Wineos Plain Ol Sugar Wash

[rad14701]

number8, any yeast will work for this as well as most recipes in these forums...

The use of gypsum may be optional if you have good water... It may work as a pH buffer but if you will be monitoring the pH and can make necessary adjustments on a timely basis then the omission should not be an issue...

Give this recipe a try, and if it doesn't seem to suit your needs we have plenty more here for you to try that are just as fool-proof... Nothing ventured, nothing gained...

[stilly_bugger]

Hi Wineo and others,

Thanks for the recipe. I've set my first wash going this afternoon and have a question.

The instructions in the first post in this thread state that the specific gravity (SG) should be between 1.070 and 1.080, with 1.080 being the absolute max. I followed those instructions to the letter and my SG before pitching was only 1.053 temperature adjusted. I ran the numbers in the wash calculator at http://homedistiller.org/wash-sugar.htm and got a higher number (1.061), but not between 1.070 and 1.080.

So, two questions:
1. Have I missed something? And,
2. I've pitched the yeast already. Should I add more dissolved sugar at the same temp as the wash to bring up the SG?

Thanks again,

stilly_bugger

PS, like others I've come over to this recipe as an alternative to Turbo yeast. I just thought I'd go a bit Henry David Thoreau and include the costings (in Australian dollars), which I'll update in this post when I've run the wash through the still.

TURBO WASH, vol. 26lt (6.87gal)
8kg (17.64lb) white sugar..............................$7.96
Turbo Express Yeast.....................................$10.00
Turbo Clear.................................................$4.00
-------------------------------------------------------
Total........................................................$21.96

Single run through boka produces ~3.5lt (0.93gal) @ 95%

WINEO'S WASH, vol. 22.7lt (6gal)
3.63kg (8lb) white sugar................................$3.61
1 teaspoon (tsp) of citric acid........................$0.14* ($2.19 for 75g/2.65oz)
1 tsp diammonium phosphate (DAP).................$0.13 ($6.50 for 250g/8.82oz)
1 tsp calcium sulphate (gypsum).....................$0.33 ($6.50 for 100g/3.53oz)
1 pinch of magnesium sulphate (Epsom salts)....$0.01 ($6.29 for 1kg/2.21lb)
1/2 cup of baker's yeast................................$0.94 ($3.75 for 280g/9.88oz)
-------------------------------------------------------
Total.........................................................$5.16

Single run through boka produces ?lt @ ?%

* As a rough guide I calculated cost by taking 1 teaspoon to equal 5g (0.18oz)

[sparky marky]

I think that Is the gravity wineo aims for since he is a pot stiller. It will end up a little cleaner that way since he isnt using a reflux and it will ferment out super quick!
If you want 1070-1080 you need to use about 4.5-5kg of sugar in 25l. For me 5 kg takes about 8-9 days to ferment to dryness.

[stilly_bugger]

Okay, thanks Sparky.

If I bring the sugar up to 5kg, should I add more of the other ingredients in proportion?

[frozenthunderbolt]

If I bring the sugar up to 5kg, should I add more of the other ingredients in proportion?

Could do, personaly i would only worry about ballencing the water and DAP

[braemar]

I have been doing Wineos recipe for around 12 months and with very few variations'
I use a home made offset reflux still with a 800 mm column packed with scrubbers it produces 94% very neutral spirit.
I have posted my recipe below if anyone is interested, i don't use gypsum as my town water is slightly hard and it all works ok without it.
5 kg.of sugar made up to 27 litres will give you 1.07 sg (i use raw sugar it has a small amount of molasses in it which seems to help as a nutrient)
I have only just started to add an extra 1 kg of sugar when the sg drops below 1.03 it seems to be working ok and the quality does not seem to drop.
This wash normally ferments dry in 10 to 12 days at 26 to 28 deg. and i let it clear for another 10 days or so.
I do three washes at one time, i only do one run on reflux and do not filter at all, turn around time is normally one month this could be shortened with higher temps. and more nutrients or less clearing time but i reckon the quality would suffer.

Sugar wash 27 ltr #3

Ingredients:
*5+1 kg white or raw sugar (raw gives extra nutrients via. Molasses)
*2 teaspoons DAP
*1 teaspoon Citric acid
*1 pinch Epsom’s salts
*120 gm. bakers yeast
*clean water



Method:
*completely dissolve 5 kg. sugar in 12 litres hot water
*combine dissolved sugar, dap, Epsom’s salts, stir until dissolved
*top up to 27 litres with cold water (aim for 30 deg. & 1.07 sg)
*add citric acid & pitch yeast. (wash must be between 25 to 30 deg.)
*stir in yeast ½ hour after pitching.
*ferment until sg. is below 1.03 dissolve and add remaining 1 kg sugar slowly
*ferment until finished @ .98 to .99 sg. (maintain 25deg. to 30 deg.)


