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I believe most of us are fermenting on the grain, with most seperating the grains in some way prior to distilling.

I have read the different perspectives on squeezing, overnight draining, etc. what I have not seen is quantification of the losses…. Again, just lots of opinions. (Some very strong)

Since squeezing is pretty process dependent I filled two paint strainer bags with mash and left them overnight. In the morning i had 4 gallons of moist corn, not quite as dry as squeezing to death, but close.

I put the corn mud in my thumper with a gallon of water to loosen it up some. I then charged the boiler with straight water and fired it up. The strip run went very smoothly with the distilate coming off very flavorful. Proof dropped quickly and held at 40 proof for most of the run. I kept it going until 16 proof and shut it down.

After the math and the end result was 0.78 quarts of pure ethanol extracted.

I believe my mash was around 9%, all grain.

In my mind, that is a significant amount of product that would’ve gone in a trashcan. There is a lot of likker in them squeezed grains!!!!

How much ethanol did you get from the stripped wash?

Tried squeezing the grains…Many different ways, just hate doing it!

Back to steam stripping on grain for the last few months. Still a pain in the ass to dispose of the slop and grain! It is easier to separate grain and liquid after a steam strip run than before. But as you found there is some more product in the grain. If the flavor is to much reflux is your friend.

Now the city has given everyone compost bins. So I have a place for the spent grain. No alcohol smell from the grains so it does not attract attention. Boozy smelling sqeezings attract neighbors and flies!

Your number would suggest that the 4 gallons was half liquid. If the 4 gallons was all liquid at 9% you would have 1.44 qt of ethanol. You got just over half of that suggesting the 4 gallons was half liquid. That seems a bit high to me but I do not have an explanation for your result.

subbrew wrote: ↑Mon Dec 04, 2023 8:52 pm Your number would suggest that the 4 gallons was half liquid. If the 4 gallons was all liquid at 9% you would have 1.44 qt of ethanol.

As I clearly stated, I hung these sacks overnight to drip dry. It did not pour out, I had to scoop it in one handful at a time.

The explanation you are looking for is grain absorption. The grain is not just absorbing water. It is also absorbing ethanol. That’s what I extracted from the grain.

How many lb of grain did you start with? Grain absorption is approximately 1 pint per lb of grain.

Thanks for posting. I'm also tracking these kind of calculations and experiments as a way to stubbornly avoid even getting a bag let alone bothering with hoisting it or squeezing. I'm open to settling on an acceptable loss if it gets me out of that part of the process. I don't have steam stripping capability...assume that means a thumper...maybe something for the future. For now I am going to ferment a sugarhead on the spent mash which will capture most of the really tasty AG beer in exchange for sacrificing some portion of the sugarhead.

A couple questions asked already above would help me better understand your results...
How much grain did you start with? Was it all corn?
How much ethanol did you get from the stripping run?

and if you know...what was total volume of your mash when you added the yeast?
If you have them OG and FG would be nice to know those too.

wanderingnunical wrote: ↑Mon Dec 04, 2023 6:22 pm I believe most of us are fermenting on the grain, with most seperating the grains in some way prior to distilling.

It would be interesting to see what percentage of the forum is now steaming fermented grains (or pomace) for the stripping run.

I know some say they can taste a difference, and prefer to separate the grain.

zach wrote: ↑Tue Dec 05, 2023 1:31 pm

wanderingnunical wrote: ↑Mon Dec 04, 2023 6:22 pm I believe most of us are fermenting on the grain, with most seperating the grains in some way prior to distilling.

It would be interesting to see what percentage of the forum is now steaming fermented grains (or pomace) for the stripping run.

I know some say they can taste a difference, and prefer to separate the grain.

I'd like to thump the grain one of these days but don't look forward to dealing with a 13g thumper full (or 1/2 -to- 2/3 full) of boiling hot spent grain so I might never do that... I get no lack of flavor with running clear beer...

Cheers,
jonny

Interesting results.
I probably spend a little more effort that some to squeeze the shit out of my grains, and get back all but about a gallon of the water I put into the fermenter. Where my bigger losses come from is the loss to the trub bed, or "custard" as the squeezed wash clears.
I usually toss about 2.5 gallons of thick custard that surely has close to half a gallon of distillers beer in it.
From a fermenter full of 24 gallons of water and 50# of grain, I end up with about 20.5 to 21.5 gallons of cleared wash at around 9% on average. That's what, 2.07 gallons of theoretical alcohol?
So if I'm tossing 2.5 gallons, it amounts to an 8th of a gallon of theoretical alcohol. Or about a fifth of finished product, accounting for cuts of course.
Acceptable sacrifice to the fermenting gods IMHO.
Each distiller has choices to make in their own shed weight cost and benefits.
I'm happy getting what I get from my current process. We're all after the same thing in the end, finding a process that results in the best spirit for the time and energy invested

Deplorable wrote: ↑Tue Dec 05, 2023 4:15 pm That's what, 2.07 gallons of theoretical alcohol?
So if I'm tossing 2.5 gallons, it amounts to an 8th of a gallon of theoretical alcohol. Or about a fifth of finished product…

That’s 20% … seems like a lot.

