the secret to a good neutral

violentblue · Post by **violentblue** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 11:59 am

So whats the secret then?
distill, dilute distill dilute distill?

I've done the carbon filter, while it does clean it up some, it never really gets rid of all the off flavors

Post by **HookLine** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 12:13 pm

Clean ferment.
Tall column.
Patience.

wineo · Post by **wineo** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 1:36 pm

And multiple runs!If you have to use carbon,You need to make a cleaner ferment.

Rod · Post by **Rod** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 1:44 pm

I noticed a homebrew shop selling a mixture of sugar and carbon , specifically for use in distilling

anyone used this

Post by **Dnderhead** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 1:53 pm

Rod sounds to me like they found another way to rip folks off
lits see you take 5.$ worth of sugar and 2.$ of carbon and sell
for 15.$ ?

violentblue · Post by **violentblue** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 2:03 pm

I' getting a feel for seprating the heads hearts and tails, efficiently.

my current run doesn't reall have an off flavor, it just has flavor. thats not a bad thing If I were making a rum or brandy, but I'm attempting a neutral from a wash made of many different sources, any flavor would be quite confused.

waiting for my experimental rum to clear then I'll run it.

new_moonshiner · Post by **new_moonshiner** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 3:13 pm

if ya make a good clean run ya dont need carbon to polish ..

birdwatcher · Post by **birdwatcher** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 3:17 pm

new_moonshiner wrote:if ya make a good clean run ya dont need carbon to polish ..

I agree. I have never filtered with carbon.

G

big worm · Post by **big worm** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 4:49 pm

don't guess i ever had any of that carbon filterd suff.... most home made hooch just tasted like paint thinner to me. i think there is a lot of hobbyests out there who need to read this site.

Ricky · Post by **Ricky** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 5:20 pm

you are going to have some flavor in a good vodka. sorta taste like ethanol.

neatral is used rather loosely in my opinion. as for the paint thinner taste that was mentioned get the distiller to make a healthier heads cut and it should help.

wineo · Post by **wineo** » Tue Feb 19, 2008 8:42 pm

I make my vodka from a plain sugar wash,with only DAP,Epsom salt,acid,and gypsum,and a lot of yeast.I use 8 pounds of sugar.
I potstill it 2 times,making cuts on the 2nd run.It has flavor.Good flavor.
I do stripping runs and save it up till I get 12 gallons,then on the 2nd run I make hard cuts and keep only the hearts of the run.I throw out the tails,and use some of the heads for macerations.Even the begining heads taste better than a refluxed turbo.

frynturn · Post by **frynturn** » Wed Feb 20, 2008 5:33 pm

Rod, I've used that carbon sugar mix (Turbo Sugar) as it was part of my newbie pack I got with the still. Don't really know if it does much good - just makes the sediment a nice grey colour.

Post by **manu de hanoi** » Wed Feb 20, 2008 10:01 pm

the flavor really depends on the wash. Using a glucose/galactose wash i get something almost neutral, apart from a very sweet taste. And more importantly no heads/foreshots !

violentblue · Post by **violentblue** » Thu Feb 21, 2008 9:32 am

manu de hanoi wrote:the flavor really depends on the wash. Using a glucose/galactose wash i get something almost neutral, apart from a very sweet taste. And more importantly no heads/foreshots !

ya with my new potstill thats exactly what I got, just a slight fruity sweetness.
I decided it would be better used in a blueberry liqueur, rather than a gin which I had originally intended.

I, guess I'll stick to buying my gin for now, and I'll try my hand at rum, and a nice rye whiskey.

pintoshine · Post by **pintoshine** » Thu Feb 21, 2008 11:09 am

I ferment at a medium sugar content with a target of 9 to 10% etoh.
I ferment it warm, fast and dry.
I strip collecting everything except for the deep tails because of diminishing returns.
I collect enough from my runs to charge my column still with 50 L of 45 to 50%. I run my column fast and take off only about 10 ml a minute I am in for a 36 hour run. With 5 to 1 reflux it will hang up at 95% of clean ethanol for 33 hours or about 20L. So in conclusion, tons of reflux and and high proof previously distilled input.

stoker · Post by **stoker** » Thu Feb 21, 2008 11:24 am

cool, a 36h run

and do you stay around the still all the time, awake?