Clearing:
*let settle for at least 3 days then decant into clean fermenter
*leave to clear for at least another 7 days.
*Decant again if required before putting wash into boiler.


Distil:
*transfer cleared wash to boiler. (ensure no sediment gets into boiler)
*once up to temperature equalise on full reflux for ½ hour.
*collect first 100 ml. of spirit and discard.
*keep next 200-300 ml (heads) add to next run.
*spirit run on high reflux, adjust to keep head temp. under 82 deg.
*keep all spirit collected after (heads) up to 82 deg.
*any spirit collected between 82deg. & 90deg (tails) add to next run.
*dilute to 40% and enjoy

yield:
*spirit run should yield around 2.5 litres at 94% per 27 lts wash
*diluted to 40% gives you 6 litres of neutral spirit. Per 27lts wash

Regards
Braemar

[stilly_bugger]

Awesome, thanks for that recipe and the comprehensive instructions.

One question: heaped or level teaspoons?

[braemar]

I use a proper measuring spoon leveled off but it doesn't have to be an exact science.
Regards Braemar

[stilly_bugger]

Troubleshooting.

My batch of Wineo's Wash seems to have stopped fermenting. I set the wash going on 19 July as in above post, SG 1053 temp. adjusted. Then on 21 July (when SG was 1040 and pH was about 4 (rough pH estimate using a soil pH test kit)) I added 1.37kg of sugar and 1/2 tsp of DAP dissolved in 2.5lt water to bring up the final alcohol content (initial SG was too low). I allowed the dissolved sugar to cool to fermenter temp before adding.

Checked the mix last night (28 July) and SG is still 1040. The wash has been bubbling away at 1 'blop' every ~3 seconds all week, and is still 'blopping'. I forgot to measure the SG just after adding the dissolved sugar to the mix on 21 july, but judging by the SG it seems my wash has stopped in its tracks. Yes?

Any help appreciated.

[Dnderhead]

depending who's recipe, but but I thank your pushing the ABV ,so it will take more time to finish. if it does....

[stilly_bugger]

I used the recipe in the first post:
22.7lt wash with,
3.63kg sugar
1 tsp DAP
1 tsp gypsum
1 tsp citric acid
1 pinch epsom salts
1/2 cup baker's yeast

Produces SG 1053 temp adjusted (lower that what is suggested that it should be). So I added 1.37kg sugar, 2.5lt water and 1/2tsp DAP to bring up SG. That's a total of 5kg sugar in a 25lt wash. Well within the acceptable range. Max sugar for 25lt, according to the wash calculator on this site, is 6.25kg.

I might just turf it and start again. It was going well until I messed with it.

[braemar]

Hi Stilly Bugger,
I have just read your last post and if your wash is still bubbling at 1 per 3 seconds and the sg has returned to 1.04 since adding the extra sugar it is still working the sg would have gone back up to around 1.06 after adding the extra sugar and now it is back to 1.04, i would guess that you may be fermenting the wash at too low a temperature, i have found that this recipe is very reliant on the temp and the difference between 26 deg. and 30 deg makes a big difference to the fermenting time, i normally have the wash around 26 to 28 deg but any lower than 26 deg. and it slows to an almost stop if you still have the wash try warming it up to around 30 deg and my guess is it will go allot quicker.
Regards
Braemar

[stilly_bugger]

My wash hovers at between 16 and 18 deg Celsius sitting in my house. I might invest in a wash heater to try to get it up around 26-30C.

Thanks for the tip.

[Mangler20]

Wineo,

Any chance you could help me scale this recipe to 7 gallons?

[Dnderhead]

just divide the amount of ingredient by the amount of wash, 8lb sugar/ 6 gallon wash= 1.3 lb sugar.per gal.then if you want 7 gal. then multiply the amount wash you want(7)X 1.3=9.1lb sugar
you could do this for each ingredient,but i dont thank its necessary.

[tomgndallas]

since i have ants in my pants today and waitin on the wife to do her toes and get ready to head out to the walmart, i decided to give winoe's recipe a go. slightly modified here she is.

