Trying to make better whiskey. My last process was a departure from a UJSSM. Rather than sugar, I mashed malted barley, then fermented on cracked corn, stripping run, repeat until I had about 5-6 gallons of low wines. Did my spirit run, collected into jars to work on my cuts and it was alright. I used to use a parrot and ditched that to avoid smearing.
So I had a thought that maybe adding a bubble plate for the spirit run would help distinguish the cuts better. I haven't found much advice on trying to add a bubble plate to one of these stills. Is it a nutty idea? The goal is to just try to clean up my distillate and to make cleaner cuts. Are there other ways to achieve this that are easier? The mouth of the boiler is 8". There's an 8" bubble plate available at milehi. Wondered if I could get it into the onion dome so that it was removable or maybe fabricating a small column/extension to the boiler so that it would set into the boiler and the dome would set into the plate addition. no more than a couple of inches.
Am I nuts? Better advice to get to the same goal? Thanks a bunch
if you can fit it, give it a try. doubt you will increase proof much without active reflux... problem, where will you fit a rc? before going there though, have a read on lentils for alembics and what they do. further, read to understant what the alembic onion does.
If you want to insert plates then I suggest you remove the helmet, keep the boiler and build your plates column for the boiler, in this way you have a pot-still (with original helmet) and the plates column you use when needed . Change the original helmet requires a lot of work and in case of failure it is difficult to go back.
Demy wrote: ↑Wed Apr 07, 2021 12:40 pm
If you want to insert plates then I suggest you remove the helmet, keep the boiler and build your plates column for the boiler, in this way you have a pot-still (with original helmet) and the plates column you use when needed . Change the original helmet requires a lot of work and in case of failure it is difficult to go back.
This is what I was thinking. As for the deflegmator, I dunno even what that is. I'll do some more reading and try to understand better about how the onion works. It may not even be necessary. I need to do another run to see. One of the problems (or happy accidents) was I aged this stuff in a barrel that I had some very heavy molasses rum in prior, so it took on a lot of that flavor. Not horrible. Definitely interesting. But not what I was going for. So I think before I get too deep into this, I'll just do another run and see if I'm happy or not with it. thanks
Here is my own advice: if you don't want to change anything consider double (or triple) distillation, you will get a purer alcohol (but less aroma) to every distillation, so you will realize if it is good for you and in the meantime read as much as possible in Forum. This will avoid evaluation errors, so once you have acquired the information evaluates whether to edit or keep your set-up.
The Baker wrote: ↑Thu Apr 08, 2021 8:03 am
It's not very big and it's pretty.
Don't mess with it?
Make another from a keg?
Geoff
I have to agree with this.
If your goal is to make whiskey or bourbons your set-up will work very well. Just do stripping and then spirit runs.
A plated reflux column is more for one and done runs when making brown spirits.
As far as cuts go, only practice will make them better IMO
This is a great read and almost mandatory if you truly want to learn how to make great cuts https://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11640
Good Luck and enjoy the journey
Thanks all. I've decided to just do some more runs. I haven't been on these forums for awhile and was a little shocked to see that I joined them in 2007 which must have been when I first started. ha. Sadly, I haven't made a lot of stuff that I've been happy with. I tend to make things more difficult for myself a lot of times. I also haven't been doing it constantly since 2007, but have done enough batches where I should have figured out my cuts by now. While I've gotten a lot of help here, there is just SO MUCH INFORMATION it can be overwhelming. Thanks for talking me down from the bubble plate idea. I think it best to just be practicing! And not aging my sour mash in a very molasses-flavored barrel! Thanks again all!
