Aging and Maturation.

[I am Still Standing]

Been looking at the aging process. Ignore the figures, that's just the working out.






Volume



100.00 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

1 98.00 2.00 2%
2
2 96.04 1.96 0.04 2%

3 94.08 1.95920 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

4 92.12 1.9591840 1.60E-05 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

5 90.16 1.959183680 3.20E-07 1.60E-05 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

6 88.20 1.95918367360 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-05 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

7 86.244064972928 1.9591836734720 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-05 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

8 84.2848812994586 1.959183673469440 2.56E-12 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-05 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

9 82.32569762598920 1.96E+00 5.12E-14 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-05 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

10 80.366514 1.96E+00 1.02E-15 5.12E-05 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-04 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

11 78.40733027905040 1.96E+00 2.05E-17 1.02E-06 5.12E-05 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-04 8.00E-04 4.00E-02 2%

12 76.44814660558110 1.96E+00 4.10E-19 2.05E-08 1.02E-06 5.12E-05 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-04 8.00E-04 0.04 2%

13 74.48896293211170 1.96E+00 8.19E-21 4.10E-11 2.05E-09 1.02E-06 5.12E-05 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.4E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-04 0.0008 0.04 2%

14 72.52977925864230 1.96E+00 1.64E-22 8.19E-21 4.10E-19 2.05E-09 1.02E-06 5.12E-05 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.4E-09 3.20E-07 1.60E-04 0.0008 0.04 2%

15 70.57059558517290 1.96E+00 3.28E-24 1.64E-22 8.19E-21 4.10E-11 2.05E-09 1.02E-06 5.12E-05 2.56E-04 1.28E-10 6.40E-09 3.20E-07 0.00016 0.0008 0.04 2%


0.04081632653061230 0.041124571048960 4.11E-02 4.11E-02 4.11E-02 4.11E-02 4.13E-02 4.12E-02 4.10E-02 4.10E-02 4.09603200E-02 0.040960 0.04080 0.04



Year 1 loss of 2% I.E. 2 litres. So 2 litres Added 2% of another batch
Year 2 " " 2% of another batch losing 1.96 of original , to 0.04of the 2 litres added end of year 1
year 3 losing 1.92 of original , to 0.0392 of the 2 litres added end of year 2



so from orignal you lose 1.95 top 1.96 % each year except the first year losing 2%
The first years top up you lose 0.04 in year 2 then 0.008 in year 3, 0.0000160 (1.6 ml) in year 4, 0.000000320 in year 5 (.3 of a ml),in year 6 .0000000064 it bearly discernable from a volume standpoint
year two top up the same and negligible after year 6

and so on . So what we really have is approximately this : 70 % is aged 15 years, 1.95% is aged 14 years, 1.95% 13 years, 1.95% 12 years, 1.95% 11 years, 1.95% 10 years, 1.95% 9 years, 1.95% 8 years, 1.95% 7 years, 1.95% 6 years, 1.95%. 5 years, 1.95% 4 years, 1.95 % 3 years, 1.95% 2 years and 2% 1 year. Assuming 2% losses each year . I dont know the origin of the top ups or how its done . i.e new or aged ?


So the question is I know there's interaction between the cask and the whiskey and all the top up's, but it seems to me that by virue of the topping up process , all whiskey is in fact blended. Is that a fair comment or not? That’s not to debase the fine art of aging ... I dont know much about the topping up process, but i think the rest is fairly sound within a percent or two.

[still_stirrin]

I’m not exactly sure I understand your question, but not all producers “top up” casks once filled and moved to the rack house. The angels will take their share, and depending on the cask size and atmospheric conditions, the whiskey may increase (or decrease) in proof through the aging process. Although there is typically, shrinkage depending on the conditions and volume to surface area ratio.

Personally, when I’ve filled casks, I don’t “top up” either. Rather, I fill (and date) another cask. But some members here may follow the “top up” method for their aging vessels.

Of note, commercial producers (like the cognac distillers) often blend spirits. But that usually involves blending the spirits after aging but prior to bottling. But again, some hobbiest may accomplish their blending in the aging casks, but I don’t personally do it that way.

