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OFD142014

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  1. Update: I ordered a pallet of rice and gave it another shot in our downtime. I had it ground next door to a flour/meal consistency, hauled it back and repeated cooking as per the norm. I dosed the ferment with DAP on day 2, for good measure. Much better results this time-I'm attributing this to grinding. The "interesting" distillate was transferred into a charred-reused TN bourbon barrel and is now stowed away in the R&D corner of the warehouse. Moral of the story, don't depend on a "flaked rice" designation when you order. Thank you guys for your input, apologies for late response!
  2. I have recently had some time to experiment with some rice; I found out a way to clean the inside of my still. Though the rice polished the inside of our pot, the ferment and subsequent distillation yielded next to nothing. I cooked to 190F and held for an hour with high temp. alpha amylase, cooled to 155F and added gluco amylase and continued to cool to pitch temp (80F). SG read 1092 (2.5 lbs/gallon)- FG 1070 the next morning. It was almost as if I didn't get a conversion and got a false SG reading. It was pretty sweet to taste initially, though. Any ideas on what might have happened here? this is my very first attempt with rice and had high hopes but...
  3. We had luck changing the heating elements to low heat density "wave" elements (Amazon, I think) and diluting the fermented wash so as to reduce viscosity. This isn't ideal for time but, it did get the job done. Best of luck!
  4. Would you be willing to elaborate on "...once I figured out what it likes to ferment?" I am running into the same issues as most on this thread-slow start/stuck ferment with my first experimental batch. I have added DAP as well as a b-vit supplement, reheated ferment and still doesn't seem to taking off as expected. though, currently it is more active, its just not working as I would expect. Any other insight?
  5. Apologies in advance- I haven't any insight to your question but, where are you buying malted corn or, are you malting it yourself?
  6. This may be a little Mickey-Mouse for a commercial distillery but, it works for us. I had a fabricator at one of our sister companies (The Cherokee Group) put this together for me. Slide it in after fermentation, drop your hose inside and pump to the still. This will leave you with having to climb in and manually bucket out the grain bed but, again, it works for us. I hope this helps. Attachments_2016625.zip
  7. Fair enough, I was planning on getting it tested just for my peace of mind. I am using plain old silicon gaskets.
  8. Apologies, bluestar. The short answer is yes, I do see the green color in the stainless condenser. The stainless condenser is attached to the stainless pilot still. The copper condenser is attached to the copper production still. No wash goes directly into the pilot still without first being stripped by the copper production still. Could the distillate be picking this color up during the stripping run in the copper still/condenser? I don't see the low wines to be green in their cloudy, low proof state. Maybe the color is diluted so much that I cant see it? Could it be that the low wines from the stripping run are so low proof, and smeared that the reaction doesn't occur there? Perhaps the reaction only occurs during the rectification run, when the fractions are more concentrated? What are your thoughts?
  9. Again, thank you all for the information. Just to clarify, I do the stripping runs in the 100% copper still. From there, the low wines get put back into the copper still for rectification if it is a product we intend to sell. If the low wines are intended for RnD, they go into the stainless pilot still. I am leaning towards something formed either in fermentation or in the copper condenser. I suppose the green isn't visible in the cloudy low wines until it is concentrated in the rec-run? I have been assembling my own "nutrient bomb" as of late that might be contributing to this in the wine and sorghum distillations that I am seeing this in. Problem is, the color hasn't reared its head in any of the other products that I am making... using the same basic set of nutrients. Nutrient Bomb for my 300 gallon ferment: 3 cups DAP, 1 cup boiled (deceased) yeast, 1/4 cup thiamine hydrochloride, 1/8 cup magnesium sulfate. Am I too high on any of these? Could too much DAP be causing this? Temps, agitation, etc. have remained the same. I did not use this "bomb" on the brandy wash, I used bio-ferm complete. I ran the brandy first, noticed the green color, then when done ran the sorghum... heads came with green color. Maybe it's something residual from the brandy (acetic, diacetyl?) that didn't get washed out before running the sorghum. Even after rerunning this colored spirit, it still comes out with the same color green heads smearing into the hearts.
  10. Ha, I made the name to match the color of my spirit. Thank you all for the information. Our current production still is a copper reflux (copper condenser). The pilot still is a stainless reflux with copper plates (stainless condenser). I flush both stills with hot water after runs, nothing fancy. Every so often, I will use a mild caustic solution followed by mild acid solution as well. Of course I flush after this with hot water back to neutral. Maybe I am not actually cleaning enough? The copper salt formation sounds reasonable to me, but why all of the sudden? We have been operational for almost two years and haven't had this issue until very recently (started last month). I don't see any blue or green in the cloudy low wines. Maybe it is forming during the strip in the copper system and when being rectified (production or pilot still) it concentrates and makes itself visible? Can this salt, if that be the guilty party, travel up the column as a vapor and then be re-condensed? As I said before, the condenser on the pilot still is stainless and only the plates in the column are copper. In any case, I will try a thorough cleaning of both stills before rectifying my next brandy and see if this solves the issue. Thanks again!
  11. Hello, I am writing to ask if anyone has experienced green distillate before? It isn't blue, more of an emerald green. I first noticed it when rectifying brandy low wines. Then I noticed it again when rectifying sorghum low wines. It does clear up eventually in both instances, however it goes further into my hearts than I am comfortable with. I do supplement the ferments with nutrients rich in Nitrogen. Could excess nitrogen be creating an environment that is oxidizing my copper? It is my understanding that this leads to a blue tint. On stripping runs, I collect down to between 20-40 proof. Is this too low; am I leaving some residue on the inside of my column and or condenser- Is this getting dissolved by the heads/hearts fraction of the spirit run? I am experiencing this in both, the production still and my pilot still which leads me to believe it is something in the wash carrying over and not something in the stills. Is it possible that it is a combination of yellow tailsy residue from the still and bluish oxidation from the copper (yellow+blue=green)? Have any of you experienced this or anything similar? Any help is greatly appreciated. Thank you, Emerald City
  12. Awesome, thank you. Even after a thorough cleaning of the condenser, the yellow still appeared yesterday in the first part of the spirit run. I will stop worrying about it if this is normal. Thank you both for your imput, I really do appreciate it!
  13. After my 3rd strip, I disassembled the condenser yesterday and noticed A LOT of crud had built up. Soaked in very mild caustic, then mild acid and then rinsed with water. This seemed to chew up a lot of what had accumulated in there. My guess is that the accumulation of fatty/ oily stuff comes with the later part of the hard fast stripping runs and only really has the opportunity to dissolve into solution again with the high proof spirit that comes over in the rectification run? I will be doing a spirit run today and look forward to the results. Thank you for your help! I Will share my findings in the next post.
  14. I appreciate your interest. It is a copper shotgun condenser.
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