StillSmart

Ok so my understanding is the more time you run the same product thru the still it will lose flavours and become more neutral so if i run a sugar wash (10L) thru 1st time and throw out the first 50 ml then collect 1.500 ml 2 times is it safe to say that there should be no acetone left in the next run. so the next stil run i can collect by adding back the 3L plus a 1 litre of water run that and not need to discard the first again or should i rather throw the first 50ml out again and now i run it again to to do third run at what point id the just a complete nuetral

Hi inksanity

Don't worry too much about the first 50ml, it's a small proportion of the heads cut, which doesn't make it into your hearts cut anyway.

When you strip a wash on the Airstill, or any other type of still for that matter, just collect everything, I normally strip a wash until the output of the still gets down to 30%, it's not worth collecting beyond this point and you will be well into the tails, A strip run is just the first stage in a bigger process, there's nothing to be gained by trying to make cuts on a stripping run.

Especially with a sugar wash, there is very little or no methanol produced in a sugar wash, it's produced more in fruit based washes, however from my experiance with sugar washes and turbo Yeasts, about the first 30% you collect on a spirit run will be heads containing Acetone and Ethel acetate or traces thereof, these chemicals can be detected (tasted) even when there are only a few parts per million in your alcohol.

The Airstill guides on this forum are a great starting point for beginners and you will produce far better spirits than following the standard Airstill instructions, however you should treat them as what they are, as a guide only.

For best results I would suggest collecting from the still until your output drops to 30%, then stop.

From a few of the above strip runs, water your combined strip down to 30% ABV and run it a second time as a spirit run.

This time collect your spirit in 100m jars, each jar is a faction of your total, after airing the jars for a day or two, measure the ABV of each and adjust it to 40% ABV for tasting , then starting on the middle jar and moving outward, taste each sample.

This will enable you to make CUTS, the most important process of home distilling, you will soon find where the heads, hearts and tails are, the hearts have a neutral taste and a warm, smooth mouth feel, heads are foul, they bites your tounge with a sharp burning sensation and taste slightly of pear drops, the cut between hearts and tails is normally easy to find, tails taste dry and oily.

You can smell the early heads and late tails, cut them jars out instantly, but you need to taste it to find the true cut between heads, hearts and tails.

It will all come with practice and patience, the best advice I could give anyone would be to not be greedy, if it tastes slightly of heads, it's heads!! It will spoil your finished spirit if you let too much in to your hearts cut.

Plus use a carbon filter for neutral, a good one like the Essencia filter is a must in my opinion, I put everything neutral though my Essencia, even aged rum as I age it on oak first, then filter it to make it white rum.

OK, so this thread seems as good as any to bump. I've been trying to find this out without much success, so apologies if this has been answered 100 times, but I did try the search function. Honest!

When doing cuts and you are taking 100ml per jar and testing the ABV.... well how do you do that? I've got an alcohol hydrometer with the AS bundle but it's it is so big, it looks like it's going to need much more than 100ml of liquid to float in! I feel like such an idiot asking this question!

You can get a refractometer of evil bay for cheap money. Just makes sure you get the type for spirit .....you can test with just a drop literally

H12rpo wrote:You can get a refractometer of evil bay for cheap money. Just makes sure you get the type for spirit .....you can test with just a drop literally

Ordered! Thanks for the tip.

captainfog wrote: I've got an alcohol hydrometer with the AS bundle but it's it is so big, it looks like it's going to need much more than 100ml of liquid to float in! I feel like such an idiot asking this question!

It's perhaps not good to put spirit in plastic but at a pinch you can use the tube it was supplied in as a trial jar. From memory it's about 50ml.

http://www.scientificglass.co.uk/contents/en-uk/d91_Measuring_Cylinders.html

What's not to like..?!

hampk wrote:http://www.scientificglass.co.uk/contents/en-uk/d91_Measuring_Cylinders.html

What's not to like..?!

where to start ... get a spirit refractometer.

Mash you could put the spirit in a plastic tube
then use a refractometer !!

This thread is as clear as mud.

If the OP would like to repost with a question that I can answer, then I will try.

Robert.

gaza the instructor wrote:Mash you could put the spirit in a plastic tube
then use a refractometer !!

Why would you do that?

cause its a joke Mash.

Mmm.. borosilicate glass..

Mash really hates plastic doesn't he.
I don't see the problem if its good quality
food grade.I would rather use glass or stainless
but plastic is cheap and you can own lots of it
for pennies.

I put lots of plastic in the Blue bin twice a month, if I didn't then I would possibly be the plastic king of the Northern hemisphere.
I prefer glass, stainless, whatever.
But used with discretion, IMHO plastic has a role to play in my everyday brewing and distilling.
Knowing your HDPE from your PET, or your ass from your elbow is a good start.

Robert