Any alcohol obtained by steam stripping the spent grain and custard would not have to go into the batch product if the flavor is a concern.

If they were stripped, is there anything else that alcohol could be used for?

Dancing4dan wrote: ↑Tue Dec 05, 2023 9:29 pm If they were stripped, is there anything else that alcohol could be used for?

Chucked in with feints destined for a neutral?

I agree with Deplorable’s outlook. At scale it doesn’t feel efficient to chase that last little bit. “Just make another batch ”

I will do a sugarhead or rumski and ferment again on spent grains with some molasses and sugar/jaggery/panela plus a bit more grain mashed in. I’ve also simply topped up with another boiler charge of water, let it settle, siphon & strip which dilutes the etoh left behind in spent grain. The abv if that clear beer will be oretty low but you could use that as a cooling additive for next mash too. Some of the big whisky distillers use that concept pre-ferment. Third soarge or whatever they call it. If you’re doing back to back mashes and fermenting off grain it might make sense to work something similar into your process.

Cheers,
j

Without hanging a bag or squeezing I got 71% of the liquid wash out of the mash in my last batch.

I calculated this based on collected wash divided by liquid volume of the mash (volume of the mash less volume of the grain in the mash which is estimated at 0.36 qt/lb grist).

So left behind about 30%. Of that 30% I'm guessing 2/3 (20% of the total available) could have been captured by aggressive squeezing process while remaining 10% would only be possible to get by steam stripping. For that batch I just ate the loss and was happy with the 1.5 gallons pure ethanol in my 4.2 gallons of low wines.

For current (new all grain) batch my plan is to collect the liquid and strip that, then combine that with prior batch for a spirit run. On top of the spent grain I will ferment a sugarhead at same total mash volume and gravity. My expectation is that in the resulting sugar head liquid collected I will include 70% of the previously lost AG batches ethanol and flavor and my loss this time around will be mostly the product of the sugarhead. I'm confident enough this will work that I discontinued my UJSSM project. I'd not thought of doing that as a rumski...that does sound like an interesting alternative.

Deplorable wrote: ↑Tue Dec 05, 2023 4:15 pm
I probably spend a little more effort that some to squeeze the shit out of my grains, and get back all but about a gallon of the water I put into the fermenter. Where my bigger losses come from is the loss to the trub bed, or "custard" as the squeezed wash clears.

I fall into Deplorable's camp, squeezing the daylights outta my grain until its dry and falls apart. Back in the 90's one of our salespersons making $500k a year shared one of his secrets: "Take the crappiest job (prospecting) and make it your own - embrace it and be the absolute best at it and the effort will pay off for you." For a 13gal half-cleared ferment this requires 1 hour of commitment.

Now, if someone introduces a method of filtering out the fines/yeast in the custard to recover the last gallon of liquid goodness, that would be great.

Twisted Brick wrote: ↑Wed Dec 06, 2023 10:42 am

Deplorable wrote: ↑Tue Dec 05, 2023 4:15 pm
I probably spend a little more effort that some to squeeze the shit out of my grains, and get back all but about a gallon of the water I put into the fermenter. Where my bigger losses come from is the loss to the trub bed, or "custard" as the squeezed wash clears.

Now, if someone introduces a method of filtering out the fines/yeast in the custard to recover the last gallon of liquid goodness, that would be great.

Pick up a small used plastic conical fermenter off marketplace. Homebrewing is on a decline and the gear is everywhere cheap. Put your custard in there and stick it in a fridge to cold crash. Everything will settle and compact and you will have the spoils.

NormandieStill wrote: ↑Wed Dec 06, 2023 2:33 am

Dancing4dan wrote: ↑Tue Dec 05, 2023 9:29 pm If they were stripped, is there anything else that alcohol could be used for?

Chucked in with feints destined for a neutral?

I was very curious about flavor. All of the distillate was very pleasing to me with a lot of the grain flavor coming through. no fusels or cardboard until the very last quart. Of course the proof was low so I did toss it back in the thumper with my final run.

Here was my full process to churn through my trashcan of wash.. All wash volumes are very rough estimates. Product volumes are actual measurements.

I mash in 20lbs per day in a 10 gallon igloo cooler. Grind grain to powder, dump in boiling water and stir. Add High temp enzymes at 185F. Regular temp enzymes added at 145 along with malted barley. I then let it sit overnight. After it reaches 85F, I pitched safeale s-04 english ale yeast.

Started with about 60 lbs grain 70%corn, 20%rye, 10% barley and I think 28 gallons of water. SG was around 1.070 but I didn't get an exact reading.
After fermentation was complete I let the cap fall and was able to siphon off about 7-8 gallons of cleared wash.
RUN #1
I charged the thumper with about 2 gallons and the boiler with 5-7 and did a full run.

