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  1. 1 point
    We recently purchased one of Paul's set ups in his photos and had newbie issues getting it dialed in. Paul gave me a cell number for his main guy. Mike took multiple calls both Saturday and Sunday to get me running. Service has been excellent. Still is running like a champ! For any new folks looking for a manufacturer I would recommend Paul and can say I have been very happy with the product and service.
  2. 1 point
    If the "single barrel" is new, it needs approval, strangely enough. Clearly allowed, but you can't just add new info or language.
  3. 1 point
    Back to the original question here. As Paul says, its an easy backflush. Water rinse, caustic, water rinse, acid, water rinse (or leave it without rinsing in accordance with your passivation schedule). You can pipe from the cip manifold to where you attach the parrot with a transfer hose too. It'll clean the hose in the process too.
  4. 1 point
    The sizing of the reservoir depends on the mash cooling time plus the fermenter cooling as well, so if you had a 250 Gal mash load, a 500 Gal reservoir for that plus extraneous loads like fermenters. Recovery time should get done before you are ready to make a still run, so get the reservoir back down to around 50-55F before use again. If you are doing stripping runs, you'll have to upsize the chiller in some cases, especially if the tank starts to overheat- creeping above 70F before you're not close to the end of the strip run is not a good sign and you should adjust technique so you don't overheat the chiller. I am adding a 2-stage cooling technique for larger mash runs by adding a hybrid adiabatic glycol cooler which will give you performance of a cooling tower with a closed loop system, so I can run it along with the chiller to take the high heat out of the mash run which reduces the chiller size and overall KW. On a recently completed system, the savings winds up being 20 HP per hour of usage compared to cooling with a chiller. Hope to have pictures posted soon!
  5. 1 point
    https://www.katmarsoftware.com/alcodenslq.htm There's a video how it works. Also it's a free download to test it out.
  6. 1 point
    High solids = sugar or sweetners? If so, invest in Alcodens LQ and take the time to do the work up-front, to ensure your final proof is on target. Trial and error proofing (why so many people do this, I don't know) would be an absolute disaster if you are proofing via distillation. Your final proofing should only be a confirmation of the proof you expected out of whatever processing operations you were doing.
  7. 1 point
    I bought a Master Distillation kit from Pellet Labs: https://pelletlab.com/product/master-distillers-1000ml-distillation-kit/ I have sent so many of my distillers to them that I should be getting some sort of commission, but alas, no. You can also find them on Amazon with free shipping, if you are lucky. You do not need an Anton Paar, the gauging manuals are based on thermometer and hydrometer measurements. Buy a calibrated thermometer and calibrated hydrometers and LEARN HOW TO USE THEM CORRECTLY! Here is a video from Rudolph here as well as the instructions written out on how to to use a distillation apparatus: https://rudolphresearch.com/videos/distillation-obscured-alcohol-products/ BDAS is who I used for samples testing: https://bdastesting.com/ but find someone close to you as you have to pay to ship off your samples. Jennifer
  8. 1 point
    Geoman, 1) It is going to take much more than 30 pounds of fruit to make brandy. Of course, smaller scale makes distillation more difficult, because the space between heads and tails is so compact. Even the smallest test batches of fruit I do start with 500# - regardless of your still size. 2) Sugar. Good fruit brandy is just fruit, no added sugar. You need to concentrate the flavor of a huge amount of fruit to get something aromatic. in the case of your 30# peach v 7# white sugar, you are getting much more fermentable sugar from the sugar than the peach. That is going to dilute your fruit flavor. Also, when you don't use sugar, you won't need water. It will start gloop-y, but the fruit will break itself down during fermentation. 3) Fruit quality. Don't use rotten or moldy fruit. Crap in, crap out. This is going to increase the chance of spoilage in a big way - you can't see all the mold spores, and you won't be able to remove them. 4) Temp control - gold star for that. 5) Agitation - You might consider opening your fermentation vessel and punching down the fruit at least once a day. Solids will rise to the top, which will slow down your fermentation, but also increase the possibility of spoilage. Keep it all wet and well-mixed. 6) Pits - get em outa there. You might thinking about adding back a small percentage when you get proficient, but when you are starting out there are source of cyanide that you don't want to worry about. Agitation and funky fruit are the reasons for the ugly fermentation, but consider your base recipe - and try to just use fruit. I have some books in German I can recommend if you speak it, but in English "distilling fruit brandy" by Josef Pischl is a good, if not perfect, starting place. Happy distilling!
  9. 1 point
    This can't be a new problem, extending Bonded Area to warehouse/rick house. How do the Big Boys Bond those big barn rick houses in KY? In fact we're allowed to have locked high volume tanks outside with only a fence around them. I'd stack my conex's outside with a fence around them and add it to Bonded area.
  10. 1 point
    The variables are infinite. Build with the number of plates it takes to get to your highest abv desired. Then you can run less reflux, or more heat, (purposely inefficient) to get back down to the lowest abv you might desire. We bought from Paul, above. Five plates on an 8" diameter column. That's just what I decided was my sweet spot. With more or less reflux/heat we can get 70% to 90% abv. Not very important for collecting hearts in whiskey. But with fewer plates you will have trouble controlling abv in heads and tails for separation.
