All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

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aquasport
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All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by aquasport »

Hey guys
I made my first strip run today and I need your opinion on my results. The recipe is below. My OG was 1.049 and after fermantion I was at 1.006.
I am using a 5gallon pot still with a slobber box. I extracted around 1.5 liter of low wine at 40% did something go wrong?

Recipe:
2 lb - Simpsons English Peated Malt
4 lb Weyermann® German Smoked Malt
2 ib 2 row
4 gallons of strike water
1 gallon of sparging water
Last edited by aquasport on Sat Feb 19, 2022 7:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Hillbilly Popstar »

With that potential abv, your strip should be closer to 30-35%, unless you're using a thumper.

Strip a bit deeper, you're likely leaving alcohol and flavor in the still.

Not everyone here does this, but I typically strip until what's coming out the condenser is the same ABV as what went into the boiler.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by shadylane »

With the recipe used.
I would have stripped much deeper than 40% abv total.
All the way down to the point that only sweet water was coming out the condenser.
By stopping early, a lot of the grain and smoky flavor was left in the boiler.

Some folks strip till low-wines are 1/4 the volume of the still charge.
With 4 gallons in the pot, there would have been closer to 4L low-wines.
Do 4 stripping runs and there would be enough to fill the pot for a spirit run.
Last edited by shadylane on Sat Feb 19, 2022 5:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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NZChris
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by NZChris »

I scour the web for information from distilleries that are making products similar to what I want to make. I don't recall ever seeing any whiskey distillers stopping their stripping runs with a Low Wines collection that high. Mine are stopped in the mid to high twenties.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by shadylane »

aquasport wrote: Sat Feb 19, 2022 4:17 pm Hey guys
I made my first strip run today and I need your opinion on my results. The recipe is below. My OG was 1.049 and after fermantion I was at 1.006.
Looks like the mash protocol was good.
I'd add some more 2 row to raise the OG to almost 1.060
And some Gluco to lower the FG closer to 1.000
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Deplorable »

You've been given good advice above. If you haven't yet dumped your boiler, fire it back up and continue your stripping run to collect the rest of the alcohol, and flavor. Until recently my stripping runs have resulted in 35 to 38% ABV in the total collected volume. My last whiskey strip I went to 28% and then added almost two gallons of fresh wash to that. I noticed a very significant improvement in flavor of the final product bend, as well as more keep overall.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by shadylane »

How far to strip also depends on how long Ya want to wait before drinking.
If Ya want to age in a keg, Strip deep until its cloudy, oily and nasty.
If Ya plan to drink the finished liquor white and young, end the strip earlier.
aquasport
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by aquasport »

Thanks Guy
I've already dumped my wash - I got 40 proof using an Alcholmeter, It wasn't 40% ABV. I stop the strip at 5% proof, should I have gotten more low wine?
I was using a slober box not a thumper.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Salt Must Flow »

aquasport wrote: Sat Feb 19, 2022 7:15 pm Thanks Guy
I've already dumped my wash - I got 40 proof using an Alcholmeter, It wasn't 40% ABV. I stop the strip at 5% proof, should I have gotten more low wine?
I was using a slober box not a thumper.
Are you saying you stopped your stripping run once the product you were taking off was coming out at 5% ABV?

I think everyone here is thinking that you stopped once your total collected product reached 40% ABV which would be 80 proof and leaving a LOT of alcohol and flavor in the boiler.

There is a BIG distinction between what the % ABV is coming out of the still vs what the total collected product % ABV is.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Sporacle »

So this is where it gets a bit confusing, so you stripped in a 5 gallon pot, and got 1.5 litres in total of low wines at a total abv of 20% ? For that volume I think the yield is a little low.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by aquasport »

This was the total collected product - 20% ABV or 40 proof on the alchometer - sorry for the confusion, I'm new to distilling. I threw away 150ml of foreshot and tails that were less than 5% proof
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Sporacle »

Just for clarification did you collect into seperate jars or vessels for your stripping run? I only throw out a predetermined amount of fores and collect everything else in the one vessel with the alcometer taking the total abv of the strip, I do not discard tails as these will be cut during the spirit run.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by shadylane »

Let's see how bad my math is while drunk and I'm assuming the 5 gallon boiler was full. :lol:

1.049 fermented to 1.006 = 5.5%
20L of 5.5% Mash contains 1.1L of 100% alcohol.

