Home Distiller

Hook, I sanitize a couple of ways... before ever using them I clean them with heat, steam, acids, bases, brushes, what ever it takes to make them spotless, even polishing the outsides with an angle grinder and scotchbrite discs...

If I'm racking wine into it, I have used a potassium metabisulphate solution swirled all around inside and poured out. I have also used a couple of commercial sanitizers... never had any troubles. I've done big sugar batches in kegs and just boil the sugar and water together and let the heat do the work...

Thanks for that JD.

junkyard dawg wrote:I've done big sugar batches in kegs and just boil the sugar and water together and let the heat do the work...

Presumably you are using an external heat source, like propane?

just press about a bussel of pears to make four gallons of cider hopefully picking more tomorrow. got on this cider kick god help me racked the mustang the other day. and got 4 32gal trash cans of pintos sourmash fermenting on the grain tring to fill my 15 gall gibbs man i wish i would order the 10 gal. i got 5gal at 71% from another run from spring break.

I ran 10 gallons of mexican sugar wash thats been sitting for a month.Its been too hot to run it.It turned out real good and clean.I have 3 gallons of 80 proof airing out.{after cutting}I have 10 more gallons of it clearing out. Also have 6 gallons of white wine clearing out with some charred oak sticks in it.Its from my grapevine in my yard.
wineo

Got about 14 gallons of sugar wash going in a keg.

I started out by adding 14kgs sugar to hot tap water in buckets and proceeded to stirr with a drill and massive paint stirrer.

Then topped off with cold water to make 50 liters, dumped in 2 packages of turbo yeast then... then waited... then waited some more... two burps of the airlock in one hour.

@#$%

Ok so obviously that wasn't working, so I dumped in an extra gallon of water, 6 crushed centrum silver vitamins, and another old pack of turbo yeast and stirred again with the drill.

Within 5 minutes the airlock started opening up, now its releasing 2-3 large bubbles every second!

drunk2much you getin 4 gallons of cider out of 1 bushel of pears.
i aint much on perry but keep that tree at all costs

goose eye wrote:drunk2much you getin 4 gallons of cider out of 1 bushel of pears.
i aint much on perry but keep that tree at all costs

so Im told

I just got done with an interesting run. I was given a lot of quarts of crystallized Sweet Sorghum Syrup, in the spring, by a friend who has won several first places awards at the KY Sate fair for his Sweet Sorghum Syrup.

I made a small 5 gallon wash using the stuff using 5 quarts and a small amount of off the shelf lactic acid and DAP. WOW this stuff delicious as a wash. It fermented a few days and I tried the fermented wash. WOW it tasted like a great barley wine. I distilled it last weekend. WOW It tasted just like the Chinese stuff my associate at work brought me back from China last year when he was over there setting up a new gateway for UPS.

I have been promised lots of this stuff in trade for teaching my friend how to turn his surplus into fuel. He scorches a batch now and then.

If you live in the east central USA and have access to this stuff I would recommend it to anyone who could make it. It is going to be extremely nice on oak because of an extremely nice, full flavor which is slightly like rum but milder. It is also slightly like rye, but milder. As you can see there is nothing to compare it to.

Just in the middle of the hearts cut of my first bakers yeast batch. (Using tomato paste, 10% abv.)

Much cleaner than Turbos. Tastes good with plain water.

Even though the product I have been getting from the Turbos is quite drinkable and no worse than the commercial stuff, I won't be using Turbos again.

well the regretful news is they anit my tree though the fuit meat anit worth a durn the juice is a sweet as sugar cane. and for the love of god no more pears. There is no duplication in pear might i add and this is from just the fruit i could reace on two trees.

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yeha i think i answered my own statement of enough! :lol

use a weight on a rope to chunk up in tree where you cant reach
so you can shake em. put that bucket over your head befor you
comence to shakein
some folks run em threw the hamer mill an then let em sit for at least a couple days for they squeze em an herd tell folks sprinkle some type ameno acid on em so they release there flaver befor squezin. you gonna have yeller jacket all about but they dont much bother you unlessin you grab one or the weather breaks.

you can always take a scion for graftin

so im tole

HAVENT HAD MUCH TIME
was given 5gal of unhopped malt syrup (still got 3 left) fermenter #1
pressed several gallons of cider. fermenters #2and#3
sister-in-law brought 20lbs of grapes over this morning, #4 (tomorow)
damn I still got 4 carboys and 2 empty kegs!
I've been looking for someone that I can get fresh pressed sorgum from,
been suppling a buddy I work with, sum-o-my-rum; to take to his pioneer
rendevous(gettogethers).He is working on getting a gallon or so.
Glad to see pint-o thinks it's so good.
Now when winter gets here, I will have something to kill time on while waiting for spring. That and reading this site.

traded the use of a tool for 45 gallons of crushed tempernillo/cabernet s. grapes. really late harvest... A good winemaker could make some great wine with these grapes... Hope I can do it justice....

This has been a great season for getting nice fruit... plums and grapes! I have to make more secondary fermenters now... 'bout 350 bottles of 3 kinds of wines.... I'm in over my head....