  11. 1 point
    This is a great discussion, really provides excellent overview of pros/cons and underlying process of a vacuum distillation for spirit production! Kudos to @Silk City Distillers and @Southernhighlander for taking the time to do so...
  12. 1 point
    By the way, looking at the photos, I don't see what in that would be eligible for patent protection, looks like a fairly typical vacuum setup. There is a tremendous amount of prior art in this area. If you think you've come up with something brand new, the flavor and fragrance crew probably did it 50 years ago.
  13. 1 point
    Southern highlander Congratulations on your success! I am happy to hear that you had the profits on my boiler to go onto to sell 17 million. Good for you. Sounds like the equipment business would have been a better business plan. Yes, the boiler was sold to me by Southern Highlander. The tag on the boiler Shows the manufacture date from Ajax. I am selling the boiler at a best offer with no intention to use the profits to start a distilling equipment operation. I’m just trying to make space to run a humble distilling Operation.
  14. 1 point
    I feel like there is enough drift on the handheld Anton Paar units that you need to recalibrate with distilled water every day. Wondering if anyone else has had the same experience. We use the DMA35 for quick, intermediate measurements, and we use Alcodens for all proofing/dilution calculations. More than once I've gone through proofing (which may extend more than a day) with Alcodens only to realize the DMA35 was off by a few tenths. Alcodens calcs are always laser precise, the density meter, not so much. Nearly every time when the measured proof had a deviation from the calc, it's just that the meter was off. Glass rules. If you are working with sugar additions (honey), start honing your lab skills, a digital density meter is not going to save you any material amount of time.
  15. 1 point
    We had issues early on with foaming in the fermenters and with slow stripping runs for Rye. We started by adding Beta-Glucanase to the mash in two steps, once during heat up when the Rye is gelatinizing at about 135f for an hour (milled to course flour and Alpha Amalyase added) and again after it has been cooled to 80f and is about to be pumped to fermenters (same time we add Gluco Amalyases). We do a higher cook temperature rest at 170f for 30 min for the corn we add (25%) and then take it up to 190f for half an hour to make sure any other nasties are held at bay, then malt is added during the cooling time at about 160f and another rest. Without the BG it was a lot thicker and we had more foaming and mashes that didn't finish where we wanted them. With the BG the foaming went down, we ferment much drier, and heat-up in the still was greatly improved. In the still, we do find that on occasion we have a rye run that will move very slowly. Typically this is because there is some scorching at the bottom of the pot (doesn't take much). To counter this we heat up the rye a bit slower than we do with Bourbon or Corn whiskey. Doesn't work every time, but we went from issues with every other rye run to 1 in 8. Super low tech way to help with foaming in the fermenter, spray PAM around the insides a few inches below the top. It helps break the foam while it rising and has saved me lots of time cleaning up in the morning.
  16. 1 point
    I'm sure that you misunderstood the manufacturer's recommendations. I've never heard of a cleaning run using tails. We recommend that our customers use heads or vinegar for the cleaning run. Of course the cleaning run is done one time to remove welding chemicals etc. Regular cleaning is not done during a run. It is done after the run is complete. For cleaning the line arm and condenser, you simply flood the column with the CIP, which floods the line arm and final condenser and comes out the parrot. It's that simple. If someone does not have CIP, they can flood from the parrot connection, flooding the condenser then line arm and then the column then draining into the pot.
  17. 1 point
    I filled out your survey. You shouldn't make 3 identical threads under different subject headings though, this isn't a massive forum where people won't see what you post, and it's just going to confuse things.
  18. 0 points
    We started out at about 30% but there is an automatic pressure tank that tops up the system in the event there is a spillage. Every once and a while if changing a condenser or something, you might loose a little here and there - so, what the actual proof is today, I don't know, maybe around 20 - 25%. I was planning to do a full system maintenance in January and I'll probably flush it out and refill it with fresh coolant then.
  19. 0 points
    Hello! Hotel Tango Artisan Distillery is the first combat-disabled veteran owned distillery in the US. We offer a robust lineup of craft spirits and liqueurs, serving 5 states throughout the US, as well as being the premier provider of spirits to the US Military. This is our production/distilling group operating this account, looking to get more involved in the community, share knowledge, and hopefully locate proper homes for some of the equipment we'll be sure to outgrow as we expand! If you're in Indianapolis, or just passing through, reach out! Come say hi, take a quick tour of our distillery, and maybe even come swap some product!
  20. 0 points
    We do this for our cooling fluid (methanol & water), which runs continually through a closed loop. The coolant is cooled by a trip through a large pond behind the distillery. Works great. Although we have reached it's limits.
