Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

Hi everyone,

Thanks for all your advice here, it's been invaluable while building my rig which I'll be kicking into gear as soon as I get some time!

With all the reading I've been doing I seem to have got myself a little confused. I'm initially wanting to produce the best neutral I can which will then be either aged in glass, some soaked on bourbon chips and some to age in my barrel. I'll also be building a Gin basket to try out some of the recipes here, plus a 4" packed section roughly 500mm long.

I'll have a go at some of the Rum and Whisky recipes later on after managing a decent neutral.

This is where I'm a bit stuck. Could I just clarify some things please and tell me if I'm on the right track.

- to make a great neutral, do a number of stripping runs (cutting foreshots) then a spirit run with these hearts keeping the heads and tails for a feints run?
- should the packed section be in place between the top plate module and the RC for stripping?

- for Gin, do I simply use the quality hearts neutral at 35-40%, 4 plates with no packed section running into the Gin basket and no cutting on this?

I'm learning all the time thanks to this site and need to get my head around temps and how vapour acts within the still with different configurations, hence this post.

Cheers,

Chocko.

For neutral with a strip/spirit run strategy, you would configure your rig as a pot still and run the wash hard and fast as your stripping run. All you’re doing here is concentrating the alcohol. You can cut fores here too. This gives you what is called “low wines”. You would run further washes way until you have enough low wines to warrant a spirit run. This you would do using all of your plated sections with a packed section on top of those and your RC on top of the lot. You can certainly keep the cuts that don’t make the grade for an all feints run. Some people will evench chuck them into their next run rather than save them for an all feints one.

Note that if you have 5 plates and a packed section, you should be able make good neutral in a single pass. I can only run 4 plates due to a height restriction so I strip my washes first. If I could run my neutraliser with all of the plates I’d do single runs.

As for gin, yes you would dilute your neutral hearts to a safe strength (anything less than 40%). You can run it over plates with the botanical basket in the vapour path or can also run it the same way without plates. I would still do cuts and blend them based on flavour although I have not made a vapour infused gin. Others with more experience here will chime in I’m use.

Professor Green wrote:For neutral with a strip/spirit run strategy, you would configure your rig as a pot still and run the wash hard and fast as your stripping run. All you’re doing here is concentrating the alcohol. You can cut fores here too. This gives you what is called “low wines”. You would run further washes way until you have enough low wines to warrant a spirit run. This you would do using all of your plated sections with a packed section on top of those and your RC on top of the lot. You can certainly keep the cuts that don’t make the grade for an all feints run. Some people will evench chuck them into their next run rather than save them for an all feints one.

Note that if you have 5 plates and a packed section, you should be able make good neutral in a single pass. I can only run 4 plates due to a height restriction so I strip my washes first. If I could run my neutraliser with all of the plates I’d do single runs.

As for gin, yes you would dilute your neutral hearts to a safe strength (anything less than 40%). You can run it over plates with the botanical basket in the vapour path or can also run it the same way without plates. I would still do cuts and blend them based on flavour although I have not made a vapour infused gin. Others with more experience here will chime in I’m use.

Thanks mate, this is another grey area for me too, having only been reading on reflux bubblers. This is my almost completed rig below, would it be correct for stripping (for pot still config) to just remove the perf plates and run it straight through? Maybe even remove one or two of the modules and have the packed section under the RC?

Chocko

For pot still mode, you just need to get the vapor to the pc, no plates, no packing, keep the defleg if you want to play with small amounts of reflux while running, you could also put a tee above the defleg and use it to swap vapor infusion botanicals mid run

RC Al wrote:For pot still mode, you just need to get the vapor to the pc, no plates, no packing, keep the defleg if you want to play with small amounts of reflux while running, you could also put a tee above the defleg and use it to swap vapor infusion botanicals mid run

Brilliant, thank you.! :handgestures-thumbupleft:

RC Al wrote:For pot still mode, you just need to get the vapor to the pc, no plates, no packing, keep the defleg if you want to play with small amounts of reflux while running, you could also put a tee above the defleg and use it to swap vapor infusion botanicals mid run

This!

Now that your still is finished time to look at the next project and make your bubbler modular. The carter head is a great design and by making a 4" 90 degree bend with a bought or scored 4" bend. Make some easy flanges on some short 4" pipe then solder them into the bend.

Next make a tee section where the normal site glass has an internal 4-2 reducer where the 2" is branched 90 degrees so it goes out the base of the tee section. This is where a primus glass can be used as a sight glass and also serves as bubble plate.

Then a new 4" blockhead that can use your PC and make a basket to go in the blockhead.

So to do an infusion run use 2 plate sections and put the RC ontop, then put the 4" bend with the rest of the carter head on that. Then the RC can be used to change the botanicals as stated before.

Now is the plan I'm using for my carter head project but as I don't like gin :puke-huge: the project has gone on the back burner.

Cheers Bryan

Bryan1 wrote:Now that your still is finished time to look at the next project and make your bubbler modular. The carter head is a great design and by making a 4" 90 degree bend with a bought or scored 4" bend. Make some easy flanges on some short 4" pipe then solder them into the bend.

