Hello from Western New York

[axisofed]

Greetings all,

Ive been reading this forum for a few months now. Id like to thank everyone for the immense amount of information on here.

This sounds like an interesting hobby to get into . I dont have the patients for wine making... and labatts is just fine for me - so beer making seems silly. But i do enjoy my alcohol - so i figured why not give this a try. So my friend and i set out to construct a small "beginner" pot still. I read as much as i could on here but didnt follow any specific plans. Have a 4 gal SS stock pot with a 1" arm that tapers down to 1/2", then to a 3/8" (OD) coil... 25 feet worth of that. All wonderful to look at and - probably riddled with inefficiencies. But im hoping it makes a good *My First Still* still.

My first run (all bran) didnt turn out so well. For my cleaning run i used a gallon of cheep red wine... this is where things started going wrong. The smell of the distillate from the cleaning run was nauseating at best. Kind of.. rotten olives mixed with wet dog concentrate. Just awful. Ive heard of people making brandy out of red wine... so why this was so bad, i have no idea. I tasted a sample going in and its was ok. What are they using to make cheep red wine theses days?

Well, the smell/taste seams to have permeated the copper. Just smelling the arm makes me gag. But i figured what the hell, flushed it with water and ran the all bran wash. Maybe the awfulness would get washed out by the heads or something. No luck. My all bran run smells good (i think? dont have a good comparison), but has the same rotten olive taste... all throughout the run too (not just heads or tails). After the run the copper still smelled... blaachh. So im cleaning again with vinegar. After a days soak the smell in the copper has improved greatly... its still there a little but not any where near as bad. Im planning on charging it with vinegar and letting it run without any water in the bucket so i get steam throughout.

So, if anyone has any advice id love to hear it. Ditching the copper doesnt seem like an option - id more likely just get used to drinking rotten olive booze.

[Bushman]

Welcome to the forum, I am glad I read your entire post as I thought maybe you had missed the vinegar run. I would flush her and see how it performs. Also if you can post pics so we can see your set-up that sometimes helps. I am sure you will get her right soon!

[Mud Mechanik]

Welcome to HD, I'm with bushman, post up some pics.

[axisofed]

Oh, i should have mentioned - i followed everything in the new distiller reading lounge for cleaning a new still. Soaked in vinegar, then did a vinegar run, then did the wine.

Id also like to mention - im usually pretty forgiving on odd smells and such. Ill eat/drink just about anything. So when i say awful -

Pictures below. I used some high temp epoxy (jb stick type) on the OUTSIDE of the pipe, to give some strength to the whole thing. The lid is very thin metal. Everything in the vapor path is SS or copper. Using flour paste to help seal it.

I ran a 2 gallons of ~2% vinegar through - the smell has gone down but the pipe still has a wet dog aroma. Im starting to get really discouraged... :-/ Tomorrow i plan on getting a cheap bottle of vodka - diluting it and running it as a control SHOULD come out clean (right?)... if it comes out all wet doggy it may be time for more drastic measures. Ive read some things on baking soda being used to clean bad smells out of metal.

[Torp]

axisofed, run your low wines thru the still again. I always get the bad smell tails throughout my first run on a potstill. I am not sure why but it always cleans up after I put it through for a double distill. I run sugar washes also.

I hope this helps you

[Bushman]

What did you use for your joints on the column?

[axisofed]

Ill make sure to do a second run on my next batch. Again, my main concern is the copper its self smells bad.

Maybe i should ask - what does everyones still smell like? Does the copper pick up smells and flavors?

The joints are soldered with lead free solder. Three joints are not soldered and i use a combination of white PTFE thread tape and flour paste to seal those. Left those un-soldered for ease of taking down and storing away. Still getting the hang of the flour... looks like crap in those pictures... i used too much water.

[LWTCS]

what does everyones still smell like?

Smells bad,,,well to others,,,mostly.
Smells like a well seasoned still head to me....
Only time it ever smells,,,,,,,,not bad is when I charge the thumper with roasted orange peel.

Get over it and sniff yer piss.

[axisofed]

what does everyones still smell like?

Get over it and sniff yer piss.

*sniff sniff* smells like beer to me

Ill quit worrying and start stillin more.

[LWTCS]

Thats the spirit,,,,,