporate, and in a humid one your alcohol content slowly drops, the alcohol is able to bond with the humidity, and there is no place for water to go in saturated air, so it isn't wicked away.

So please explain how you can dismiss capillary action as a moving force. I would really like to know, I just cant reason it out. There is something I am missing and I want desperately to see it.
In a living plant, the capillary action that is drawing liquid up from the roots is working because at the top of the plant, water is being evaporated. By drawing off from the top of the tube you "make space" for more liquid. It's a siphon running against gravity. And the siphon analogy works nicely here because if you imagine creating a siphon inside a closed jar, you have created a static system. Your theory is that the coefficient of expansion of the liquid is so much greater than that of the wood, that the excess volume is being pumped out of both ends of the tube, carrying with it the chemicals that have been extracted from the wood as if it were tidal. I'm suggesting that the concentration gradient of those chemicals caused by the greater concentration in the tube will cause them to leave via simple diffusion (which will also occur faster at higher temperatures).

If your model for liquid transfer in and out of the wood is based on pressure (liquid expansion) then there has to be a pressure difference or you have a static system. The model for a barrel has one side of the wood exposed to air so you have both a temperature gradient and a pressure gradient. By immerging the wood in the liquid you remove both of those gradients. So if temperature cycling were to have an effect on extraction then the mechanism in a jar cannot be same as in a barrel.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by jonnys_spirit »

When I pop the bung on my barrels after a month or whatever there’s a slight but pronounced vacuum in the barrel. Every time.

Sticks in a jug never do that.

Two different systems.

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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

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NormandieStill wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 10:31 pm
Your theory is that the coefficient of expansion of the liquid is so much greater than that of the wood, that the excess volume is being pumped out of both ends of the tube, carrying with it the chemicals that have been extracted from the wood as if it were tidal. I'm suggesting that the concentration gradient of those chemicals caused by the greater concentration in the tube will cause them to leave via simple diffusion (which will also occur faster at higher temperatures).
I see what you are saying. Let me see if I can figure out a what the rate of expansion is, if its the same between the two then this makes sense. It doesn't take much difference, we are talking about micro movements.
jonnys_spirit wrote: Tue Feb 08, 2022 6:13 am When I pop the bung on my barrels after a month or whatever there’s a slight but pronounced vacuum in the barrel. Every time.

Sticks in a jug never do that.

Two different systems.

Cheers!
-j
You don't find a vacuum in your mason jars when the temp drops? I'm not saying its the same system, that's ludicrous. I am saying there are commonalities and heat/diffusion aren't the only drivers. In fact, I don't think you actually read my post. It's something I see frequently, people skimming your post then responding.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by NormandieStill »

Ben wrote: Tue Feb 08, 2022 8:18 am
NormandieStill wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 10:31 pm
Your theory is that the coefficient of expansion of the liquid is so much greater than that of the wood, that the excess volume is being pumped out of both ends of the tube, carrying with it the chemicals that have been extracted from the wood as if it were tidal. I'm suggesting that the concentration gradient of those chemicals caused by the greater concentration in the tube will cause them to leave via simple diffusion (which will also occur faster at higher temperatures).
I see what you are saying. Let me see if I can figure out a what the rate of expansion is, if its the same between the two then this makes sense. It doesn't take much difference, we are talking about micro movements.
OK. I'm going to give you this one based on the rough evidence that I can find. It seems that the difference in thermal expansion between the oak and water is in the order of 100 times, where water expands more. It's hard to find actual numbers as the thermal expansion values I found for oak were linear and come from the building trade in the US (so F) and the thermal expansion coefficient for water is listed as volumetric and in C.

How that temperature swing based pumping of liquid from the pores compares to the direct diffusion from the exposed surface will be partially explored in an experiment that I hope to start this week... and which I will post in it's own thread in a different part of the forum because I think we've successfully hijacked the OPs original discussion! :wave:
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by bitter »

patience grasshopper!

Most stuff I don't even look at till 8-10 months, unless its neutral or Gin.