Foreshoots tossed
1/2 gallon on oak @ 118 proof (great flavor)
Heads and tails saved for next run (about 3 gallons volume)

I went back on day 2 for more clear and discovered it only settled an inch. I started squeezing while debating the meaning of life. After about a gallon I decided to simply load up the bags and allow to drain overnight. The bags drained about another gallon of liquid and the resulting grain was "mudball" consistency..... a little more wet at the bottom than the top. Certainly not wet enough to "pour". This is when I became very disappointed with the volume left to run (looked like 5 gallons of custard).

I had been considering steam stippling from grain anyway and it seemed as if I created the perfect experiment to understand the content of the gain absorption and flavor. I scooped that mud into my thumper and added fresh water until I could see liquid in the grain. I then made the run with my assumption being that the product would be very little and off tasting.

Run #2
Foreshots came off at 120 proof
5 qts collected
1st qt was 50 proof

after full collection I calculated 0.78 quarts pure E2OH recovered. I tasted it also.... it was very flavorful and enjoyable to drink.
My thumper had 5 gallons of oatmeal that pored out the 4" opening easily into my backyard slop pile.


At this point I now had 4 gallons of low wines, 5 gallons of cleared wash, and about 2 gallons of fermenter custard.

RUN #3

Boiler charged with 5 gallons wash and 2 gallon feints from run #1
Thumper charged with 2 gallons sludge, all the steam stripped grain run product, and a gallon of feints from run #1.
I ran slow and low, collecting in 400ml increments and proofing each jar.
The thumper had about 4 gallons of sludge, but not nearly as thick as the all grain strip.

After blending I have 1.3 gallons (125 proof) and the taste is fantastic.
total E2OH production was 1.4 gallons (200 proof)
4% foreshots
18%heads
59% hearts
19% tails

Since I have the data, I also created the proof vs distillate chart below.... The chart doesn't have taste buds, but it does give me an idea how the still runs


Enjoy
WN

wanderingnunical wrote: ↑Wed Dec 06, 2023 12:39 pm After fermentation was complete I let the cap fall and was able to siphon off about 7-8 gallons of cleared wash.

Cool thanks for the detailed write up. This line quoted above jumped out at me.

My last mash was similar in scale...50 pounds grain in total mash volume of 28.5 gallons so probably 24 gallons of water, but I was able to collect 17.25 gallons liquid wash. I used a hop spider which is a cylinder of stainless steel mesh closed on one end...I pushed closed end to the bottom of the fermentor (but top was above top of grain bed) and siphoned from there. When that emptied I waited 20 minutes or so and came back and the spider was nearly full and I scooped that out with a ladle. Repeated every 30 minutes over about 3 hours with diminishing returns and called it a day.

Sorry if I'm hijacking your thread. I really can't comment on the performance of the thumper. It is something I've considered adding to my still but think probably best to get some more experience with my current system before making changes.

My solution is also to squeeze the hell out of the grains, so not much water or ethanol is left. I have a fruit press that is just big enough to squeeze a batch of 20 lbs of grain (into 10 gals of water) fermented mash, and that leaves very little liquid in the grain. I pour the fermented mash into a 5 gal paint strainer bag in the press hopper, letting it drain naturally as I go. By the time I get the last of it in the hopper most of the liquid has drained through before pressing. I get another gallon and a half of liquid by pressing, sometimes a little more. The spent grain after pressing is damp, but I don't think there's much liquid left.

A possible downside to this method is the beer going into the boiler for the stripping run is cloudy.... might be a problem with electric elements, but I use a propane burner and have never scorched a batch even running it pretty hard. I have scorched corn I'm cooking before mashing, but never the beer during a stripping run.

Homebrewer11777 wrote: ↑Wed Dec 06, 2023 4:26 pm

wanderingnunical wrote: ↑Wed Dec 06, 2023 12:39 pm After fermentation was complete I let the cap fall and was able to siphon off about 7-8 gallons of cleared wash.

Cool thanks for the detailed write up. This line quoted above jumped out at me.

I should clarify that the first run was only the easy clear on top. Fermation was done the day prior and no cold crash.



I akso run propane and have never had scorching with a cloudy mash. It must be a real problem for the electric folk’s because they are very passionate and outspoken about their clear mash.

I've not had issue with scorching with about 10 stripping runs to date and haven't made much effort to clear the mash once separated from the solids.
My electric elements are 2000 watt so that may be it is the guys with the 5500 watt 240 V elements that have this issue. Or maybe I've just been lucky so far.

Also I have not been in a hurry to get into the still. I'm a weekend brewer and I'm tending to go two weeks from mashing in to racking off the grain. I keep reading the note on Jimbo's Wheated Bourbon post about not letting the ferment go longer than 7 days due to concerns about lack of pasteurization of the grain but so far I'm not having that issue.