Calling Chemists - Removing Copper Sulfate

[Stonecutter]

don't let any of the internal parts of the rig dry naturally especially copper. Use one of these that has a heater built into it.



Before having that would set parts down in front of a shop fan.

I’ve let my rig air dry and haven’t had a problem yet. We have dry air here though.

[Bee]

And you’re not sure how to clean it?

I've never cleaned it except for vinegar runs and removing verdigris. I've heard arguments to the effect that they should not be cleaned under normal circumstances.

But I'm really just fishing for opinions. I don't know everything.

[Ben]

I just pull mine apart and set it on a shelf. No cleaning required. If I notice things are becoming especially nasty I will throw everything in the still while the backset is still hot. It's clean and shiny by the time things cool down, give it a rinse and shelf it.

[NZChris]

Assuming it’s a copper shotgun, making sure the citric acid solution contacts all of the surfaces should be enough to remove the verdigris.

I have a CPU fan set up so that I can use it to blow air through condensers to make sure they are dry.

[Stonecutter]

I've never cleaned it except for vinegar runs and removing verdigris. I've heard arguments to the effect that they should not be cleaned under normal circumstances.

But I'm really just fishing for opinions. I don't know everything.

For sure Bee I hear ya.
I know absolutely nothing. I realized that my initial post was lacking in the “helpful” department so I followed up with another. IMO NZChris and others have given some good advice.
I’ll start fan drying of my copper shotty as well. I can hear your frustration through the airwaves. It’s very disturbing to spend the time and effort into putting in a run only to have some gremlin throw a wrench in the works.

[jonnys_spirit]

I rinse my copper boiler/riser/condenser with water after a run and let it drip dry. I've been known to also not even rinse it for days and have not yet had blue distillate after many runs of different product...

The stillage left behind typically cleans it up pretty shiny below the liquid level and the patina above the liquid level continues to develop. The patina is more of a brown though not a green/blue verdigris..

Cheers!
-j

Edit: Added reference foto of boiler innards with water rinse and air dry after many uses.

[Deplorable]

Another suitable cleaning device is a bore snake. For 3/8 ID pipe I'd think a .410 shotgun bore snake(obviously new) would work.
I use a rifle cleaning rod to push gauze through mine and it gets it suitably clean and dry for storage.

[NZChris]

The last time I pulled anything through a condenser was to clean out fusels before a gin run. The next strip or the heads from a spirit run cleans mine.
I built an SS Liebig for the gin still and never clean that either.

[shadylane]

It's a shotgun with 3/8 tubes

Does the shotgun have a removable end cap?
If so, you can by mechanical means. If not vinegar, backset or a mild acid will be needed.
Plug one end and fill it with the acid of your choice.

[kiwi Bruce]

I noticed I have a pH problem going on and have a couple batches with copper sulfate in them.

Copper is everywhere I get that, but where do you think the sulfur is coming from? In my humble...isn't it more likely to be ammonia? We do use it a lot (DAP) for example.
Kiwi

[Bee]

I noticed I have a pH problem going on and have a couple batches with copper sulfate in them.

Copper is everywhere I get that, but where do you think the sulfur is coming from? In my humble...isn't it more likely to be ammonia? We do use it a lot (DAP) for example.
Kiwi

From what I understand, the sulfur is present in nearly all the ingredients, grain, yeast and water. From the crumbs I've gathered from various "blue booger" threads, water quality & plumbing articles, and articles on other brewing disciplines, the cookie looks to me to be a combination of unhealthy fermentation and pH being a factor in whether or not the corroding compounds are locked up in compounds that don't boil off with the alcohol. IOW, your ingredients will always have sulfur in them and your mash recipe has to keep them locked up.

Tough to find any directly-related material, but here is one that obliquely references it. - https://istillblog.com/2020/05/19/aspec ... r-control/

I use litmus paper, so I can't tell you precise pH levels, all I know is the color I have to shoot for.

ETA: Oh, this guy says it's copper carbonate, not sulfate. https://scotchwhisky.com/magazine/ask-t ... om-copper/

Now I'm more confused - but I still know that proper pH avoids the problem to begin with. Maybe lower pH binds up the calcium carbonate in the water.

Anyone know how I can determine which blue/green compound I'm dealing with?

