Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

Hello, new to distilling. However have been homebrewing beer and cider for a while and have done plenty of research into distilling. So i have a airstill pot still, just the 4l one. I brewed and distilled the airstill starter kit it came with, following all instructions. However i have also made a 25l wash, (6kg of white sugar, turbo yeast and turbo carbon) and i plan to distill it soon, can someone please explain about foreshots regarding an airstill because on the website it told me it doesnt create methanol and in the dvd the lady distills 750mls and uses it all as is. Just want to be safe. Thanks in advance

G'day mate and welcome.

Please drop by the welcome centre to introduce yourself :smile:

You need to read the viewforum.php?f=57 a few times to get to know what is what.

In short, all spirit distillation will create methanol. :handgestures-thumbupleft:

In short Definitely take the 1st 50 to 75mls and chuck it!

' and have done plenty of research into distilling.'

You questions would suggest otherwise ;-)

I recommend you park the air still up and have a good read of the Newbies section here, we'll point you in the right direction. And please, as suggested, drop into the welcome center and introduce yourself :handgestures-thumbupleft:

This might help ya .cheers hillzabilly

Hey Joel, im new to all this also but have learnt wonders since reading (and re reading) all that I can from these guys.
As for foreshots, All stills produce methanol and it is highly poisonous. DO NOT DRINK. If someone has told you that this still doesn't produce methanol they are fools. :violence-smack:
Anyway why risk it? just chuck the first 50-75ml as Teddy suggests, and, read and re read before going any further.

Just to be clear most washes will only contain trace amounts of methanol if any, it is the fruit washes that will produce more methanol.

Having said that there are lighter compounds in the foreshots that are not good for you, I personally am not a fan of acetone etc ;-)

Someone did an analysis of the turbo airstill distillate (no cuts) and it indeed contained very little methanol (ppm). However turbo airstill distillate that has only had 30mls discarded tastes terrible.

I found the analysis online by searching "Fusel OIl analysis" in google. They took the 30ml foreshots and even that had less than 5ppm methanol. They were using some triple distlled turbo yeast though