6 gallons of water, give or take, i adjusted total volume to give 1.08 initial SG
9 lbs of sugar, inverted in two gallons with 2.5 tbsp of citric acid for 30 minutes
3 tbsp of fermax yeast nutrient, with a pinch of added epsom salts
Aerating now and have pitched the yeast, 5 tbsp to get er going in a starter of wash
I had frozen about a gallon of water last week, pitched that in the mix before I poured in the inverted sugar, this quickly knocked the temp from 170 to 95 degrees.

When she drops below 90, which should be pretty quick i would imagine, I will pitch the yeast and close her up for a few days. Let yall know how it progresses.

Tom

[Mangler20]

OK I decided to stick to the recipe for now.

I am stuck however, using the same ingredients of the original recipie, I started with the following :

- pH 5.7
- sg 1040


After following the recipie, I was getting no bubbles in the air lock but could see the pressure building up and decided to let it sit to see where it goes.

Got up in the morning and the airlock hadn't changed, pressure still built up. So I threw in some more yeast (superstar distillers) and it took off.

After a few minutes I am back to nothing again.

What am I doing wrong? The temp isn't an issue, I am in Florida so it is above 80 in the bucket.

[tomgndallas]

if it is above 80, that yeast should going crazy. your initial starting gravity was a bit low. In the first part of the post, Wineo states that SG should be 1.07 to 1.08. I think the initial sugar added is a little low, but the lower starting SG corrected for the temperature that you have when you checked it with the hydrometer should just yield a lower ending ABV, which aint bad and will not stress the yeast. Did you add epsom salts, DAP, anything like that initially? At what temp did you initially pitch your yeast? Is it fizzing and just not bubbling your airlock? Is your container tightly sealed? I use a big container for my larger washes that is used for fermenting wine before you pull off to secondary, it does not seal air tight, so my bubbler does not really go off. I check and stir my wash about every 3 days, check the SG and make sure that it is moving down the scale towards .998.

List so more details and just leave her be for a few days and recheck your SG. If she is fizzing and the SG is moving down the scale, its working!

[Mangler20]

I pitched in the yeast at 95f like it says to do.

I am realizing that I didn't adjust for temp on the sg reading now. The temp is currently 81.5 and I am getting about 1060 for the sg right now.

The container is air tight, first thing I checked. Plugged the hole for air lock and squeezed container, no air escaped.

After opening her up, I see it is fizzing.

When I first close the lid I see the air lock start pushing the water so it is pressurizing but it gets to a point and stops moving.

I'm going to let it sit for now and see where it goes. Next time I should add more sugar to get the sg higher?

I guess the container isn't completely air tight?

[tomgndallas]

you got water in your airlock right? haha, just a silly question. yes your best bet is too wait a week and check the SG and compare it to the starting. if she is fizzing and smelling like booz, you yeast are doing what they are supposed to do. mine is fizzing away now, smellin good too!

[Mangler20]

Yeah airlock has water lol

But I apparently need to learn how to put the lid on tight, getting a burp every few minutes continously so I'm letting her alone for now and will check sg.

Quick question though, this is my second attempt at this wash and the same thing happened last time. Didn't take off until I added more yeast the next day. Does that mean I didn't have enough to start with?

[tomgndallas]

I added 1 tablespoon per gallon, i think the original recipe called for less, but I am running slightly modified. this is supposed to be a slow moving wash, i think 2 weeks or so for the total fermentation time if I remember correctly. if you do the gerber or the all bran, you will see a much more vigorous ferment going.

[Dnderhead]

did you aerate wash? if pitching dry yeast do not mix just sprinkle on top.or rehydrate.
it can take 48 hours to start working.

[tomgndallas]

did you aerate wash? if pitching dry yeast do not mix just sprinkle on top.or rehydrate.
it can take 48 hours to start working.

yep, what dunder said. I aerated my wash for about a half an hour or so while I waited for the temp to come down, and then also started my yeast so it had time to hydrate and start multiplying. I then dumped it in. just checked my wash...it is hitting the airlock about 80 times a minute...blammo

[Mangler20]

That's probably my problem, not aerating enough.

I'm new to this, what do you mean by hydrate the yeast? Just put it in some water for awhile?

[Dnderhead]

yes you need just enough water to cover yeast. if you stir in dry yeast you can "drown " it .so either just sprinkle on top and let it fiend its own way or rehydrate for 15-30 minutes.

[tomgndallas]

and I add a little of the wash I just made, it gets them going really good.

[Mangler20]

Thanks guys, ill post back after this batch.

I think I'm good to go now...

[tomgndallas]

Did she perk up a bit? Mine is still bubbling away!

[tomgndallas]

day three, still bubbling away, this wash smells really clean. will chech the SG thi weekend and will report back