[jonnys_spirit]

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/blue-dis ... stillique/

Two items work together to create the ammonia - Excessive nutrients and high pH will form ammonia in a ferment which can be the root cause of this reaction. Lower pH and don't use excessive nutrients if this is the scenario..

I have used ammonia before to purposefully patina brass and copper items with a blue crust. Vinegar makes green patina.

Cheers!
-j

[contrahead]

- but I still know that proper pH avoids the problem to begin with.

And yet your problem may not be with the pH at all. Several others have already suggested that the remedy to your problem might lay in having a clean top end; a clean riser and condenser.

I myself have had runs in the past where the product came out blue. After time, trial and error – I concluded that these incidents usually occurred if my still had puked. (My first still had a very small capacity boiler, and I was obliged to fill it to capacity in order to reap any usable amount of spirit. But this sometimes caused the boiling, foaming mash to climb up high into the riser and deposit slime onto the packing). Eventually I learned that cleaning the riser and packing after stripping runs, prevented the production of blue tinted spirits.

Not every blue thing that comes out of a still is necessarily copper sulfate.
(Copper nitrite, copper chloride and copper hydroxide - come out blue too).
--------------------------------
Litmus paper is not the same thing as pH test strips. While pH strips are more sensitive than litmus paper, they are still just indicators and not especially accurate.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=ph+test+strip ... &ia=images

https://www.howtohomebrewbeers.com/2018 ... -beer.html

[NZChris]

I’ve had blue in 17% ABV low wine’s when triple distilling Irish style whisky, but the color has never come across into the high wines, it stays in the boiler. I suspect your problem is caused by something that you haven’t thought is important enough to tell us.
What is your triple distilling protocol?
How do you know that you haven’t got verdigris somewhere in the downward path?
Are you using a cleaning product or protocol that could be causing a problem?

[Bee]

I'm pretty sure it was because I used all hard tap water instead of only 40% tap and my pH was too high.
I stripped hard, did a slow spirit run. Both were blue. So I ran slow again and was was less blue. I didn't clean any of the copper in between. I'm sure the copper is from the column or condenser - no other copper is involved. No packing.

I've had pH issues before to the point where enzymes would not convert. I added sugar to save those mashes. Using litmus paper, I know those failed mashes had high pHs. I solved the conversion problems (and the blue booger issues that invariably came with them) by lowering pH, part of which was by using less tap water.

[kiwi Bruce]

Copper sulfate won't distill over, so what you have, must be being created somewhere past your boiler...and that would be (my guess) a copper ammonia salt. Did you/do you passivate your copper work before using it? This will stop the copper reacting to compounds in the vapor trail.
Kiwi

[Bee]

I don't believe it is Copper Carbonate because that is insoluble in water.

On the assumption that it is copper sulfate, I added some sodium carbonate to a sample. The sample lost it's blue tint, but looks a little brown. I am talking shades of Just Noticeable Difference here, compared to distilled water. I was expecting some precipitate, but I'm not seeing any.

[Medicine_man]

Copper sulfate is produced by the reaction between copper and sulfuric acid. If your washes are turning out blue and you are assuming that this tint was caused by copper sulfate then only a couple of plausible explanations come to mind. Since the presence of sulfur is required to create copper sulfate to begin with; how did it get there?


Either you created the copper sulfate yourself by using sulfuric acid instead of acetic acid (vinegar) when you first cleaned out your still, or your high pH water in the wash is slowly cleaning and releasing this pigment from the inside surfaces of your copper. Copper corrosion by contact with air is inevitable and unavoidable (gold is about the only metal that does not corrode). Ever hear of acid rain? And sulfur dioxide can be carried by dry air.

My suggestion is to forget about it. The problem should wash away soon. A tablespoon or two of bicarbonate of soda is useful for removing buildup from the inside of a copper boiler (but your boiler may not be of copper).

As “StillerBoy” said: pH is a manageable task. It should be simple and easy to amend your water by adding either citric, malic, tartaric, tannic, fumaric, lactic, phosphoric or acetic acids. You should be on top of your pH management game anyway, to achieve proper fermentation with yeast. Get yourself some pH test strips (if you don't have any) but stay away from cheap electronic pH testers.

Oh; cupric oxide (a source of copper) in trace amounts is usually found in quality multivitamin and eye care tablets.

Could be copper acetate...it's blue in suspension and could be from heating vinegar and copper...either way, it too is toxic (LD 50).
I'd err on the side of caution and re-clean the still and start over.