New barrel aging for rum

[DFitz]

I'm filling a toasted barrel (no char) with rum. I hope to get a nice blonde rum from this attempt. This is the first alcohol going into this barrel. Do you have any advice in regard to time the rum ages? I figure I'll let time do its thing and sample occasionally to be sure not to over oak. I have two used, charred five gallon barrels in reserve but would rather not use them for rum.

Any advice on this?

[Bushman]

Sounds like a good plan, how big is the barrel? Usually the larger the barrel the less contact surface with alcohol and the longer it takes.

[DFitz]

10 gallons

[HolyBear]

Rtalbigr is one of the kinda barrel/aging experts here. If you don't get a response, you might try pm him...

[Burks]

Just out of curiosity, where are you acquiring your kegs from?

[DFitz]

I picked them up at Gibbs Bros. in Hot Springs AR

[Filago]

Not sure if anyone has seen this site bought a couple small ones charred inside new barrels swelled tight in 20 minutes with warm water gonna try and leave my full 1 liter of nuetral till Mamasitas birthday in May any concerns or input on these or the Co. selling'em? oakbarrelsltd.com

[bcboyz86]

There is a website: http://1000oaksbarrel.com/index.php?pag ... &Itemid=39" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
Has a TON of different barrells and they don't seem to be much of a price difference than anywhere else, except there's a huge difference in variety. And they have sets that come with essences if that's your cup of tea. I will definitely be getting mine from them when the time comes. Hopefully I will have enough disposable income to get a 5 or 10gal one too. And maybe a few smaller 2 or 3L ones for experimenting...

[bcboyz86]

I haven't personally done any oaking in barrells, but I think 5 months is a bit long... Might end up with a very oaky not tasty linker :/ my plan was to put it on oak for 2 weeks and take a sip. Small barrells, especially new ones give off tons of flavors as opposed to thief bigger brothers because of the alcohol:wood surface area ratio. But maybe a month on oak and 4 months in a big glass jar might work well. A good 5 mo.the of aging and a solid month(wicho equals out to about a year in a bigger barrell worth of woody goodness) might turn out really nice.