Added water to distillate and it went cloudy

[Hudster2001]

I was watering down my distillate to get to the specified ABV, and without thinking I added water to the distillate and it went cloudy. Will it clear or is this batch ruined?

I don't think It went cloudy because of any tails or oils, I had a 3L batch at 93% abv of distillate, I didn't use the first 500ml and the last litre, it just didn't feel good in the mouth.
So i just went with the nice tasting mouth feeling cuts.

Also on my first run, every bottle has some condensation on the bottle neck on the inside, any idea what causes that?

[NZChris]

Bad cuts. You didn't say what you were making.

The condensation occurs when the neck is colder than the contents.

[Hudster2001]

I don't think it was bad cuts. It mentions in a post on this forum that "Also note that the calculator labeling was worded so as to be a reminder that alcohol should be added to water, not water added to alcohol, to help reduce the possibility of clouding the resulting mixture"
https://homedistiller.org/wiki/index.php/htm/calc ... d14701.htm
It was this that happened to me, I'm just wondering if it will be permanently cloudy

[Hudster2001]

Forgot to mention it was a tomato paste sugar wash

[Deplorable]

How did you run it? what type of still? How fast was your take off? What was the total charge volume and ABV?
At 93%, I'm going to venture a guess that you were running a reflux column, and you pushed your take off speed a little too far and pushed tails through the heads. It may smell okay and taste okay, but you have fusel oils in your final blend and its clouding. Bad mouth feel is also an indicator you may have stuffed your cuts.
If you kept 3L and discarded 1.5L, I'm thinking you got greedy, and you're paying the price.

[NZChris]

Probably also paying the price for not stripping it first. I suggest you strip another two charges worth and add this run to those low wines for a spirit run.

[Saltbush Bill]

Also note that the calculator labeling was worded so as to be a reminder that alcohol should be added to water, not water added to alcohol, to help reduce the possibility of clouding the resulting mixture"
https://homedistiller.org/wiki/index.php/htm/calc ... d14701.htm
It was this that happened to me, I'm just wondering if it will be permanently cloudy

Ive read that , but never payed any attention to it, Ive always added water to spirit, be it Sugar washes , Rum , Sugar heads like UJSSM or Grain based spirits........never once had a clouding issue.
TPW run through a T500 if Im right ?
I suggest you went to far into tails when making cuts ......or ran the still to fast and smeared tails.......The latter of the two is less likely because if you ran a T500 that fast your ABV would be lower I think. Was your 93%abv temp corrected?

[maltyguy]

did you use a plastic/silicone gasket? could be it.

[6 Row Joe]

Fusel oils. Too close to the tails. You can see them entering the jar. Think "oil in water" . Unless you are doing a stripping run, when you see it stop before you go too far. Dilute it to 30-40% and run it again.

[Hudster2001]

I don't think I went into into the tails at all, I had 3.7 litres of distillate in 100ml cuts, I discarded the first 500ml as foreshots and heads. And the last 10 jars, (1 litre) was put aside to add back into my next run.
I then rated each jar in turn, starting with the middle jar I worked my way out, diluting a sample from each one form to 30% abv, and tasted them all.
After that I discarded another two jars, both from the start of the run, they had a slight burn when swallowed.
So what I was left was almost 2 litres of 94% abv . I diluted each jar separately, and bottled without mixing them, but they are all cloudy, so for it to be tails would mean I had tails in each cut through the entire run, is that possible?

[still_stirrin]

… I diluted each jar separately, and bottled without mixing them, but they are all cloudy …

What kind of water did you use?

Minerals in tap water will cause a haze sometimes. You shouldn’t see this problem if you use distilled water or even reverse osmosis filtered water to temper your spirits.

But you can always rerun the diluted spirit and reclear it. Just be sure to use the right tempering water next time.
ss

[Hudster2001]

I used Highland spring bottled water, it has a high calcium content, so it has a nice creamy feel.
I'll just abandon this batch and redistill it I think.
I might keep a litre back and leave it for a few weeks to see if it clears on its own.

[still_stirrin]

I used Highland spring bottled water, it has a high calcium content, so it has a nice creamy feel….

Well, that’s the source of your “cloud”. Use distilled water (or R.O. water) only. The “spring water” minerals will cause the haze in alcohol.
ss

[NZChris]

If it tastes good, filter it through your liver.

[Hudster2001]

I found an old post on here which said to try 2 things. Firstly to take a sample and add more water if it goes clear it's minerals in the water. Secondly to take a sample and swirl it round a glass, then pour it away, and smell the glass door after few hours, if it smells bad it's tails.

I did both. The glass smelled ok, so it wasn't tails. Adding water to bring the abv to 30% cleared it instantly, so I'm fairly confident it was minerals.

So I'm going to run it through a filter to clean it up, hopefully.

[Hudster2001]

This is driving me nuts. I took some of this batch of neutral spirit that I had left, and as an experiment, I blended it together and diluted it down to 45%, in 2 brand new and cleaned 10 litre bottles. One has went cloudy and one hasn't. How does that happen, surely if it was tails they would both be cloudy.
I've lost faith in that batch, so it's all being dumped, and I'll start again.
I just can't figure out how 2 bottles of the same blended batch would behave differently.

[still_stirrin]

This is driving me nuts….I've lost faith in that batch, so it's all being dumped, and I'll start again.

“Dump it” back into your boiler and rerun it!

Or, you could “dump the 2 jugs together” and then separate them. That way, both will “look” the same….and taste the same. And you won’t have to worry about the difference in the appearance or taste.
ss

[NZChris]

Dumping it is the worst way to deal with it.

[bluc]

I wouldnt worry about it. Mix it with some coke. I have had louching from tails and also had chill haze in whiskey.(only clouds when cold).

[still_stirrin]

…. Mix it with some coke….

Pepsi, OK?

[bluc]

Yea