uncle jesse's simple sour mash, fients ABV question

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Manic Mechanic
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uncle jesse's simple sour mash, fients ABV question

Post by Manic Mechanic »

question. I ran a spirit run today with 6 gallons of gen 6 low wines at 43%. Mighty tasty. This is the second spirit run I made with UJSSM. The first 5 gallon run gave me 10.7 litres of feints at 68%. This last one gave me 12 litres of feints at 75%. Should I be keeping all heads and tails as feints? That abv seems high to me. If I make an all feints run I think I need to add either water or dunder to get it back to 45% abv before running it? Last run gave me 9 litres of heads, 4 litres hearts and 3 litres tails. (conservative cuts) All foreshots 150 ml per 5 gallon run were removed on strippng runs. Also 1650 watt electric 8 gallon still doesn't give enough power to run spirit run below 43% tails. 43% stalls at about 203 tank temp and 200 vapor temp.5 gallon stripping runs I can run to 207 tank and 203 vapor at 25%. advice?
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Manic Mechanic wrote: Fri Jan 14, 2022 4:18 pm question. I ran a spirit run today with 6 gallons of gen 6 low wines at 43%. Mighty tasty. This is the second spirit run I made with UJSSM. The first 5 gallon run gave me 10.7 litres of feints at 68%. This last one gave me 12 litres of feints at 75%. Should I be keeping all heads and tails as feints? That abv seems high to me. If I make an all feints run I think I need to add either water or dunder to get it back to 45% abv before running it? Last run gave me 9 litres of heads, 4 litres hearts and 3 litres tails. (conservative cuts) All foreshots 150 ml per 5 gallon run were removed on strippng runs. Also 1650 watt electric 8 gallon still doesn't give enough power to run spirit run below 43% tails. 43% stalls at about 203 tank temp and 200 vapor temp.5 gallon stripping runs I can run to 207 tank and 203 vapor at 25%. advice?
Are you talking about two different stills, on your 5 gallon strip run you can get to 25 abv, I'm assuming that's at the spout not total abv of low wines.
In my small boiler I can strip to 30abv total with 1250w with a 25L wash/mash
I generally keep my boiler charge at 30abv for all fients run (CCVM) or if I'm adding to a spirit run I dilute with either water or a portion of a finished wash/mash
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

Post by Manic Mechanic »

Same still. So is running a spirit run or feints at 43% starting abv to high?
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Manic Mechanic wrote: Fri Jan 14, 2022 8:30 pm Same still. So is running a spirit run or feints at 43% starting abv to high?
I usually run around 30%
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Sporacle wrote: Fri Jan 14, 2022 4:55 pm Are you talking about two different stills, on your 5 gallon strip run you can get to 25 abv, I'm assuming that's at the spout not total abv of low wines.
Nearly every time I make an assumption I get it wrong. If a poster doesn't say if an ABV is off the spout or from the receiver, you only have a 50/50 chance of getting it right, so don't guess, ask them.

Personally, I don't watch ABV off the spout, as it isn't as important as ABV in the receiver.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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NZChris wrote: Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:16 pm Nearly every time I make an assumption I get it wrong. If a poster doesn't say if an ABV is off the spout or from the receiver, you only have a 50/50 chance of getting it right, so don't guess, ask them.

Personally, I don't watch ABV off the spout, as it isn't as important as ABV in the receiver.
Yeah, 100% on the assumption thing.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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So my method is to collect 150 ml off the spout in a beaker measure ABV with a hydrometer measure the temp in the beaker and correct abv to temp. Then I add it to a 1 litre jar (receiver?) For UJSSM when I get to 81 abv I move my sample in smaller jars 300 ml until I am well into 78 ABV and move back to 1 litre jars until 71 abv and move back to smaller samples until 66 abv. Then I run out tails as far as I can before I run out of power at about 40% abv off the spout. My feints from 6 gallon stripping run (addition of heads and tails is about 68-72 abv when mixed together in the receiver (3 gallon carboy?) My question is what should I dilute an all feints run to before distilling? I would dilute feints with dunder. Or do I just add 7 litres of feints to 15 litres of low wines and run that? I make my final cuts by taste from the various jars.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

Post by rubberduck71 »

"Water makes the best filter" I've read here on HD site, so I usually dilute my spirit run boiler charge to ~30% ABV.

I wouldn't use dunder to dilute feints. Dunder/backset has a very specific use in rum & UJSSM, but that's for primary fermentation phase, not the distillation phase. I'm fairly new to this hobby (<2 years), so I could be wrong on that.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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rubberduck71 wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 12:26 pm "Water makes the best filter" I've read here on HD site, so I usually dilute my spirit run boiler charge to ~30% ABV.
That's a good trick for making neutral, but why would you want to filter flavor out of UJSSM?

