kleclerc77

We use roller milled grains (winter wheat included) for all of our grain in mashes. At first I was skeptical, hearing advice from people saying that nothing short of flour would suffice. But we get great yields and everything works just fine with this coarser grind. Especially with exogenous enzymes, those things do work. As far as your recipe goes, I use weight of grain vs volume and look at the end result. I know a lot of the big guys use volume when talking about amount of grain, but I think you'll find most smaller places using weight. The idea being 1.5-2lbs (~<1 kg) per gallon of the total mash. So if my conversions are right that amount of grain seems to be on the lower end of that. Lots of good stuff to say about flavor production in lower gravity mashes though if that's what you're going for. I'm not sure I have a great answer about the leftover solids. They'll all be left over and you have to find a good way to get rid of them. That is/was honestly our biggest challenge of the whole process.

Heat up times with the baine marie may be painful, but it's definitely preferable to the alternative. Are you too far along to run the still on low pressure steam?

I wouldn't strip on grain if you are using a still with submerged electric elements and no agitation. Both the distillate and the still will be a scorched mess.

Yep you're on the right track with a counter flow heat exchanger. That's a small volume and if you can count on 49 degree spring water year round that's a great cooling temp. Hit up Jesse at Trident Stills in Maine, he can fab you something that's sized appropriately (I think you'll find other suppliers will only have units that are wayyy oversized for your operation) and you can't beat his prices. He made us a couple that were priced much better than other quotes we got, not to mention he is full of great mashing/distilling advice if you ever need any. Also what @ViolentBlue suggested about keeping the volume low and topping off with cold water is great advice. After doing that, an immersion cooler like @Southernhighlander suggested will probably cut it too, though I have never used one personally.

There's a 2000L Kothe setup that was just listed for sale if you're willing to go bigger and non-continuous https://adiforums.com/topic/12974-kothe-2000l-vodka-complete-distillery-for-sale-available-1122-new-never-used/

I'd be hesitant to put fruit distillate into new charred American oak, especially a 4 char - it just doesn't stand up (in my opinion!!!). I would try to clean it up beforehand. Like @meerkat and @PeteBpointed out, copper contact with liquid can help reduce sulfur a lot. If you don't want to redistill it - any way to gently agitate for a while in your still or a vessel with a bunch of copper?

We used FRP (Fiberglass Reinforced Plastic) panels for the walls of our production area. It works like a charm. It takes some skill to install, so if you can, find someone who has installed it before.

What temperature are you letting your ferments get to? The only time we have had a rye ferment (~90% unmalted rye) not finish out was when the ferment got too hot. I found myself mashing on a Friday and wasn't around to click the glycol jackets on at all over the weekend. These ferments ended up between 1.005 and 1.010 SG, and though that may seem relatively good, it's really not. Our low wines yield from the ferments was about 15% less, which is significant. From my understanding, if you get the yeast doing its thing quickly enough, bacterial competition shouldn't be an issue. That's why I'm thinking the temp of the ferments may be the culprit. I also have to echo @Sudzie's sentiment that your starting gravity is higher than it should be.

Do any of these come with pressure relief? I see a port on a couple of the pots you could probably pop one on? Do you sell anything like a bulb/helmet topper for these kettles as opposed to columns? I'm also in the market for something that size, as mine is at the end of its life. Preferably to be fired by a propane burner. For research purposes, of course.

Grade A molasses ferments with the least amount of intervention. Blackstrap seems to really not want to ferment unless you have a pretty serious nutrient regime, along with agitation, oxidation, and so on. The reason blackstrap is used by most of the big guys in the Caribbean is they have crazy centrifugal systems and other industry tricks that remove the ash and other impurities that hinder fermentation. In my opinion, it's worth the extra cost for the grade A to not deal with the ass pain of tricking blackstrap into fermenting.

If I could recommend one add-on to your still set up, it would be a pressure relief valve on the pot. Paul or Slick would have the best advice as to the exact parameters there. That is my number one advice to the DIY crowd. There have been multiple still explosions over the past few years that were results of either non-existent or way miscalculated pressure relief valves. Probably many more on the DIY scene that don't make the news. Luckily the main offender, a still manufacturer out of Oregon, is out of business. Though stills operate under very low pressure, something getting clogged in a worm condenser or in a packed column will cause the still to pressurize, leading to a possible explosion of the unit. Stay safe.

