StillSmart

Been given some old proper pennies,
for the young ones these are from when
12 pennies made a shilling. I know cause
mi granny told me !!
Cleaned 'em in coke came up real shiny.
Put about a Shillings worth in the boiler,
did spirit run, cleaned out in the morn.
Oh no, horrid marks on boiler base, cant
budge the marks !!
Any clues guys???

Lemon juice? Vinegar? Brillo pad will definitley shift them.
I always thought old pennies were copper, must have been an alloy.
Sorry to hear of your troubles.

Robert.

Take 12" of 15mm copper pipe...if you have a pipe cutter ?? or use an hacksaw.. cut the pipe into "ring size" lengths...jobs a good un. this way you'll know your using the real thing.

ok cheers guys

I have this occasionally. Never worry. Not established yet what causes it. Maybe cloudy or sweeter washes. I clean it with a ss scrubber.

Once you have run your AS for a while it does take on a golden hue and is difficult to get it immaculate. Truck wash aka Traffic film remover (caustic) is v good.

I don't think these are made from the finest grade of stainless steel.

Sure your right on there made to a
budget. Still want to try and keep clean.
Its the T500 that suffered from copper thingy?!£

Sorry I thought it was your AS - I'm sure the same applies

My copper dome no longer looks lovely and shiny after its first stripping run. I've cleaned it but it still has the discolouration on the inside.

I read elsewhere that the patina build up is a good thing. Do others worry about discoloration internally on the dome?

Let it naturalise. It is part of the conditioning of the metal.

Its probably quite strange of me but the steel I will give a wipe over with a green scourer / hot water after use & the copper I tend to just rinse. I only really clean the outside every now & then will a stainless scrubbie & cillit bang, shines up real nice with a bright rosy copper hue but that's purely eye candy. If my still has puked then I will clean the inside with hot, soapy water & a demijohn brush but I mostly just rinse it out after with hot water, especially if I know the next use will be a similar wash. I did give a good clean out after a peated whisky before making cachaça because I'd convinced myself the phenols might be hiding in the pipes, might be my mind but I think my first few runs had a slight metallic taste / smell to them especially in the heads which has gone now

Re Seagull.
Don't know about you but if my dome is
discoloured I would see the doc
On more serious note I have copper dome
etc and copper is a funny metal isn't it.
So say its good for all sorts of things,
but we only want flavour BUt good
flavour so do you clean or not???
If so with what???

How often do the big boys break their stills up & scrub them out, I wonder?

Easydrinker wrote:I always thought old pennies were copper, must have been an alloy.

Pennies were bronze from the mid 1800s up until decimalisation. Mostly copper, but possibly with enough zinc and tin to cause issues. I think ha'pennies were the same (and I'm amazed my auto-complete recognizes "ha'pennies" )

Re Benoit;
After every session, I am paranoid about
infection. Think it comes from brewing
beer !! Use citric acid to clean my
stills is that a good thing

Re Woodworm;
Have a good handful of old pennies
dated 67 64 etc used coke to clean.
Really shiny let still cool(late night
to following morning early) brown
stains on still base