I strip until my low wines are the ABV I want, usually less than 27% for UJSSM.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Sorry Manic, are your fients from a stripping run or spirit run? If they are all fients from a UJSSM then I would combine them with a fermented UJ and do my calcs so I was at 30abv for my boiler charge. Or simply add water till 30abv and run that way depends on what you want to achieve :D
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Manic Mechanic wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 8:55 am So my method is to collect 150 ml off the spout in a beaker measure ABV with a hydrometer measure the temp in the beaker and correct abv to temp. Then I add it to a 1 litre jar (receiver?) For UJSSM when I get to 81 abv I move my sample in smaller jars 300 ml until I am well into 78 ABV and move back to 1 litre jars until 71 abv and move back to smaller samples until 66 abv. Then I run out tails as far as I can before I run out of power at about 40% abv off the spout. My feints from 6 gallon stripping run (addition of heads and tails is about 68-72 abv when mixed together in the receiver (3 gallon carboy?) My question is what should I dilute an all feints run to before distilling? I would dilute feints with dunder. Or do I just add 7 litres of feints to 15 litres of low wines and run that? I make my final cuts by taste from the various jars.
This method more belongs to a spirit run. A stripping run you collect everything except the foreshots in the same recipient. You make more ferments, and do a stripping run for very batch. hen you have enough stripping run collected for your boiler capacity, you run a spirit run, in wich you do the collection in small jars to help making your cuts.
Does it makes sense the way I explained it?
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

Post by Manic Mechanic »

Ok. My feints are from a spirit run of 6 gallons of low wines run at 43% abv. I am ready to makes an all feint run and have 20 litres of 70% abv feints.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Manic Mechanic wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 4:30 pm Ok. My feints are from a spirit run of 6 gallons of low wines run at 43% abv. I am ready to makes an all feint run and have 20 litres of 70% abv feints.
This is starting to get off topic
You just need to choose how to dilute your fients to an acceptable abv for your run.
You can dilute with water or a finished wash (just do your maths with the wash abv) it all depends on how you want to do it, personally I would aim for 30abv, dilute it and run it and see what happens :thumbup:
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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That is the question. What is the acceptable ABV% for an all feints run? Is 30% the standard? I would need to add 50% water to my feints and run it.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method fients ABV question

Post by Saltbush Bill »

This subject was getting pretty convoluted and off topic to be in a Tried and True recipe thread......shifted.
If you add back UJ feints from each run to the next UJ run you wont have to worry about abv , they will be diluted enough by the wash.
Its personal choice if you do it that way, some do , some don't.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Manic Mechanic wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 4:30 pm Ok. My feints are from a spirit run of 6 gallons of low wines run at 43% abv. I am ready to makes an all feint run and have 20 litres of 70% abv feints.
How do you plan to run it? Pot still or Reflux?
20L of heads and tails on a pot run I don't think you're going to get a lot of salvageable hearts, but I could be wrong.
20L of head and tails diluted to 30% and some baking soda mixed in will clean up really nice in a reflux run, and you'd be surprised at how much neutral you could recover from a 10 gallon boiler charge.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash, fients ABV question

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Deplorable wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 7:10 pm 20L of head and tails diluted to 30% and some baking soda mixed in will clean up really nice in a reflux run, and you'd be surprised at how much neutral you could recover from a 10 gallon boiler charge.
Have you done a side by side in a reflux with and without the baking soda? I predominantly use my fients as my everyday spirit after I put it through a reflux and am really happy with the results, bourbons, neutral and rums all in the pool together then they sit in a carboy on all my old oak. Nothing is ever identical but it's very drinkable :D
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Manic Mechanic wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 6:12 pm That is the question. What is the acceptable ABV% for an all feints run? Is 30% the standard? I would need to add 50% water to my feints and run it.
Water is flavorless and great for making neutral.

There is no standard. I use my previous distillation records for a guide.
I knock my UJSSM feints down to around 27% using fresh wash and that makes me product good enough to keep me out of my ageing stash.
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Re: uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

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Sporacle wrote: Sat Jan 15, 2022 1:05 pm Sorry Manic, are your fients from a stripping run or spirit run? If they are all fients from a UJSSM then I would combine them with a fermented UJ and do my calcs so I was at 30abv for my boiler charge. Or simply add water till 30abv and run that way depends on what you want to achieve :D
So I took your advise an added 4 gallons of fresh wash to 2 gallons of 68% feints from a spirit run. Charge was about 6 gallons of about 35% in an 8 gallon electric still with copper reflux but no packing wide open . Really great run. About 3 .2 litres heads 4 litres hearts between 80 and 70 abv and about 3.7 litres tails to 25% abv. A bunch of smaller jars between cuts to make final cut by taste, really steady temps and run. I will add this dunder to next new corn wash.
Thx
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