Although gluten doesn't make it through to the final distillate, the possibility for gluten contamination still exists. The two main culprits would be grain dust from mashing wheat possibly ending up in a spirit container, or if your barrel supplier happens to use any wheat paste to seal barrel heads/leaks. The latter obviously isn't a problem for vodka, but for any spirit you are barrel aging. That's why I was surprised with the TTB (or was it the FDA?) saying you can declare spirits gluten free.

Haha good, I didn't mean to imply you were making a bad gin there!!! It may just be the case that the plates being in the way effect the oil / flavor extraction in a negative way for a larger part of the run than if they weren't there at all. For example, an 8% heads cut seems like a lot when it comes to gin. It could have something to do with being at too high a proof for too long? People distill individual botanicals at different maceration proofs (therefore final run proofs) when they really get into it.

The reason you may be struggling with the desired flavor could be the plates! Ideally you'll run gin pot-still style, as every plate used will strip it of that much more flavor, not to mention just make the whole distillation and flavor extraction process act much differently. I'm sure there are exceptions and people are passing their gin through plates successfully, but I'm speaking in general. There are tons of gin mad scientists out there after all. That may or may not also be connected to your collection efficiency issues as well. There are lots of other variables that people take into consideration to achieve a gin: maceration proof, maceration time, individual botanicals vs doing them all at once, collection percentage, fresh vs. dried botanicals, the list goes on. But my gut here would be to start by bypassing those plates if you can.

@Alex_Sor all of your answers on here are snarky and unhelpful. Wasn't it a couple months ago that you suggested barrel aging bourbon (or spirits in general) wasn't necessary, while also admitting to never making bourbon? Get a grip. Your advice is bad.

@Alex_Sor You seem to dwell a lot in the theoretical. People here are looking for practical advice. Using slightly warmer cooling water prevents chugging for me and others.

I've found there is a point where the cooling water is too cold for a spirit run. Cold as I can get it for everything else (crashing mash/stripping runs), but if the water is too cold during a spirit run it can cause some serious chugging/inconsistent flow rates.

If you don't make whiskey why do you think your advice on bourbon production is valid? The process you're describing would not qualify as bourbon here in the US.

My thoughts exactly 😂

If I had the ability to lauter, I would. Why not use the equipment to its potential? @Silk City Distillers - are you getting a pretty fine flour from the hammer mill? We have been considering doing a single malt here (no lautering capability), but I can't imagine working with/pumping the roller milled stuff that was crushed to be lautered. The small percentage we use in other recipes already forms quite the brick on top of the ferment after ~12 hours or so. Maybe with a finer grind, it would be more doable though.

Malted grains definitely have a different flavor profile than their unmalted counterparts. The spirit will come out tasting different for a malted vs. an unmalted rye mash, for example. Malted barley's diastic power is much greater than most other cereal grains, that's why you only need a relatively small amount of it at the right temp to saccharify the starches from a large amount of unmalted grain, ie: adding ~15% malted barley should be enough to fully convert an otherwise unmalted grain mash, where with other malted grains like rye or wheat, you'll need a much, much higher percentage. If I'm not mistaken (I may be) the malting process of any grain will make the starch readily available for saccharification, so high cook temps for malted grain wouldn't be necessary. Everyone has different setups/priorities/flavor preferences that steer them one way or another. I am happy with both the price of unmalted grain and more importantly the flavor it yields in the final product, so we use unmalted grain accompanied by exogenous enzymes and a percentage of malted barley. I'm sure others feel differently. Hope this helps.

@Bier Distillery I guess 'louched' out of solution would be a better verb than 'shocked'. I use shock because it can happen very suddenly and I must've heard it described as such at some point.

It's oils that have been shocked out of solution and will not re-dissolve. Once they have come out of solution, getting them back in solution is challenging. The best way we have found (without chill filtering, anyway) is as soon as you notice any haze/flocc, bring the proof up with higher proof spirits. Heating and agitating can also help, but maybe not permanently. It's the cold that really does it for us. Because of the extreme cold temps in the winter, we find ourselves needing to bottle at a higher proof. If you're not willing to make that trade-off, chill filtration may be your only foolproof way to avoid haze/flocc.

Did you bring it straight from 170 down to 100? Try stepping the proof down more gradually to prevent flocc/haze, especially when approaching that 100 proof mark or lower.

Like most things here, there's a safe and an unsafe way to run anything. I'm sure you're doing it safely. Back to OP @Golden Beaver Distillery's question - how many plates are you running on your setup to achieve 190+?