Kindred Spirits

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Depending on what you are running you can do a normal distillation, just take your heads cut and discard them. Or if you want to do a small sacrificial run that works too, just be sure the boiler is charged enough so as not to run dry.

A vinegar run would be a good idea especially if you take it apart for cleaning its more like a finishing process for cleaning. I like to use them for leak detection as well because does get in all the cracks an crevices and the smell alerts you to any potential leaks. Depending on the buildup you see during single spirit type runs you can typically get away with a good CIP cleaning process. If the buildup is significant due to wash crusting on the sides of the boiler you might have to get in there and scrub it off.

How much buildup is there on the inside? Typically its recommended to use some mild chemicals like PBW and hot water, followed by a light citric rinse if you are looking for that shine, however with copper there is such a thing as "too much" cleaning with acids as they will eventually eat away the copper. In terms of the condensers, you can soak them by capping the bottom inlets/outlet and filling from the top. Usually for most clients I recommend a light cleaning between spirit types, or when you can notice the effectiveness of the copper starting to fade. If going to lets say a vodka from a Gin, it would be recommended to do a more thorough cleaning to get rid of the oils from the gin run, but even then, most of the time a 140 degree PBW will clean it out pretty well.

My first question to any client that has any sort of sediment or flaking issue is What kind of proofing water do you use? Second is what's your filtration process for bottling?

I am available to help assemble and "tie-In" equipment on site for buyer if interested.

Definitely go this route if you are looking to stay with something stock. You can get up to 1000 gallons in the SS IBCs. If you are interested in some conical fermenters, PM me. The manufacturer I work with makes some really nice ones that don't cost a fortune.

Get some 550 gallon stainless steel IBC totes, I recommend them for most clients. They are durable and inexpensive, yet easy to clean and move around..

Worst case you could stand them up at night if you are that concerned, or dump the barrels into totes that they could fill from.

All the "Old Timey" barrel taps were smooth bore, but most are threaded now. https://barrelsunlimited.com/product/4-inch-brass-spigot/ With a threaded setup you have to make sure the gaps in the valleys of the threads are filled. The old style you just can't be shy about hitting in and they work great. Main thing for both is making sure the hole is the proper size and not ovaled out at all. Might be worth it to grab some forstner bits to make sure of that.

Don't worry about needing a gin basket for gin, you can do a boiler charge gin very easily. If you need help with getting a recipe going feel free to reach out. I have helped a number of distilleries develop award-winning gins with their own native botanicals. If you want to add a gin basket later for some more "delicate" botanicals it should be easy to do so.

I typically recommend clients charge the boiler at around 40 %abv just to ensure you aren't cutting down on your heating surface at the end of the runs and greatly reduces the potential for getting close to running the equipment dry. What you could try doing if you want to keep the abv down is use the plated column to "compress" the heads, and then once you have them pulled off, switch over to pot still mode for the hearts, then recompress for the tails. Almost the same thing as what silk said, except it will drop the ABV a bit more and allow the column to cool a little bit to aid in the tails compression. Main thing is, total collected run has to be below 160. I also second @Silk City Distillers remark about cutting by taste not proof or temp. Too many people want a hard number to make cuts at, but it's called the "art" of distilling for a reason. You will get a little more smearing when it comes time to make the tails cut, but it shouldn't be an issue since you have the much larger window due to the strip/finish method. Once you start getting hints of tails, recompress and get the last bit of hearts out.

For the new make, 12 barrels. Might be able to renegotiate the price for a smaller order. For the 6 year no minimum.

Yeah if you ever need to upgrade out there you should look into a "bagasse-style" or other type of alternative fuel boiler where you could feed in raw materials to generate your steam for production. 100 gallons is the smallest I recommend for commercial clients, but even then it's tough to make things work economically for a setup that small unless making gins with GNS base. You have a special situation being on an island, which is a super cool distillery. Do you have a website? The unit the OP posted looks nice, but with what I imagine the cost would be, puts it in the hobby (with no price limit) category.

With a 4-Nozzle Enolmatic, we were consistently filling 2000-2500 bottles per day. That is with a good team at distilleries I have help get started and trained.