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All grain wash

PostPosted: Tuesday Dec 16, 2008 2:06 pm
by drsmurto
Have a mate who has been asking me for a while now about making a malt wash for him to purify using his 25L water purification apparatus.....

His request was 25L @ 18%

On my system thats not really practical, nor am i keen on fermenting the wash with a crap yeast (aka turbo).

MHB provided me with Safwhiskey M-1.

Plan is to aim for 25L @ 10% using above yeast and an all grain base of 50/50 ale malt and peated malt.

Will be doing a short boil as there are no hop additions. Just need to boil long enough for the hot break to form, chill and pitch yeast. Let it ferment out, gelatine it and then pass it on to the mate to do his bit.

I will take half of the product and age that on some toasted french oak chips for a few weeks

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Tuesday Dec 16, 2008 7:33 pm
by gregb
A low and long mash schedule?

Cheers,
Greg

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Wednesday Dec 17, 2008 1:04 am
by DavidP
I don't believe that 18% is reasonable.
on the distilling forums everyone would say that you'd want to aim for around 10% because when the alcohol % is too high you stress the yeast and get bad/harsh flavours that are very hard to get rid of.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Wednesday Dec 17, 2008 8:54 am
by drsmurto
Yep, long (2-3 hours), and low (62C).

Turbo yeast goes to 18% abv but as you say, thats not 18% ethanol, its a lot of the other alcohols you dont want to be drinking.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Wednesday Dec 17, 2008 3:40 pm
by DavidP
drsmurto wrote:Yep, long (2-3 hours), and low (62C).

Turbo yeast goes to 18% abv but as you say, thats not 18% ethanol, its a lot of the other alcohols you dont want to be drinking.


yeah man...at 18% it's gonna be some harsh stuff! thats what hangovers are made of!

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Thursday Dec 18, 2008 8:52 am
by drsmurto
Just got an sms from the mate with the still who reckons that anything less than 18-20% wash doesn't distil right.

Yet to clarify that response but as someone who has done more distillations in a lab than jenna jameson has had pork sausages i find this very hard to believe.

Sure, the amount of water present is greatly increased but a decent reflux still shouldn't plow thru it no worries. You get less ethanol at the end but i am aiming for quality not quantity.'

And i just picked up the peated malt too. Grrrrrr.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Sunday Dec 21, 2008 4:39 pm
by DavidP
drsmurto wrote:Just got an sms from the mate with the still who reckons that anything less than 18-20% wash doesn't distil right.

Yet to clarify that response but as someone who has done more distillations in a lab than jenna jameson has had pork sausages i find this very hard to believe.

Sure, the amount of water present is greatly increased but a decent reflux still shouldn't plow thru it no worries. You get less ethanol at the end but i am aiming for quality not quantity.'

And i just picked up the peated malt too. Grrrrrr.


no offence......but I think your friend has been brainwashed by the homebrew shops that only push their turbo yeasts.
it won't matter how low the starting % is if you have a decent reflux, it's going to come out at a very high abv out of a good reflux.
but if your making an all grain mash then a reflux still isn't the right tool for the job, all the flavour would be stripped out.
I can't see that anything less that 18-20% is not going to distill right. It all distills the same. Only out of a pot still it will come out at a lower abv, but it will be a much cleaner product. If he did a stripping run ..ran out all the alcohol quickly and ran it deep to get up alot of the flavour and then redistilled with good conservative cuts you'd end up with something very flavoursome AND clean with the higher abv that he is after. You'll have less product but....quality not quantity.
The highest I've ever fermented to is 14% and even that is a little higher than I should go....but when I triple distill it comes out rather clean anyway.
I just did an all mollasis rum which was under 10% and I've double distilled that and it is the cleanest distilate that I've ever had. doesn't burn the hair off your nose when you take a good sniff and now that it's on the oak it smells like bloody great!

hopefully this isn't against the rules...but your friend needs to check this place out and do a shitload of reading.
http://www.homedistiller.org/

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Tuesday Feb 17, 2009 12:30 pm
by drsmurto
So i bit the bullet and ended up doing the mash.

7kg of ale malt
6kg of peated malt

2 hour mash at 62C

Ended up with 16L at 1.100 which isnt too bad considering the mash was nigh on impossible to stir.

Used Safwhisky (M-1). Airlock spent the first 5 days doing its best impression of an AK-47..... 9 days later there is still an impressive krausen but the airlock has slowed down. Will check SG in a few days and see if it needs a champers yeast to finish it off.

Once it stops i will be hitting it with gelatine, racking, another does of gelatine and then into a pot still.

Resulting liquor will be re-distilled and then left on some toasted oak chips for a few weeks.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Thursday Feb 26, 2009 2:37 am
by DavidP
Now that sounds good!! some may consider 1.100 too high but it sounds alot better than the proposed 18%!

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Thursday Feb 26, 2009 8:12 pm
by drsmurto
Racked it yesterday and FG was 1.104 giving me 11.3%.

Had a taste, bit weird without hops but the peat flavour is really coming thru.

Picked up the pot still on the weekend. Will hit the wash with gelatine and then run it thru the still.

Quietly excited....

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Friday Feb 27, 2009 3:33 am
by DavidP
drsmurto wrote:Racked it yesterday and FG was 1.104 giving me 11.3%.

Had a taste, bit weird without hops but the peat flavour is really coming thru.

Picked up the pot still on the weekend. Will hit the wash with gelatine and then run it thru the still.

Quietly excited....

Great stuff! have you got some white oak for a bit of aging?

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Sunday Mar 01, 2009 12:14 pm
by drsmurto
Not yet, planning on getitng some in the next week or 2. Am in no rush to distill it. I want it uber clear before it goes into the still.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Monday Mar 02, 2009 3:34 pm
by Tipsy
How long do you expect it to take before you can have the first taste test?
Sorry but I know nothing about spirits other than I like the taste.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Tuesday Mar 03, 2009 9:21 am
by drsmurto
Once distilled it will sit on oak for min 4 weeks.

Will start the tasting then.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Tuesday Mar 03, 2009 3:38 pm
by Tipsy
Can't wait.
I would like to do this myself,
but only after some honest feedback from someone who I can rely on thier opinion.

Wouldn't want to lash out on gear I would use once or twice.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Tuesday Mar 03, 2009 9:16 pm
by drsmurto
No worries, will report back.

Will also be sending samples off to a few HBS who have helped me with yeast and advice for their opinions.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Wednesday Apr 08, 2009 4:38 pm
by drsmurto
Tried to distil the first 4L in a 5L pot still.

Fail.

Frothed everywhere.

Will track down some anti-foaming adjunct (or find someone with a bigger pot still).

The smell (and taste) of unhopped, peaty malt liquor isnt too shabby at all! :shock:

Before it started frothing up i was collecting a nice smelling clearish liquid. No methanol. Shows what using a good yeast designed for the job can do rather than turbo yeast.

I did plan on throwing away the first 30mL or sure but thats basic chemistry for every distillation, not just ethanol.

The other option is do run 2L at a time but i really cant be arsed with that.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Wednesday Apr 08, 2009 4:58 pm
by DavidP
it's hard to make good cuts with only 5 litres.
once you get the frothing sorted...
If I only had a 5ltr still I would run it all through 5 litres at a time and run deep into the tails each time and then I'd put all of what I collected from each run and run it again. You'll get much better separation of heads/hearts/tails...and if you go deep enough into the tails on all of the first runs you'll still get the flavour.

Re: All grain wash

PostPosted: Thursday Jun 18, 2009 3:46 pm
by skurvy84
hows this going mark?

did you find a bigger boiler or give up and start again?