bluefish_dist

Personally after going through the process I would want all building permits in hand at a minimum. For us it took longer to get permits from the city than to get our dsp. We did have the state stop in to verify what we were doing.

Still is class 1 div 2, without enough ventilation you need 25 ft 3 ft high classified and 5 ft radius of the outputs classified. You can get away from this by having enough ventilation to keep your output diluted to 1/4 of the lowere explosive limit. Then no classification required. Dalkita can help on the calculations.

15k might be too high, but it will be more than you expect. We had to do plans for our space which was 2000 sq ft. We ended up with plumbing, electrical, mechanical and a general architect. The architect was good to have on board as he was able to negotiate a solution to our fire loading and unknown building renovation. Pm me if you want details on cost for each step and what they did.

We were able to push the 120 gallon limit to 190 gallons by using a flammable cabinet for 70 gallons of the 120 which is doubled to 140 when in the cabinet. So we get 50 gallons outside the cabinet and 140 inside, with no more than 30 gallons open. We worked with Dalkita and our local hazmat.

The 4l and 8l per hour are approximate volume of distilled alcohol. So for a 300l charge at 10% you would pull off maybe 30 to 45l of alcohol so you would have a run of say 7 to 10 hrs. With a 6" that would be 3.5-6 hrs. Once you add in warm up time the 6" is a lot faster, but you will need more power to make it work. A 4" will run nicely with 5000w while a 6" will need 10,000w.

A 4" will do a little over a gallon an hour, so say 4l per hour. A 6" will do closer to 8l per hour. So how long do you want your still runs to last?

I ran into an issue with a disagreement over class and type on a label. To change it we had to change our formula, but I was able to work with a specialist so it only took a few days.

Not sure it's legal, but I have been in several distilleries that have served samples out of unmarked bottles.

If you didn't use a still to create the dunder you might be ok. depending on quantity you might fall under a home brewer/wine maker provided that the alcohol was evaporated from an open pot with no way to condense it. I personally would not do it. You will have a month or so after getting your dsp prior to being able to sell while waiting for label approval and/or waiting for state licensing.

There are a couple of forums that have lots of info. Home distilled is probably the biggest. I would go there and search, then start reading.

I think that time is how long it takes to get to the top of the stack and get reviewed. Once it's at the top and gets rejected your corrected submission goes back to the top. So it's usually a day or so to get a rereview, not another 20 days. If you need help call them. I had a formula that was causing issues on the label. One I got ahold of a specialist they were able to update the formula quickly so the label could be approved.

http://www.generant.com/Literature/Series%20VRV%20Product%20Literature.pdf These can be ordered to spec and are about $60.

My local health department considers ice a food, so if we serve ice we have to have a food service license. The food service regulations do not allow pets. So if we don't serve ice and don't have to deal with the health department it should be ok. I have also seen a few things done that I am pretty sure are not allowed, but get done anyway. It often depends on who is doing inspections.

Pressurized water is much safer than steam which is what we are dealing with. with pressurized water a leak immediately reduces the pressure. Quite safe. Look up hydro forming. It's forming steel to molds simply using water pressure. Safe since water does not compress. From working with using air pressure to pump flammable fluids, 55 gallon drums won't handle much pressure, even 5 psi will start to distort the shape. I think even a 15 psi relief is probably too high on most stills.

I think that is an issue that they are cracking down on. I too have been in other distilleries that I could touch the still and we had to adjust our floor plan for approval. I have also been in distilleries that have partial walls. I would call your specialist and ask. Once I was that far most of them were helpful and wanted to approve the application.

The gallon limits are based on type of flammable liquid. We deal with class 1-B and class 1-C. Also wort/wash is class 2. Class 1-B is for 100 proof and up if I remember correctly and 1-C is for 40-100 proof. I might be a little off on the cut off but it should be close.

If you don't have sprinklers it does. Your open container limit is 30 gallons per control area. Dumping 55 gallons would exceed that. If you pump it, it's a closed system and that would be ok. If you add sprinklers you could do it and be less than the maq. Once you exceed the maq you will have to go to a hazardous occupancy. You really need sprinklers to be able to deal with large volumes of alcohol based on the fire code.

Your fire martial is correct. The 30 gal open, 120 gal is the maximum allowed quantity in a single control area without a flam cabinet or sprinklers. You can increase your amount by adding sprinklers. That doubles quantities. The other option is change the occupancy to S types. That also requires sprinklers. If you are in a non sprinkler building there is not much you can do. Also did you get hit up for having a type 1 division 2 heating element? Or did you add ventilation to get around the electrical classification?

Ttb does use encrypted emails for communication. They came from zix secure. Could easily look like a phishing email. Mine always came from someone that ended in ttb.gov. I did have to set up an account to see the emails. Seems like a round about way to communicate but that's how they did it. Your email,may be legit if you are in the ttb approval process.

Lots of people build stills. They are really quite simple. Now you are going to have to decide what type you want, pot still, reflux? If it's a reflux, what type do you want, lm, cm, vm, ccvm? Then do you want bubble plates, perforated plates, packed column or a combination. I would head over to homedistiller.org and do a lot of reading.

Make sure you file your monthly reports now. Also your quarterly excise tax even if it's 0. And yes, all I got was an email saying approved. For formula approval all you get is an email saying the status changed.

In fact the ttb expects you to have the equipment at the time you apply. Part of the application is listing all your equipment and serial numbers.

Pm sent

Bar codes like UPCA do have a minimum size. I have used a 1.25 X 1.5 label to hit that minimum. You can print on a pretty cheap direct thermal printers, about $100 or so. The good zebras which will do direct or ribbon printing are about $1k, but work really well. I have used those on production lines that did 2000+ pcs per day with automated labeling. Direct thermal works fine as long as you dont expose the product to heat after labeling. Should not be an issue with spirts, but it was with heat shrunk consumer products so we had to use the ribbon print. The ribbon print also looks a little better as you can do it on a high gloss label. To creat the labels I like easy label the best. Pretty simple and not too expensive. I used it to create labels approved for shipping via USPS with no problem. If you dont mind buying by the roll, most label companys will do custom label sizes for you. labels should run $.01 to $.03 each.

From a quick google search it appears that its simply alcohol with multidextrin. The alcohol is absorbed into the powder and encapsulated.