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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by bluc »

Deplorable wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 8:14 am
bluc wrote: Mon Feb 07, 2022 1:46 am 57 proof is pretty low to be ageing i normally age at 130 proof..
That's subjective. Aging proof depends on what you want to pull out of the wood, and the spirit you're aging.
Bourbon in Virgin wood, has a different barrel entry proof than single malt Scotch in a used barrel.
I have not experimented below 65abv 130proof..
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by hawkwing »

Do you like grungy whiskey? It doesn't sound like it since you don't like the taste. Like bluc said if it isn't good white it won't be good brown. I expect you are not happy with your cuts. In my experience if it's cloudy you have nasty tails in there and I don't know about you but I don't like that taste. I expect you might have to redistill it to remove the nasties. At least for my taste. I had some expensive scotch once that was a step down from gasoline. I don't understand how people like that nasty stuff. I like a smooth taste, maybe a little flavor but not to the point where my body wants to convulse. :D

Did you char the oak? Leave the jar or jug open and have lots of air space in it. Put a coffee filter or cloth over it with an elastic band or better yet a hair tie as they are not so grabby on the material. Give it a shake to mix in some air every now and then. You should see results in about a month. I would consider removing the oak before it gets too oaky for your taste. Also target your abv a little highter for aging but that's probably not your problem.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by ZMan3k »

I aged some bourbon the same way you did, mine was 15lbs cracked corn, 3lbs malted barley, 5 lbs sugar and 3 lbs honey for a 15 gallon wash. Gathered 6 gallons in a carboy and aged with 6 oak spirals, let it set in the garage for about a year when i first tasted it. Wasn't impressed at all, in fact i took a gallon and a half and mixed it with some clear and made an apple pie mixture with it all. Let the rest sit and figured I'd be making more the next Christmas, however upon tasting that time (between 1.5-2 years of aging at that point) i was very pleased with the flavor and almost sick that I had used a gallon and a half the previous year! Lesson learned I will never be upset with an aging whiskey until i have had it on wood for 2 years.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by subbrew »

ZMan3k wrote: Mon Apr 25, 2022 5:32 pm I aged some bourbon the same way you did, mine was 15lbs cracked corn, 3lbs malted barley, 5 lbs sugar and 3 lbs honey for a 15 gallon wash. Gathered 6 gallons in a carboy and aged with 6 oak spirals, let it set in the garage for about a year when i first tasted it. Wasn't impressed at all, in fact i took a gallon and a half and mixed it with some clear and made an apple pie mixture with it all. Let the rest sit and figured I'd be making more the next Christmas, however upon tasting that time (between 1.5-2 years of aging at that point) i was very pleased with the flavor and almost sick that I had used a gallon and a half the previous year! Lesson learned I will never be upset with an aging whiskey until i have had it on wood for 2 years.
Curious what the abv was if you got 6 gallons from a 15 gallon wash? A quick calc shows a starting gravity if you had good conversion of about 1.065, so 8.5% alcohol in the wash (I assume it is actually a mash in that you converted the starch of the corn and barley). So that is only 1.28 gal of alcohol in the 15 gal of wash. If you got it all and made no cuts you are looking at 21% abv in your 6 gallons.
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by shadylane »

Ben wrote: Sun Feb 06, 2022 10:55 am What was the distillation process, cut process and recipe?
That's good questions. :thumbup:
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Re: Bourbon 4 months old no improvement

Post by ZMan3k »

subbrew wrote: Mon Apr 25, 2022 8:20 pm
ZMan3k wrote: Mon Apr 25, 2022 5:32 pm I aged some bourbon the same way you did, mine was 15lbs cracked corn, 3lbs malted barley, 5 lbs sugar and 3 lbs honey for a 15 gallon wash. Gathered 6 gallons in a carboy and aged with 6 oak spirals, let it set in the garage for about a year when i first tasted it. Wasn't impressed at all, in fact i took a gallon and a half and mixed it with some clear and made an apple pie mixture with it all. Let the rest sit and figured I'd be making more the next Christmas, however upon tasting that time (between 1.5-2 years of aging at that point) i was very pleased with the flavor and almost sick that I had used a gallon and a half the previous year! Lesson learned I will never be upset with an aging whiskey until i have had it on wood for 2 years.
Curious what the abv was if you got 6 gallons from a 15 gallon wash? A quick calc shows a starting gravity if you had good conversion of about 1.065, so 8.5% alcohol in the wash (I assume it is actually a mash in that you converted the starch of the corn and barley). So that is only 1.28 gal of alcohol in the 15 gal of wash. If you got it all and made no cuts you are looking at 21% abv in your 6 gallons.
Sorry, i guess i was unclear, this was multiple 15 gallon washes, I saved a bit of grain and backset from each previous run to create a sour mash, the total 6 gallon volume came from approximately 10 different washes, i saved my favorite 2-3 jars of hearts from each then proofed down to a little over 100 proof and threw it into the carboy.
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