110#'s previously frozen cherries, 25#'s cane sugar, 3pkgs EC-1118 prestarted in 3/4 gallon must for 12 hours (probably the most active starter I've made). Came home from work and shes poppin like gangbusters. I did save 10#'s of cherries to try makin a little panty dropper.

I can't hardly wait. I havent had Cherry Brandy since I bought it as a young Hillbilly . Wife can't wait to verify the panty dropping properties of this majic elixer.

pintoshine wrote:ditto CoopOz
For you JD

Deathwish wrote: this is a very easy wash I use 10lbs of sugar 16oz of wheat germ 1 tsp of citric acid I put all of that in a 5 gallon pot fill it close to the top with water and let it boil for about 1 and 1/2 hours then pour it in my 6 and 1/2 gallon fermenter top it off to 6 gallons total with water let it cool then add my yeast. I like to use red star champiane yeast it is only 79 cents around here. it should ferment in about 3-4 days be careful i have had this recipe blow the bubbler out and put a dent in my ceiling. lol

And that is it.
Mine should be finished up sometimes this week.

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Sure nuff looks like alot of us had this problem. Mine did the same thang

Johnny Reb

It must be just that type of week. I did a barley wine this last weekend and it was in a 6 gal pail. It didn't just go through the bubbler, it popped the lid and went all over the floor.

I rounded the corner in the wee hours of the morning saying, "mmm that hops and malt smells good" then when I looked down and realized there was a dark brown puddle all around my dining room table ...

Well, lets just say it's not a good way to start off the day.

cheers

~r~

I've got about 20 gallons of different molasses and brown sugar washes in the fermenters right now:
10 gal wash of of 15lbs molasses and 15lbs. white sugar, with EC1118
4.5 gal made up of 5 lb white and 4 lbs dark brown sugar, with EC1118
5 gal made up of 10 lbs dark brown sugar on red * bakers yeast.

I started all of them with about 50% of the sugar listed above and have fed them each 2X to bring the sugar up to the total. To my surprise, the Bakers yeast is pretty quick to ferment, and in feeding it it's brought the alc % up higher than I had expected. After adding the last 2lbs it's on its way to about 14% *if* it can consume all the sugar....just checked the SG and she's down to 1.001 so we're getting close, but I can still taste a little sweetness in there.

This is going to take a while to run through the little 5 gal. potstill

today I'll try to ferment pineaples and oranges. I am not convinced that fermenting fruits gives better taste than maceration but i'll try the following:

1) slit oranges with the skin + sugar (these oranges arnt very sweet)
2)very ripe pineaples

I've now fermenting :

- 25 l mead
- 90 l pears brandy

The pears are begining : 170 kgs to get 91,5 l juice, champaign yeast... It bubles since sunday!

you just pressed the fruit with your home made press? 90 liter is a lot, I should make one too. were the pears very ripe?

(and I found this, the second time I've seen one like this )

stoker wrote:you just pressed the fruit with your home made press? 90 liter is a lot, I should make one too. were the pears very ripe?

I didn't press with a homemade press but with a commercial one. 30 liters capacity so it needed 6 passages to press all the 170 kg pears I had. Yes, pears were ripe, but not too much. I grinded with my garden crusher (well cleaned and desinfected before!), let macerate the pulp one night long in some plastic barrels and then pressed to ferment the juice.

stoker wrote:(and I found this, the second time I've seen one like this )

Yes, I know this site, I've been inspired by their models... If you have a look on their forum, you'll find... Bujapat!

i just filled a 44 gallon food grade drum with a molasses wash and 2X30 ltr batches o UJSM

absinthe wrote:i just filled a 44 gallon food grade drum with a molasses wash and 2X30 ltr batches o UJSM

absinthe, are you sure 44 galls is enough? better bung on another one to be on the safe side. Makes my 20 liter batches seem piddly.

Doubled my UJSM capacity after last nights strip run to 45 litres instead of 24litres, Hoping it'll still take only 6 days to ferment mostly out?

Got 45 litres of DWWG (been going three weeks now) in one drum and 24 litres in another. Might put another rum down when i come back from canoing next week.



As always, 40 litres of kit beer too.

I got 100 litres of UJSM that should be ready early next week. Today a put a 50 litre sugar/molasses wash down.

absinthe wrote:
i just filled a 44 gallon food grade drum with a molasses wash and 2X30 ltr batches o UJSM


absinthe, are you sure 44 galls is enough? better bung on another one to be on the safe side. Makes my 20 liter batches seem piddly.

well i cut the other drum to make my double boiler lol

Just cooked up 25 litres of vodka, my biggest single run yet.

I'm set for the next 3 months!

nice story
have you considered aging in a barrel? since you have so much and the taste is so good ...

Those white grapes make good brandy.Even the seedless ones.I also made some good wine from some seeded white grapes fermented on the skins for a week.Im not sure what kind they are but the vines are 20+years old.There at a friends house,and his grandpaw planted them years ago.
wineo

hi pinto, i have a few questions :

1) what is the purpose of shirley's doubler ?

2)what was the final avb ?

3) what is the purpose of the double pot distilling vs a single reflux distill ?
you could get the same result with a column (adjusting reflux to your taste), reflux column isnt necessarely vodka. couldnt u ?