crazyhorse67

Message for full equipment list and brand details. Must be moved to new location. $399,000 CDN May entertain Investor. Beautiful lakeview site in Okanagan Valley with 10 yr old building, patio, restaurant, tasting room and large lawn picknic area in Wine Country please contact for more information.

Hey Guys; I just came across this thread and am also trying to design a water reclaimation/cooling system. I am just wondering what size chiller was used with the above system so I can adjust for my situation. I was thinking of using 2-3000 litre (800 gallon)wine tanks to cool/store our process water which consists of ; 650 litre (172 gallon) pot still (which runs 5 days/week) it has 2 columns with deflaglamators and a final condenser. a 2000 litre (530 gallon) mash-tun (with cooling jacket) twice a week using the previous days cooling water from distillation. We would like to re-use our cooling water as the current situation is wasteful and hopefully benefit by having our cooling water at a constant temperature and flow-rate to minimize temperature shock at the dephlaglamators. We typically do 2 low-wine runs for 3 days/week in the still. Any input (words and /or drawings) would be greatly appreciated as we are in a small town with no known businesses that have knowledge of this type of system. Thanks, Crazyhorse67

Hey! Just saw your post and I am wondering what you ended up doing?. I too am trying to figure this one out.

Thanks guys , much appreciated I will try to figure out these PID mods (might be above my pay grade being owner, distiller, carpenter,plumber,etc.etc. but why not add programmer to the resume too!) lol . Today I did put in a manually operated bypass ! try that tomorrow. Alex _Sor I hope you are in a safe place.

I dont know if Alex_Sor or Slickfloss or Southern Highlander are still available for comment?. I am wondering what type of valves are being utilized, normally closed?. I am currently trying day one of this new cooling arrangement (Series) and have normally closed valves on my 2 tower condensers, but they are battling (no by-pass yet) so I have turned my first column PID actuators off (temp is about where I normally have it, within 1 degree C). I am also noticing my flow is starting at about 2 degrees C lower than normal and my steam settings are lower as well. Less heat input and less cooling is good right?. Any more tips would be greatly appreciated.

Alex_Sor, Southern highlander and SILK, thanks for this info I will be re-routing my cooling water set-up for my Condenser and 2 depheglamators as I have noticed issues with our current cold Canadian winter (H20 at 3 degrees celcius). I am also working on a water reclaimation system for this year( has anyone made or used cooling towers to cool their process water?) Also, best wishes to Alex_sor with the current madness happening in your country. I hope it stops asap. Thanks, Crazyhorse67

Thanks for the offer Stumpys !. We have a basic mashtun but we are looking for the V-wire false bottom to help clean up our process. Doug

We are wanting to purchase a used or new steam jacketed 2500-3000 litre MASH/LAUTER TUN or LAUTER TUN with v-wire false bottom for our distillery in B.C., Canada. We are not willing to deal with Chinese Companies due to shipping costs skyrocketing and excessive shipping wait times. contact Doug Lennie Legend Distilling

Non milled grain !?!. that sounds very interesting , no floury mess to deal with?. Where would one look for such info?

Wow, Thank you all for the speedy responses! My local welder has a used 12" butterfly that he removed from a winery job that he said He would supply for a good deal, we just thought that would be the easiest way of opening/ closing off the main chimney to divert vapor to the lyne arm and condenser. We are thinking of bolting the big valve to the top of the existing chimney with a 3-4" valve just below and off the side going to the lyne arm and condenser. The condenser would be attached to the lifting mount on the dome, high enough so we can walk below it when not being used. Our 1000 litre low wines tank could be moved in place, minimizing space wastage. A safety blow-off valve would be installed and ported outside. Is there a math formula for sizing the condenser to a 2000 litre Mashtun? . The manway has a 3/8 silicone gasket to seal the hatch (chimney is 12") fully steam jacketed and mixer paddle on the bottom. We are situated in the beautiful South Okanagan Valley in British Columbia.

I am wondering if anyone has converted their mashtun to work double duty as a low wines still? I use my 2000 litre mashtun 2 times a week( it sits unused for 3 days) and due to the high cost of another Still and lack of floorspace I am thinking of having a lyne arm and condenser fabricated. This would allow me to run low-wines for 3 days and mash for 2 days per week using the mashtun/still. This would allow me to do more finish distillation on my "actual still (vodka, Gin ,Whisky, etc.) A large 12" butterfly valve would open/close the chimney and a small 3-4" butterfly valve (12") would separate the lyne arm /condenser from the mashtun chimney, allowing one of the systems to be used per day. Has anyone done this or seen it done? This is hopefully and short term solution until expansion plans and funds are economically viable. thanks, Doug

Hi Rick; I just came across this thread and am wondering if you have made any headway in your sustainability project. Our Distillery is located in a rural area (farms and wineries) We do not have any public sewer system and wastewater disposal has been a learned experience. We currently send some spent grains to a farmer which he mixes with other feed and gives it to his farm animals. The majority we take to the local landfill where it is mixed with wood chips and other process and sold as compost material. I am looking into using some of the heads and tails as a fuel source in our natural gas boiler (with some modifications). The wastewater is the complex topic as most treatment systems I have so far are cost prohibitive. Have you learned about any affordable wastewater treatments?. I am located in British Columbia, Canada and am also looking into any govt. grants programs as well. Any insight would be appreciated. Thanks; Doug Lennie

Thanks for your input guys!. We are going to try the fine flour, warm pre-ferment brewer style and see what happens next week. I will post our results!

We are using Wheat, I found that distilling on the grain created flavours that I wasn't thrilled with and it was a mess to clean-up. We are attempting to filter post fermentation, I am guessing that the mash flour changes structure during the fermentation?. The beer guys I've talked to press pre-ferment. I'm not sure our plates can handle high temp. I will look into this!. I am worried that changing the process will change the flavour profile, which I really like.

We were talked into a plate press to separate beer liquid from mash solids. Has anyone used this method?. We are not having any positive results. The plate filters clog up about 1/2 way through the plate stack, so that only some of the plate cavities are dry pressed, the others are a floury mess. I have heard that several breweries are using this method but the ones I have talked to are pressing/filtering pre fermentation. They also say that they grind their flour quit fine which makes me wonder why our press is clogging up?. We are coarse grinding. The system was designed using samples of our mash and process information. JOHN BROOKS and MICRONICS have given us very little assistance since the Plate Press was dropped off (3 months late). John Brooks had a pump technician drop by for a day to review the AODD pump which is working correctly but she had no knowledge of Plate Press operation. We installed a HUGE 7.5 HP compressor to maximize our air needs. Our plates are always stacked 1-3,1-3, we have tried short stacking, slower-faster feed rates on the AODD pump and AIR COMPRESSOR, premixing the mash slurry so pumping is consistant. Any ideas? Thanks, Doug