In conclusion, your numbers certainly look impressive, if not mystifying. But they aren’t relevant for the way I produce my spirits.
ss

[OtisT]

I hope to live so long, to see one of my barrels make it to 15 years. I'm at 7 months and counting. Will keep you posted on this.
Otis

[I am Still Standing]

Thanks "Still Stirrin"
It was a theoretical scenario. I assumed a uniform loss of 2%, although of course, this would in all likelihood be variable. Yes, I understand that proof might go up, due to evaporation and down maybe if lower ABV were added, or perhaps moisture ingress, although maybe that's unlikely. I appreciate your reply. It's Given me a better insight into the aging process.

[still_stirrin]

... I understand that proof might go up, due to evaporation and down maybe if lower ABV were added, or perhaps moisture ingress...

Here’s a description of how atmospheric conditions might affect the cask aging process: https://blog.distiller.com/weather-affects-whiskey/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

and this: https://www.eater.com/drinks/2015/8/13/ ... skey-guide" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

Also, smaller casks are affected greater due to the greater surface area to volume ratio (exposure ratio).
ss

[I am Still Standing]

Many Thanks "Still Stirrin"

[Saltbush Bill]

For what Its worth , Ive never heard of commercial distilleries topping up kegs.

Quote "The most sought-after bourbon in the world, Pappy Van Winkle 23-year-old, begins life as 53 gallons of new-make whiskey at 114 proof.
What's left in the barrel after 23 years is a mere 14 gallons of bourbon at around 135-140 proof. What makes it into the bottle is even less. "
http://www.alcademics.com/2014/01/how-m ... rrel-.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[I am Still Standing]

Thanks "Saltbush Bill" Yes, I've heard that losses can be quite alarming. I suppose it's really down to an element of control of the ambient conditions if possible. Thtas an Amazing fact about the "Pappy Van Winkle" I am in the UK, so will try and acquaint myself with the methods of the Scottish Whiskey producers. I will post in due course. All help appreciated.

[zapata]

Scotts definitely do not top up a barrel as it ages. Their cooler weather does lead to a lower evaporation rate. But they like virtually all commercial producers just deal with it. It would totally screw up their age statements if nothing else. Age statement is the age of the youngest drop in a bottle, so you'd be turning a 10 year old barrel worth thousands $$ into a 0 day old barrel worth hundreds.

[Saltbush Bill]

Scotts definitely do not top up a barrel as it ages. Their cooler weather does lead to a lower evaporation rate.

Ive read on several occasions that even in Scotland most barrels over 18 years old are only half full, I don't know how true that is though.
Apparently that is why well aged commercial booze is so expensive to buy.............more so than the time involved in aging that long.

[I am Still Standing]

Thanks, Zapata. Yes, that was my thoughts. Why would anyone top off aged Liquor.

[Expat]

Yearly loss rates for casks matured in hotter countries are routinely double or triple that base number. Consequently their maturation period are that much shorter. Temperature means a lot.

[Single Malt Yinzer]

Topping off barrels is fairly common. "Slow proofing" is the in vogue term now. As long as you only add water the TTB doesn't care when it comes to age statements. It is supposed to help marry the water with the spirit better. Some producers are also using very low entry proofs of 50% or less for similar reasons.

[cuginosgrizzo]

A whole different concept of "topping off" is the Solera method. Solera means "on the ground", on the soil, and the name refers to the fact that barrels are stored in layers with the bottom layer containing the oldest spirit, while each layer above this contain a younger spirit.
In this method you bottle part of the oldest spirit you have from the bottom barrels, and fill up this barrels with spirit taken from the barrels in the layer immediately above this. you repeat the same with each layer, filling all the barrels in a layer with part of the younger spirit from the layer immediately above. You progress bottom up, and finally you fill up the top layer with the newly made spirit.

In this way you always bottle a mix of different aged spirit, giving a greated complexity to the product. This method is common in Rum and beers (lambic mainly) but it is used also in some scotch whisky. Glenfiddich has a Solera whisky.

[zapata]

Glenfiddich does not use a solera system like used for aging wines. Theirs isn't an aging system at all, but a solera take on a bottling system, or vatting system if you will. In Scotland it is typical to fill a large vat with various barrels, and even the single malt distilleries see enough variation barrel to barrel that they need to carefully choose which barrels are vatted together to maintain a consistent product. But most of them are starting from scratch with each vat and trying to end up with a blend consistent from vat to vat, year to year.

