Somebody please check my math - 2x expected volume

[scubatech]

This is a first for me. Last week I whipped up a 13 gallon batch of honey wheated bourbon. Decided to do a stripping run last night and ended up with twice the expected total volume. I'm running a pot still with no thumper. My recipe is:

Yield 13 Gallons
Total Mash bill 29.3 lbs
SG 1.070
Grain lbs/G 2.25

Grain bill Amount(lbs) PPG %

Cracked Corn 17.9 30 59%
Red Wheat Malt 2.7 37.3 9%
White Wheat Malt 2.4 39.1 9%
Golden Promise Malt 2.4 37 9%
Rolled Oats 1.8 33 7%
American Honey Malt 1.9 37.7 7%

Total 29.3 100%

I ground all grains to flour as usual and after conversion ended up with a higher 1.078 SG, good enough for government work. FG was 1.000 which should give me 10.24% abv. Didn't want to deal with the sludge so I drew off exactly 5 gallons and stripped down to 23% before calling it quits. 5 x 10.24% should give me about .51 gallons in total but I ended up with .87 gallons of 44% low wines, almost twice the expected total volume. Maybe my points per gallon are off. I use Brewers Friend and sometimes there are ingredients with multiple points, but I wouldn't think I would be that far off. Besides, the SG is the SG regardless of points right? Probably shouldn't try to do late night math. yeah let's go with that.

[Sporacle]

The potential yield was total available alcohol, so that's based on 100 ABV.

Your strip volume is nearly double because it's roughly half the ABV of the potential yield.

Personally I would go a lot lower with the strip, I go until the total of the low wines is under 30

[scubatech]

Thanks Sporacle. Makes sense in the light of day. Would have gone deeper but it was late and wife was giving me the side eye.

[howie]

I ground all grains to flour as usual and after conversion ended up with a higher 1.078 SG, good enough for government work. FG was 1.000 which should give me 10.24% abv. Didn't want to deal with the sludge so I drew off exactly 5 gallons and stripped down to 23% before calling it quits. 5 x 10.24% should give me about .51 gallons in total but I ended up with .87 gallons of 44% low wines, almost twice the expected total volume. Maybe my points per gallon are off. I use Brewers Friend and sometimes there are ingredients with multiple points, but I wouldn't think I would be that far off. Besides, the SG is the SG regardless of points right? Probably shouldn't try to do late night math. yeah let's go with that.

i use a way that has no scientific value, but should be roughly correct.
i multiply the volume by the ABV to give me, what i call alcohol points.
ie 18.9L (5 gall) of 10.24% = 193.53 points
3.29L (0.87 gall) of 44% = 144.76 points
therefore you have only extracted 75% (per cent) of the available alcohol, which is low IMHO.
similar to sporacle, i strip down to about 10-15%abv at the spout, to give my low wines a total of 40%abv

obviously you will never strip out all of your alcohol, but the residue will be pretty low in ABV.
a strip 2 days ago went like this, the ABV would be similar to yours...(so using your 10.24% abv)
23L (6 gall) x 10.24%= 235.52 points
5.3L (1.45 gall) x 40% = 212 points
which means i extracted 90% per cent of the available alcohol.

[JustinNZ]

If you’re getting the side-eye you could wrap the still up like an Eskimo on a cold day and run it a bit more in the morning, while you make your better half a very nice breakfast - leaving the kitchen lovely and tidy.

The maths looked about right to me. I do similar sized washes and runs.

Good luck out there.

[NorthWoodsAb]

Would have gone deeper but it was late and wife was giving me the side eye.

About the "side eye". That is the one thing about this hobby. It does take time to do things properly for best results. Schedule your run times where you can set aside X number of hours for the run where she is not waiting for you to share time for some other scheduled event with her. Eg if you decide to run after supper and she wants to watch a movie or go for a banana split with you at 9, your going to get the side eye.

[Bushman]

That is why years ago I went from a 2” diameter VM to a 4” diameter CM. It cut the hours down on a run so I didn’t have allow a full day to a run.

[Sporacle]

That is why years ago I went from a 2” diameter VM to a 4” diameter CM. It cut the hours down on a run so I didn’t have allow a full day to a run.

Same for my 4 inch plate, can fire it up at
5 am and be back up in the house by 10 am with everything clean and about 9 L of drinking strength from a straight wash/mash with feints.

[Yummyrum]

5.00am
Farmers

[Saltbush Bill]

Same for my 4 inch plate, can fire it up at
5 am and be back up in the house by 10 am with everything clean and about 9 L of drinking strength from a straight wash/mash with feints.

This is exactly why some of my replies to posts about 2 inch plated columns may appear to sound slightly negative.....

[Homebrewer11777]

Regarding the math...
5 gallons at 10% means there is about 0.5 gallons pure ethanol available. If you get 90% of the available ethanol in 40% ABV low wines you would be looking at 0.5x90%/40% which is 1.125 gallons.

When I do stripping runs I aim for total collected low wines ABV between 20 and 30%. That is a pretty wide range. Recently took one to 22% and was about 2% at the spout. I think that correlates to something close to 0.2% in the liquid so recovered almost all available alcohol. For 5 gallons 10% wash that would mean yield about 2.25 gallons low wines at 22%. In reality there is not much difference between 2% at the spout and 10% at the spout. 10% at the spout is less than 1% in the boiler and likely yields low wines about 30% ABV.

When deciding how low to collect I tend to think about expected quality of the wash with all grain > gumballhead > sugarhead. Time is issue for me too.

[howie]

Regarding the math...
5 gallons at 10% means there is about 0.5 gallons pure ethanol available. If you get 90% of the available ethanol in 40% ABV low wines you would be looking at 0.5x90%/40% which is 1.125 gallons.

i ran the OPs results with your method, and it also came up with the extracted alcohol only at 74.6 per cent.

scubatech - regarding the late night, what are you using to strip?
i only have a 2" and a 5 gallons strip would take me less than 2 hours.

[Homebrewer11777]

"Didn't want to deal with the sludge so I drew off exactly 5 gallons and stripped down to 23% before calling it quits. 5 x 10.24% should give me about .51 gallons in total but I ended up with .87 gallons of 44% low wines, almost twice the expected total volume."

5 gallons x 10.24% = 0.51 gallons pure ethanol
0.87 gal x 44% = 0.38 gallons pure ethanol collected, 0.13 gallons left behind

5 gallons - 0.87 gallons = 4.13 gallons in boiler
0.13/4.13 = 3% ABV in boiler when quit

Stripped down to 23% before calling it quits..according to this chart that looks to be about spot on for 23% at the spout, 3% in the liquid. If OP had gone to 10% at the spout would be about 1% left in the liquid.
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