After stripping If you only got 1.5l @ 20%
There must have been considerably less than 5.5% alcohol in the mash.

Next time you do a run, measure and record the %abv of the forshots.
Do the measurements @ the temp your hydrometer is calibrated at. such as 20'c
With that info we can figure the mash abv.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by shadylane »

aquasport wrote: Sat Feb 19, 2022 7:48 pm This was the total collected product - 20% ABV or 40 proof on the alchometer - sorry for the confusion, I'm new to distilling. I threw away 150ml of foreshot and tails that were less than 5% proof
We all make mistakes in measuremnets :lol:
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Sporacle »

shadylane wrote: Sun Feb 20, 2022 12:01 am We all make mistakes in measuremnets
That we do Shady, good maths though :D
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by still_stirrin »

aquasport wrote: Sat Feb 19, 2022 4:17 pm Hey guys
I made my first strip run today and I need your opinion on my results. The recipe is below. My OG was 1.049 and after fermantion I was at 1.006.

Recipe:
2 lb - Simpsons English Peated Malt
4 lb Weyermann® German Smoked Malt
2 ib 2 row
4 gallons of strike water
1 gallon of sparging water
This is what Brewer’s Friend calculates for your mash efficiency:
89CFA9F3-D72D-479D-B220-6FF7763187F8.jpeg
Notice your brewhouse efficiency is only 66%, meaning you didn’t extract the fermentable sugars very well. Time, temperature and agitation would improve your extract. Proficiency at mashing should get you to 75% to 80% if you know what you’re doing.


aquasport wrote: Sat Feb 19, 2022 4:17 pm I am using a 5gallon pot still with a slobber box. I extracted around 1.5 liter of low wine at 40% did something go wrong?
With 5.7%ABV, your wash is (fermented): 4.0 gallons x 5.7% = 0.228 gallons @ 100% (theoretical)
But more accurately, the collection should be around 30%ABV (low wines),
and that is (expected potential): 0.228 gallons / 30% = 0.76 gallons (2.88 liters) @ 30%ABV.

However, you only collected approximately 1.65 liters at 40%ABV,
which would be (equivalently): 1.65 liters x 40% / 30% = 2.2 liters @ 30%ABV.

So, you lost only about: 2.88 - 2.20 = 0.68 liters (680 ml) of the “potential” alcohol from your mash. It’s about a 24% loss of “potential” product.

But the keynote here is that your brewhouse efficiency, that is the ability to extract the best potential alcohol from your grains, is low. If you can improve that efficiency, you’ll get more product in the end.

As I noted previously, stirring the mash frequently to keep it agitated will help the efficiency. Also, holding the mash temperature stable will help too. And finally, the “hold time” until you get a good starch conversion check (iodine test) will ultimately tell you when you’re done with the mash step. It may take an hour, or longer to finish depending on the enzyme health and content in the grains. Supplemental enzymes (liquid enzymes recommended) would also help with the time to convert.

All in all, your first effort is not bad at all. It certainly is a knowledge gaining experience, right? Keep practicing, it’ll get easier and more enjoyable.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by aquasport »

Thanks ss for the encouragment, I'll keep chugging along. I have at lease 3-4 more strip runs before my first spirit run.
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Re: All Grain strip run resulting in 40% proof

Post by Avalir »

Sorry I'm late to the party. Just thought I'd share from my experience when I began my AG journey. By the way, glad to see the abv thing was just a typo.
I personally like adding extra enzymes when mashing to ensure maximum starch conversion, but a lot of that is because I work with corn and the high temp alpha amylase is a life saver.
With the distilling, I know a lot of us shoot for roughly 1/3 of the original boiler volume. Going deep into the tails on a strip helps bring a lot of good flavor to the spirit run. In my experience, if the low wine abv is too high (as a result of not fully extracting tails), once you reach tails in the spirit run they're already gross tails, so you lose a lot of great flavor by not having them. My low wines will normally be in the 20-25% abv range and it can be hard to tell when to cut tails after the spirit run because most of them smell and taste good. Going deep in the strip and having lower abv low wines will also help bring down the abv of your final cuts to something closer to or within aging range (if that's something you do or are interested in). I know I don't like diluting flavor more than I need to before I age, so lower abv off the still can reduce how much dilution is necessary.
Hope you might find some of that helpful!
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