Discussions on how hard to run your setup.

[BamaBill]

Guys, I run two pot and thumper setups. My original 7gal stove top and a 15gal keg and thumper. From day one, I have run them more or less low and slow. Sometimes I have ran it a little harder if pressed for time with no loss in product.
So, recently a buddy and me were discussing how hard we run vs how hard we could possibly run our setup's. Typically in a 15 gal mash, I'm keeping 2 gallons of 110proof.
So, my thoughts are, if I ran it harder and faster... As long as I don't push more vapor than the condenser can handle... The alcohol has to be in the pot, in the thumper or it condenses into my jar. And therfore, no loss in capacity.
Thoughts?

[Truckinbutch]

Ayup ... One place or 'tother .
Personally , I pound strip runs hard knowing that I will be smearing the entire run . I just want to separate that alcohol from all that mash and concentrate it for a spirit run where I take my time to run slow .
How can you kill a rattler snake wrong ?
Mashes I'm racking and running this week are CO/malted Barley AG mashes . They are going to be slowly single run to get the most flavor before they go in the new barrel .
This is a pretty much 'roll your own' hobby where , if you are safe , you can fit your own tastes .

[BamaBill]

By the way, Truckinbutch, thanks for the response. I have a set at 1.040 that I'm gonna run harder soon

[HDNB]

i played a lot with my old potstill, fast and slow and found the happy spot where i got the best flavour. That being a little fast, but not too fast.
Fast as possible for strips but doing a spirit run if she run too slow the product was not good. If she ran too fast it was worse but there is a happy spot on the fast side of in the middle.

Lately been trying to run a 4 plate system for whiskey and it is such a pain in the ass...slower and slower trying to find the good spot because anything fast just blows out the condenser. my last spirit run took 22 hours (i killed it after 14 and then fired up for tails the next day and spent 8 hours getting the rest of the booze out.

[Truckinbutch]

HDNB ,
That's a perfect example of what SRD and I try to impart on folks we try to help ;
just how damned long a time do you want to commit to one sitting of watching paint dry (spirit runs) ?
5 gallons of >40% low wines is just about enough to exhaust anyone's patience on a spirit run .
JMHO

[corene1]

I think everyone has a flavor that they are after so we run our stills how it suits our tastes so there is a lot of experimenting on our runs. My self, I do 25 gallon ferments and run the first 18 gallons as hard as I can and as fast as I can and collect down to 20%. There are a lot of flavors in those low wines running it like that. Then I take my low wines and mix them with the remaining mash and do a slow spirit run. The results are twofold. I get really good flavors in my whisky and The quantity of mash that has to be run is more time manageable. Just my thoughts though.

[Truckinbutch]

I think everyone has a flavor that they are after so we run our stills how it suits our tastes so there is a lot of experimenting on our runs. My self, I do 25 gallon ferments and run the first 18 gallons as hard as I can and as fast as I can and collect down to 20%. There are a lot of flavors in those low wines running it like that. Then I take my low wines and mix them with the remaining mash and do a slow spirit run. The results are twofold. I get really good flavors in my whisky and The quantity of mash that has to be run is more time manageable. Just my thoughts though.

Great minds think alike . I've been giving reality checks to the average stillers to not run them away from the hobby .
I'll sit still over that burrow for as long as it takes to effectively whack a mole .

[BamaBill]

Thanks for the input guys. Today's the first mash I've had to run since the post. I'm running it pretty hard. I have a qt in 10 minutes and it's hot but my condenser is handling it just fine.
I'm also trying something experimental with my cooling water. Do any of you know what a cooling tower is???

[BamaBill]

So, I have a Liebig (1/2" in a 2" packed shell). I'm circulating with a goldfish pond pump ($15 harbor freight). 5 gallon bucket of water with a home made evaporative cooler up top.
I think I can run this whole 15 gallons without a water change...
Cool, huh?

[Truckinbutch]

So, I have a Liebig (1/2" in a 2" packed shell). I'm circulating with a goldfish pond pump ($15 harbor freight). 5 gallon bucket of water with a home made evaporative cooler up top.
I think I can run this whole 15 gallons without a water change...
Cool, huh?

Sounds good to me .

[BamaBill]

15 gallon setup. Hit the two gallon mark in two hours. 120 smeared together. Still going. The condenser water temp hasn't been above 113° and still on the original 5 gallon closed loop.
YouTube evaporative coolers for ideas if you want to conserve water or never worry about replacing water again.

