Tips on Tails Cut

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How do we ensure that the tails cut for every batch is as consistent as possible? ABV? Temp? Taste?

I've been looking into making the cut based on alcohol temperature, but find that it fluctuates for different batches though I'm not sure why (thinking it might be due to the fluctuating temperature of my cooling water, as it varies +/- 5 degrees depending on the outside weather).

 

 

[Silk City Distillers]

Taste and experience.

Batch consistency is what makes the distillation cut point temperatures differ.  Unless you are controlling for batch consistency very accurately - through mashing and fermentation - you are going to have a very hard time using temperature for anything other than a rough indicator or where you are in the run.

If you can get starting gravity, final gravity, and fermentation temp under very tight control - you'll start to see consistency in the temp cut points for a given type of spirit.  Change anything along the way, yeast type, mash bill, mash protocol, and your cut points will likely change.

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I'm actually distilling from a neutral spirit, would that simplify things a bit? I've done a few runs of the same recipe from the same batch of neutral spirit and I'm still seeing fluctuating cutting temperatures. I'm exploring cutting by ABV with temp and taste as an indicator - would this be better or no?

[Silk City Distillers]

What are you distilling?