TPW how to?

[John51]

I'm going to give TPW a try so am checking if this will work.

6kg sugar,

juice of 1 lemon

200g tube of tomato puree from Aldi

75g bakers yeast or...?

Mix it all together except the yeast and dissolve in 8L of hot water, a la turbo. Top up to 25L. When cool enough pitch yeast.

Sound like a plan?

[chill]

I have not used bakers yeast yet, but I have had wine yeast die out (ferment stalled) with 6 kg of sugar in 25L. I revived it by diluting it and re-pitching.

I'd pick a champagne yeast for that amount of sugar, or cut back on the sugar. I am unsure how much bakers yeast can tolerate. 4.5 kg would be my guess.


Chuck

[billmcc]

Sounds good to me 5kg sugar would be better

this should be a good read
http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =14&t=5018

[Iain]

Just got a wash on that is similar but I used citric acid rather than a lemon ... also used Youngs High Alcohol Wine Yeast as I had it kicking about ... took off like a dream and still going strong week later .. expecting around 15 - 16 %abv out of it.

Did stick a pinch of epsom salts in too

[Jimmy]

Yeah, the bakers yeast is purely because it's easily available, if you have anything better lying around then by all means use that instead! I think 5kg is probably a good place to start, 6 might work but does depend on the yeast.

[John51]

Thanks for the help.

5kg of sugar and a Champagne yeast it is then, E-1118 looks good.

[Jimmy]

If you're going with a decent champagne yeast, you should be OK with 6kg sugar - providing you're adding nutrients (which is the point of the tomato paste) you are basically making a DIY turbo. The key things that will stop you in your tracks are lack of nutrient or the acidity level so that's what the lemon is for.

Whatever you do, keep notes and then try it differently sometime - for example, if you try it with 5kg sugar and get 12% (just a number I picked out of the air) then you try 6kg and only get 13% then financially it probably makes more sense to do 5kg each time. If you find it bumps it to 16% then it's more worthwhile.

[Capt-Cudellez]

pH is my biggest issue when pitching fresh champagne yeast, I once changed the fertiliser I was using in my yeast bomb, so assumed the problem was there. Not until I had a couple of washes fail to start did I bother to check the pH was 3 point something, waaay too acidic for this yeast to be happy when pitching. I had added no citric acid the pH was pulled down only by the ammonium sulphate.

So if I'm going to continue using this brand of fertiliser I need to correct with calcium carbonate.

I find if you reuse the yeast from the wash, they are much better at handling all sorts of conditions, I guess they have gotten tolerant to the acidic conditions after the first wash.

[Iain]

mm interesting point ... I have just ordered a digital ph meter as I have never checked ph before ... £7 of flea bay

[billmcc]

Capt i have to add calcium carbonate on my version of wineos otherwise ph would drop to ph 2.5 now because of the calcium carbonate and brewers yeast for vit b its done in four to five days but still drops to ph 3.7 from start ph of 6.5 but the little yeasties still take it down to fg 0.986 but i allways use distillers yeast not 118

[Capt-Cudellez]

Yip, It really drops a fair bit once it gets going, but I pitched without checking the pH, and the new fertiliser meant the wash had a really low pH when I pitched onto it. Even with a starter the yeast didn't get going at all.

Pitching in the mid 5's and it takes off, but like you it will finish somewhere down in the 3's.

For the next gen I've forgotten to adjust the pH, and I've not had issues, now whether that is because the yeast is already tolerant to the low pH or whether the sheer numbers of yeast being pitched have something to do with it I'm not sure, or it could be a dodgy reading, I'm not sure I've got it nailed down.
But I know when I don't adjust on the initial pitch using fresh yeast, it just wont start using the recipe I use.

[Savor1970]

Well TPW on 5kg of sugar over 25LTR or water using allisons yeast and it's buzzing away nicely......isn't it amazing you much it doesn't smell??? I'll keep you all informed how it goes.