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I have a 50L french medium toast new barrel. Im swelling it with water at the moment.
My spirit is 90% abv at the moment. Would it be detrimental to put it in at this ABV.

It'll extract a lot of the wood tannins if you do. I would highly recommend diluting to 62-65%ABV for aging.
ss

Sure? Tannin is better soluble in water than in alcohol.

Anyone ever did a side by side experiment something like 50% against 80% barrel or sticks abv, or knows a thread with such an experiment?

The people who do this for a living seldom go above 70% in a barrel. Not saying you shouldn't go higher... but the higher the abv the quicker you lose it to the fairies...

Sure? Because the boiling point of 60% is 81.7°C and of 80% is 79.5°C? This little difference really causes much loss? And on the other hand you need less barrels, what makes it cheaper. And generally I thought barrel aging is also diffusion, not only evaporation? And alcohol diffuses less than water.
Do you mean the philosophy at Maker's Mark with their low 55% barrel abv is greediness? Then why age the cheaper brands like JD and JB at over 60%?

While I'm sure there are better references to this, http://biotuli-hanke.fi/files/download/ ... la2011.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

hardwood lignins, stuff that holds wood cells together, are alcohol soluble. The higher the alcohol content the more and quicker they dissolve. You'll not only have bad flavors, but a leaky barrel.

But being practical, the angle's share, evaporation will be higher if barreled at a higher abv. If you barrel at 90%, you'll loose half of it to evaporation in short time.

DAD300 wrote:While I'm sure there are better references to this, http://biotuli-hanke.fi/files/download/ ... la2011.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

hardwood lignins, stuff that holds wood cells together, are alcohol soluble. The higher the alcohol content the more and quicker they dissolve. You'll not only have bad flavors, but a leaky barrel.

But being practical, the angle's share, evaporation will be higher if barreled at a higher abv. If you barrel at 90%, you'll loose half of it to evaporation in short time.

Lot to be said for a demijohn and a couple of toasted sticks methinks


Is wood on our list of "approved materials "

DAD300 wrote:hardwood lignins, stuff that holds wood cells together, are alcohol soluble. The higher the alcohol content the more and quicker they dissolve. You'll not only have bad flavors, but a leaky barrel.

Sure?
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 3/abstract" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
The lignin solubility in aqueous solutions of different ethanol concentrations was studied. The concept of the solubility parameter was applied to account for the effect of ethanol concentration on the lignin solubility. Experimental results showed that the lignin solubility increased strongly as the ethanol concentration increased from 9.5 to 47.5% then, it increased much more slowly until a maximum was reached at an ethanol concentration of about 70%. Further increase in the ethanol concentration resulted in a slight decrease in the lignin solubility.

So at 70% abv we have the maximum lignin solubility. Over and under 70% we solve a bit less lignin.

DAD300 wrote:But being practical, the angle's share, evaporation will be higher if barreled at a higher abv. If you barrel at 90%, you'll loose half of it to evaporation in short time.

Sure? Before evaporation happens, the spirit has to diffuse through the barrel. And water probably diffuses faster, because the molecules are smaller.


Perhaps some of you are annoyed by all my "Sure?". I don't want to say you all are wrong, only that this topic is never discussed and experimented to a final result as far as I know.

der wo wrote:Perhaps some of you are annoyed by all my "Sure?". I don't want to say you all are wrong, only that this topic is never discussed and experimented to a final result as far as I know.

Depends on what exactly you want to know. Collective experience of best practices can still be valuable and worth following even if the underlying governing mechanism is misattributed. The example of 'high proof aging extracting tanins', maybe its not true if the language is assumed to carry scientific precision. It would be true if you took it to mean high proof aging results in more bitter tanin-like flavors.

I don't doubt you already acknowledge the difference, but so many disagreements and arguments happen because of semantics between strict and colloquial uses of words and phrases.

Good argument BDF.

Perhaps interesting:
http://whiskyscience.blogspot.de/2013/0 ... ength.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
But it's only information about up to 70% abv.

Why not age over 70%? Perhaps only because of tradition? Most distilleries (cognac or whisky) don't produce over 70%, so they cannot age over 70%. But the most distileries dilute it a bit down before aging. Perhaps from 70 to 63.5%. Why? Perhaps:
The dilution to an uniform strength probably eased the common practice of exchanging cask between the different blenders.

I personally think, the balance between sweetness and spices like vanilla is perhaps best at 60-65%. But because I never tried aging over 70%, I am not sure. My spirits have normally after cuts 65%.

I went with 68%. I wanted max use from me barrel.
Heres a pic. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5BPDF ... p=drivesdk

Marly

Go for quality over quantity.
You are in Ireland and you are making whiskey, so I suggest you use whatever barrel strength your local whiskey distillers use and ignore the maximum abvs used by Cognac and Rum distillers.

Legal whiskeys can only go into a barrel at up to 125 proof. Most barrel in the 120-125 range. Although depending on the environment the proof may climb during aging and be above 125 when done.

bluefish_dist wrote:Legal whiskeys can only go into a barrel at up to 125 proof. Most barrel in the 120-125 range. Although depending on the environment the proof may climb during aging and be above 125 when done.

You makin "Legal Whiskey " ?

[Edit - looks like you are - ]

Pikey wrote:[
You makin "Legal Whiskey " ?

Some knowledgeable folks here are
OVZ

der wo wrote:
Perhaps some of you are annoyed by all my "Sure?"

Sure

OVZ

bluefish_dist wrote:Legal whiskeys can only go into a barrel at up to 125 proof. Most barrel in the 120-125 range.

Sure? The 125 proof rule is only for American Whiskey. And afaik not for the very cheap ones without a quality title like "Bourbon".
Scotch and especially Irish whiskey goes into the barrel normally at higher proof. But seldom over 140.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognac" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
...the resulting eau-de-vie is a colourless spirit of about 70% alcohol...
It is typically put into casks at an alcohol by volume strength of about 70%.


The "Holey Dollar Cask Strength Rum" has 75.9% abv. Because it is only 3 years old, the barreling abv will be similar high.

Hi, as far as I know, traditional stuff was all pot stilled so abv would not be any more than about 70%.
Cheers.
Will

Stainless wrote:Hi, as far as I know, traditional stuff was all pot stilled so abv would not be any more than about 70%.

Yes. And if they would reach more than 70%, would they diulute it or not? If a potstilled cognac would reach 80%, would they barrel at 80%? And if yes, why? Because of evaporation loss or taste or color or all three? I don't think we have solid answers. We only have assumptions to explain why the way of the tradition is the best way perhaps, and not only lazy- or greediness.

Hello, traditional folks have learn't this way of doing things over centuries with traditional equipment. I wish that I could condense all that knowledge into a simple post here.
Cheers.
Will