Next make a tee section where the normal site glass has an internal 4-2 reducer where the 2" is branched 90 degrees so it goes out the base of the tee section. This is where a primus glass can be used as a sight glass and also serves as bubble plate.

Then a new 4" blockhead that can use your PC and make a basket to go in the blockhead.

So to do an infusion run use 2 plate sections and put the RC ontop, then put the 4" bend with the rest of the carter head on that. Then the RC can be used to change the botanicals as stated before.

Now is the plan I'm using for my carter head project but as I don't like gin :puke-huge: the project has gone on the back burner.

Cheers Bryan

I think my head just exploded.! :shock:

Seriously though, I like the sound of that and will PM you if that's OK, just to see if there's any drawings available of what you're describing here!

Chocko

G'day Choko,

Ok mate I'll try and be a bit clearer :geek: So to make the carter head section just make another tee section and use 4" for what one would call the site glass section. But don't solder it to the 4" as yet. First you need to make a 2-4" frustum so the vapour can go from the 4" to the 2" bubble pipe. Look at this thread

http://aussiedistiller.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=6444

and it will teach you just how simple it is to make any size frustum. Now for the 2" bend I just cut the 2" 45 degrees and soldered up the joint to make a 90 degree bend. Make it a tad longer as we want this to be no more than 5mm above the lower plate so it forms a bubble cap upsidedown. Now the 2-4" frustum and 2" bubble pipe can be soldered in the tee section and soldered onto the 4" body to complete it.

The lower flange on the tee section needs to be a larger diameter so it can be drilled to hold the threaded rod to compress the seal on the primus glass. Another plate needs to be made where the diameter is the same as the lower part and match drilled to suit. The diameter is controlled by the size of primus glass you buy and for sealing the glass silicon baking sheet makes for a good gasket.

Then we can trim the 2" bubble pipe to the right height so it's just above the lower plate and cut some slots in the pipe so the vapour can exit thru them.

When it's running the oils will build up so a drain will be needed to bleed off the excess oils.

Looking at your still you don't have a 3" 90 degree bend so another one will have to be made to suit your PC. 400mm is a good length to make the 4" blockhead with a 3" pipe soldered on to suit the 3" for the PC.

To make a basket just cut some 4" lenghtways then solder it back up for a snug inside the 4" pipe. for the base of the basket just drill a heap of holes like a perf plate so the vapour can flow thru.

Now as the 4" bend will offset the still from the boiler, positioning the 4" blockhead so the PC sit close to the centreline of the boiler so the still is balanced and won't topple over when running.

Cheers Bryan

Here you go Chocko

Or you can do this

This is mine

Going back to the stripping runs, there's no harm in leaving the plates in place and I often leave the rc open just enough to load the plates.
Doing this I find doesn't slow a stripping run down much but results in a cleaner low wines which requires slightly less work to clean up on the spirit run. Also the low wines take up even less room and can easily be kept in jars instead of a keg. They will require watering down prior to running a spirit run though.

I find the safest way to make gin is to make a clean vodka first through my spirit still. I then dilute it to 45% which gives about 45 litres of charge for my still.
I put the botanicals in a 3.9 inch SS basket which fits snugly inside the 4 inch copper pipe of my gin head.
The heavier oils fall back into the charge and the result is a beautiful flowery gin that every one loves. I've never had a complaint.
The run takes about 4 hours. I've found that the 4" copper cap needs to be sealed with some electrician's tape to stop leaking. A better idea is to braze a SS ferrule and have a 4 inch cap using a 4 inch clamp.

Thanks P3T3rPan, coffe addict and YarraRanges, this is certainly food for thought and my brain hurts.

I'm still trying to locate some more 4" so I'm lucky I'm in no hurry at the moment.

I've previously posted this pic of a planned Gin head but I'm stuffed if I can find it? Let me know what you think.

Cheers,

Chocko

That drawing is essentially what p3t3rPan's first option is,
Only thing missing from your sketch is what the internals are like.

I quite like the bubble cap version as it is more in-line so weight distribution will be better than the offset carter head.

P3T3rPan wrote:Or you can do this

carter head.png

Hi there again P3T3rPan, just wondering if you'd have any further detail on this style of Gin head, I'm leaning towards one of these I think for the same reason as scythe (being inline).

Is that just one large bubble cap? Do you know if anyone has built one of these already?

Cheers,

Chocko

Hey chocko, its all in there for you.
Scale is 1:10.
4" pipe.
Lookes like a 2.5" or 3" bubble cap.
1/2" drain line.

scythe wrote:Hey chocko, its all in there for you.
Scale is 1:10.
4" pipe.
Lookes like a 2.5" or 3" bubble cap.
1/2" drain line.

I've been thinking way too hard about which way I'm going to go and would like some more advice please. I'd prefer to have inline as per the drawing but not having done anything like this before I am concerned about the oils, getting rid of them via the valve shown, and/or having them return to the boiler which I don't really want.

I could go the offset head as discussed earlier, with the valve underneath but I'd like your thoughts on having about 2kg hanging off (+PC), I think the 2" flange would be strong enough?

As below, do you think it would be possible to angle the bubble cap plate by a couple of mm towards the valve outlet to allow a bit of flow, or would flat be sufficient, I really don't want to stuff this up?

Chocko