The Glenfiddich vat is just never emptied more than half at any one time, to maintain more consistency between batches. It probably doesn't sit in the solera vat for more than a day. Say they vat a batch a day (I have no idea what their production schedule is like). That means the whiskey they started the year with has been diluted by half 365 times. They claim some of the original whiskey from the first batch vatted is still in the vat, and they aren't lying, but after a year it's a miniscule amount, even less as the years go by. By Scottish law this has no effect on age statements, and in reality it doesn't either because it dilutes down very quickly. It does however work well to make the bottlings consistent though, because at each vatting, the half of the vat that they start with is blend of all their recent batches.

In contrast to a solera aging system for wines, the wine will sit in each "scale" of barrels for a long time, usually a year, so each new harvest is added to the first barrel and the same volume is bottled from the last barrel. Over time, a simple 3 barrel solera which bottles half of the third barrel each year will end up with each bottling being an average of 5 years old. The math is interesting, but the average age will converge on 1 + [ (#of scales-1) / % of last scale bottled ] Or for a 3 scale solera 1 + [ ( 3-1) / .5 ] = 5 So every 3 years you can bottle a wine with an average age of 5 years, after the first few years of a lower average.

Note that the Glenfiddich solera effectively has 2 scales (the aging barrels and the solera vat).
1 + [ (2-1) / .5 ] = 3 But this unit is in days (or whatever time period they go between vattings). So while some teeny amount of whiskey in the vat may be from the original vatting, the AVERAGE whiskey in the vat has been in there for only 3 vattings. Even if they only vat 12 batches a year, the average whiskey in the vat has been in there for only 90 days which is nothing compared to the minimum 15 years they age in the barrels.

[I am Still Standing]

Topping off barrels is fairly common. "Slow proofing" is the in vogue term now. As long as you only add water the TTB doesn't care when it comes to age statements. It is supposed to help carry the water with the spirit better. Some producers are also using very low entry proofs of 50% or less for similar reasons.

Yes, I was wondering about lower ABV at the start of maturation, assuming losses due to low ambient humidity would give a rise in ABV. Adding water makes some sense since i imaging it would come back to original ABV, at the same time the product would be mellow. I think this goes a long way to answering my original question. Thanks.

[I am Still Standing]

A whole different concept of "topping off" is the Solera method. Solera means "on the ground", on the soil, and the name refers to the fact that barrels are stored in layers with the bottom layer containing the oldest spirit, while each layer above this contain a younger spirit.
In this method you bottle part of the oldest spirit you have from the bottom barrels, and fill up this barrels with spirit taken from the barrels in the layer immediately above this. you repeat the same with each layer, filling all the barrels in a layer with part of the younger spirit from the layer immediately above. You progress bottom up, and finally you fill up the top layer with the newly made spirit.

In this way you always bottle a mix of different aged spirit, giving a greated complexity to the product. This method is common in Rum and beers (lambic mainly) but it is used also in some scotch whisky. Glenfiddich has a Solera whisky.

Thanks , yes this is definiotely the kind of thing i 've read about on the parent site , althpough it was not referred to as "The Solera" method. Thanks for your input on this .

[I am Still Standing]

Glenfiddich does not use a solera system like used for aging wines. Theirs isn't an aging system at all, but a solera take on a bottling system, or vatting system if you will. In Scotland it is typical to fill a large vat with various barrels, and even the single malt distilleries see enough variation barrel to barrel that they need to carefully choose which barrels are vatted together to maintain a consistent product. But most of them are starting from scratch with each vat and trying to end up with a blend consistent from vat to vat, year to year.

The Glenfiddich vat is just never emptied more than half at any one time, to maintain more consistency between batches. It probably doesn't sit in the solera vat for more than a day. Say they vat a batch a day (I have no idea what their production schedule is like). That means the whiskey they started the year with has been diluted by half 365 times. They claim some of the original whiskey from the first batch vatted is still in the vat, and they aren't lying, but after a year it's a miniscule amount, even less as the years go by. By Scottish law this has no effect on age statements, and in reality it doesn't either because it dilutes down very quickly. It does however work well to make the bottlings consistent though, because at each vatting, the half of the vat that they start with is blend of all their recent batches.

In contrast to a solera aging system for wines, the wine will sit in each "scale" of barrels for a long time, usually a year, so each new harvest is added to the first barrel and the same volume is bottled from the last barrel. Over time, a simple 3 barrel solera which bottles half of the third barrel each year will end up with each bottling being an average of 5 years old. The math is interesting, but the average age will converge on 1 + [ (#of scales-1) / % of last scale bottled ] Or for a 3 scale solera 1 + [ ( 3-1) / .5 ] = 5 So every 3 years you can bottle a wine with an average age of 5 years, after the first few years of a lower average.

