Fusel Oil Lab Analysis Results # 1

[Photonic]

As many of you will know, the instructions of an AirStill (Easy-Still, Mr Distiller, Smart Still etc) recommend that for their "Triple Distilled" yeast that you do not need to make cuts, nor throw any foreshots away.

Despite moving on from Turbos, I decided to test what they said.

I made a wash of "Triple Distilled" wash exactly as the directions called for, and then ran it through my still.

The instructions say to collect the first 700ml of a 4l run, then dilute to 40% alcohol, and carbon filter. I did this, but I took 55ml of each run and kept it separate. I presumed this to be a mixture of foreshots and heads.

I sometimes send some of my wine to a wine lab for analysis (as I am experimenting with yeasts and nutrients) so I arranged for a wine-lab to run some tests on it. I submitted 100ml of foreshots, 100ml from the remaining 645ml and 100ml of the remainder after dilution and filtration. I also submitted some of the original wash.

The samples were tested for fusel oil content, and the results of some of my samples are shown below.

I was surprised to see that the amount of methanol was so small that it was actually recorded as >5 (less than 5mg/l), even in the foreshots! To be safe in my calculations, I assumed the maximum value of 5mg/l, as I did for the other fusel oils that I've highlighted in grey.
The numbers in the top left corner are the ABV% of the various samples.

Fusel Oils.jpg

(Click for higher resolution chart)

LD50 Data sources:

http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/HY/hydroxyacetone.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/IS/isoamyl_alcohol.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/IS/isopentyl_acetate.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/IS/isobutyl_alcohol.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/BU/1-butanol.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/PR/1-propanol.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/ET/ethyl_acetate.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/englishhtml/f8040.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/ME/methyl_alcohol.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/AC/acetaldehyde.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow


However, it is clear that the foreshots do contain much higher proportions of other fusels than exist in the other samples.

I also had a scour on the internet for the dosage required to kill 50% of rats that ingested the various fusel oils (LD50), I was able to find the human LD50 for Methanol.

I did some approximate calculations of how much spirit would be required to reach these doses, I hope that they are accurate, but I haven't had time to check them, so please scream if there are any mistakes.

I thought it might be of interest here, although I guess that the carrying over of fusels will vary from still to still and according type of still.

Next time I run a batch of a different wash, I could submit a sample if anyone is interested in the results.