[BamaBill]

Also, I noticed it's smoother than when I ran it slow. 142 didn't burn like it should have. This whole batch taste like the hearts of my previous runs. Strange.

[Truckinbutch]

We always like to hear positive results

[rubber duck]

There are so many ways to go. If I'm running a bigger still ill single foot it slow. If I'm running a keg size still ill double run it but crank it down pretty low on the heat. If I'm running a thumper or a plate rig I'll run a little faster.

It's not really about the proof, it's the exact rig and what the proof is for your setup. There is recipe as well.

Dialing your recipe to your setup is critical. I can give you a recipe that works well on my rig but not yours.

[Swedish Pride]

I think everyone has a flavor that they are after so we run our stills how it suits our tastes so there is a lot of experimenting on our runs. My self, I do 25 gallon ferments and run the first 18 gallons as hard as I can and as fast as I can and collect down to 20%. There are a lot of flavors in those low wines running it like that. Then I take my low wines and mix them with the remaining mash and do a slow spirit run. The results are twofold. I get really good flavors in my whisky and The quantity of mash that has to be run is more time manageable. Just my thoughts though.

yeah I like 1.5 runs as well carries a lot of flavour and as you say makes it more time manageable.
I'm big in to trying to learn my plater atm but have to say a thumper is intriguing me more and more, might have to scratch that itch a bit down the road.
A thumper would help gettign the ABV in the oakign range on a 1.5 run, I've always found myself a tad low % on 1.5 runs 55-60 range on the kepers

[Kareltje]

I tend to run stripping runs as hard as I can, but that always was quite slow, because I had a condenser cooled by air.
Spirit runs I do as slow as needed: a very slow start to collect all the nasties in the head and later a bit harder.

Now that I have a watercooled condenser and a thumper, I will go experiment a bit.

I was very intrigued by the remark that there is a optimal speed between very fast and very slow.

[MDH]

When I distill in a basic pot I typically hit about 74% tops on the second distillation for both Rye and Barley.

When I first started distilling, I was told to run "as slowly as possible" to obtain the best spirit in all scenarios. This is good for Vodka. This was not correct for everything else.

From a distiller from Kentucky (I'm sworn to secrecy... but just think of the word "Ace" and fill in the rest), I was told that they will not run the stills during extremely cold weather because the excess heat loss leads to excessive reflux, which makes the bourbon too neutral.

I also met Scottish distillers at trade events, some of with whome I had very long and in-depth conversation, and they told me the same thing - too slow of a distillation, or too much induced reflux and you will lose the essential, complex, well-rounded character that defines a spirit.

So, run slow, yes... But on the fast end of slow.

[Kareltje]

Sounds a bit like what HDNB said.

[Pikey]

........From a distiller from Kentucky (I'm sworn to secrecy... but just think of the word "Ace" and fill in the rest), I was told that they will not run the stills during extremely cold weather because the excess heat loss leads to excessive reflux, which makes the bourbon too neutral.

I also met Scottish distillers at trade events, some of with whome I had very long and in-depth conversation, and they told me the same thing - too slow of a distillation, or too much induced reflux and you will lose the essential, complex, well-rounded character that defines a spirit.

So, run slow, yes... But on the fast end of slow.

Never realised you can get too much passive reflux with a pot - probably never been cold enough here at the right time - food for thought tho'

[der wo]

I also met Scottish distillers at trade events, some of with whome I had very long and in-depth conversation, and they told me the same thing - too slow of a distillation, or too much induced reflux and you will lose the essential, complex, well-rounded character that defines a spirit. But compared to us hobby distillers they run slowly. An average stripping run in Scotland needs 5h, an average spirit run 7h. And looking at the shape of their stills, if they don't want passive reflux, they wouldn't spend so much money for so much copper for such long columns, which need much space and waste energy. Some even have a small thumper (Ardbeg for example) or an active cooled column (Dalmore for example)

So, run slow, yes... But on the fast end of slow. ...and then turn the heat only a hair down, ok?

[BamaBill]

I have a nice little sweet potato mash that I like to run. I ran my last batch as hard as I could in my pot still and thumper. I can say the abv was the same, and I had slightly more yield that didn't cloud up. I can also say it had less "bite" than any run I've ever made to date.
Man it was smooth.