Note that the Glenfiddich solera effectively has 2 scales (the aging barrels and the solera vat).
1 + [ (2-1) / .5 ] = 3 But this unit is in days (or whatever time period they go between vattings). So while some teeny amount of whiskey in the vat may be from the original vatting, the AVERAGE whiskey in the vat has been in there for only 3 vattings. Even if they only vat 12 batches a year, the average whiskey in the vat has been in there for only 90 days which is nothing compared to the minimum 15 years they age in the barrels.

Thanks Zapata
I understand. I have learnt heaps from my original posting. Certainly , why would anyone add / dilute aged product. The aging section on the parent site definitely mentions topping up though , so i am a bit confused. Does this relate to American Whiskey or bourbob perhaps. I dont have sufficient knowlege in this area. Thanks.

[I am Still Standing]

The term "Slow aging " seems to be what was being referred to in the parent site. Can anyone elaborate? Thanks.

I suppose you could go for lower ABV and accept that over time the losses (If low humidity" would increase ABV at the same time aging... Question. 1) Does the %ABV impact the mechanisms of the aging process any? 2) It is a given that humidity will affect the contents of the Barrel. Also, we are aware that the warmer the surrounding air the greater it's ability to carry moisture. So we would strive for low temp and therefore humidity, (Relative) if at all possible. 3) So what is the ideal temp /humidity to minimise loss, if indeed this is whats desired? 4) Does the temperature of the stored liquor have any effect on the aging process, notwithstanding the statements regarding humidity? i.E Does higher (Relative) aid in the acquiring of the softening notes to the alcohol? What is the optimum? I suppose its finding the best balance to satisfy all things.

[still_stirrin]

...Q1) Does the %ABV impact the mechanisms of the aging process any?

Yes, it does. Higher proof will extract more of the tanins from the aging vessel. It will result in a drying, astringent quality. Typically, 120-130 proof is targeted because of the compromise between good and bad flavors extracted.

...Q2) It is a given that humidity will affect the contents of the Barrel. Also, we are aware that the warmer the surrounding air the greater it's ability to carry moisture. So we would strive for low temp and therefore humidity, (Relative) if at all possible.

Yes, of course relative humidity affects the evaporation from the cask, as the wood’s pores allow “inbreathing” and “expiration”. Oxygen will enter the vessel and the water and ethanol will escape in the form of vapor.

As you’ve noted, temperature affects the air’s ability to hold water vapor (relative humidity). But it is also affected by the barometric pressure. So, weather conditions will affect the losses to the angels as well. Of course, wind (exposure) will affect evaporation as well.

A cool dry celler likely would actually result in more of the ethanol being consumed by the angels because the water vapor would have less “motivation” to liberate itself from your casks.

...Q3) So what is the ideal temp /humidity to minimise loss, if indeed this is whats desired?

Minimizing loss is not necessarily the best approach. As previously noted, the inbreathing brings oxygen which will help with the maturation process, reducing acetates and such. It helps the desired flavors to develop from the wood.

Study the aging processes used at the distilleries from which you enjoy their products. Then, try to emulate them, ie - vessel size (if you can), temperature, barometric pressure, even the %ABV that’s put into the vessels.

...Q4) Does the temperature of the stored liquor have any effect on the aging process, notwithstanding the statements regarding humidity? i.E Does higher (Relative) aid in the acquiring of the softening notes to the alcohol? What is the optimum? I suppose its finding the best balance to satisfy all things.

This seems to be the old question, “will a spirit continue to age”...in the bottle...in the cask?

Aging continues whether or not it’s in your cask. However, the impartation of flavors and color will not continue once removed from the cask. But aging will continue, as oxygen in the bottles will continue to reduce esters and acetates, although much more sluggishly.

How much is optimum??? Well, I usually age my whiskeys until they’re gone! So, optimum duration of maturation seems to be an elusive paradigm for me. All I can say is, “YMMV”.
ss

[I am Still Standing]

Thank you so much much "Still_Stirrin" You are a mine of information, clearly very experienced in these matters. I am enjoying my education. Hope these questions do not appearing dumb. "YMMV"?

[still_stirrin]

....”YMMV"?

Your Mileage May Vary.

[I am Still Standing]

....”YMMV"?

Your Mileage May Vary.

Indeed...lol