  21. 0 points
  22. 0 points
    Glen Lyon, This is a common scam that is perpetrated across all industries where things are sold and shipped. It is not distillery specific. They first tried it on us a couple of years ago and they have tried it many times since. Sometimes they do the shipping scam, sometimes they want the goods. The first time they tried it, as soon as they came back with needing it shipped right away, I became suspicious. I checked the customer's billing and shipping address and they were different. The ship to address was in South America and the billing address was in Ohio. The name on the card was a WASP name but the customer had a strong Hispanic accent. I have a way to get contact info and other details for people who's name and address or name and phone number that I know, so I used the name and address to get a phone number. Once I had the phone number I called the card holder. They did not know what I was talking about, they had not ordered and they did not know that their card had been compromised. Then I emailed the guy in South America and had him call me and I screwed with him for days. I talked to him like a dog and kept jacking him around about his order and he kept begging me to ship and in the end I told him I knew he was a thief and I gave him a good cussing. I had a lot of fun with that idiot. There was another from Africa that tried the same scam and I had fun screwing with him as well. There are lots of other scams and people fall for them every day. Here is one that is very hard to detect and they got Hillbilly stills with it a couple of years ago. You get an email from one of your suppliers telling you that they have new wiring instructions for the next payment. You send the next payment to the suppliers new account then your supplier emails and says I did not get my payment and you say: I sent it to your new account and they say what new account? You know at that point you have been robbed. You go back and look at the email about changing the wiring instructions. It may have one letter different in the email address, or maybe it is the suppliers email and their email was hacked. Either way as soon as your money hit the thief's account it was transferred to another and then another account and your money is gone. You can't even call and report it to the FBI. They don't allow that. You report it to the FBI online and maybe they will get back to you in a month and tell you that they can't really do anything. If you own a business, these theft attempts will happen time after time. Here are some things that you can do: Don't click on any links in emails. Don't open email attachments unless you know what they are. Never ship anything to anyone who has a different shipping address than the billing address unless you talk to the actual card holder and verify. If your supplier wants to change payment instructions in an email, call them at the number that you have for them and verify it that they want the changes. Always keep your antivirus up to date. Always keep back ups of everything on a hard rive that no one can access, that way if they hit you with a ransom ware scam you can laugh and tell them to kiss your ass, or screw with their lives for a few days. Most people would not retaliate against these people the way I do and that is probably the right approach but I can't help it. It really pisses me off when someone tries to steal from me and I am a vengeful person who will retaliate in any way possible within the law. I don't want an eye for an eye I want 10 eyes for mine. Here is the best piece of advice I can give. If your email is hacked they can have their way with you very easily many different ways. There are many different ways that email passwords can be hacked but here is the deal. If you access your email with a physical key that must be slid into a card reader, they can't hack you because there is no password, the physical key is the password. In my office these keys are used instead of passwords for everything important that it is possible to use them with. Also if you can afford it, get a security audit done of your network and all aspects of your computer system. I am sorry to hear you were robbed. Good luck in the future.
  23. 0 points
    Probably so you don't get a ton of mash burned onto the steam jacket. Most of the stills I see are built with the idea in mind that scrubbing burned on mash is both pleasant and profitable for the distiller. I understand wanting maximum jacket surface area for heat up, but I'd sacrifice 10 minutes of longer heatup time if it meant I'd spend 15 minutes less time cleaning. Huffy2k is 100% right as well, I have pictures of a nice vendome still where the 1.25" shaft bent and send the mixing blade through the steam jacket. You can run the agitator while draining, but you must be sure that it's turning slow enough to not self destruct when the liquid level gets low.
  24. 0 points
  25. 0 points
    Was really excited by vacuum distillation for a while. I still rotovap nearly everything when I get a free minute to do it. But, I think people put vacuum distillation up on some kind of pedestal as a pinnacle of distilling engineering, when it's really not the case. Vacuum distillation is just a tool, not necessarily better or worse than atmospheric distillation, just different. It's like the difference between SAE and Metric sockets, flat vs Phillips screwdrivers. They aren't so different, but why you might use one or the other certainly is different. Better to think of it as low pressure distillation, it's a continuum, from very low pressures to very high pressures. The pressure you would use in your low-pressure distillation would be based on what you are trying to accomplish by reducing the pressure. It becomes a little less magic when you realize it's still the exact same process, you are just varying the pressure of the process. The single biggest benefit for us, as beverage distillers, is the potential to reduce thermal decomposition of temperature sensitive compounds. It's the reason I still like using the rotovap to extract botanicals. Reduce the pressure, reduce the boiling point, reduce the vapor temperature, and reduce the impact of thermal decomposition - but only if what you are distilling is temperature sensitive. Also keep in mind that thermal decomposition isn't discriminate. It's just as probable that decomposition impacts bad flavors as well as good ones. So don't automatically jump to the assumption that by distilling in a vacuum, you get a better tasting product. Yes, for the most part, when distilling botanicals, you get a "Truer" extract. But it's not always the case, and it certainly isn't the case when distilling from a fermented wash (as opposed to running straight solvent extracts with neutral alcohol). Also keep in mind thermal decomposition is a factor of temperature and time. Which is the reason that most vacuum distillations are not carried out under periods of long reflux. Good example of this is the short-path distillation technique - the goal being the reduce the time under temperature as well. (Realize this means no columns, no plates). The other factor when it comes to temperature, is that higher temperatures aren't necessarily bad. Consider the fact that under the kinds of distillations we do, they are not straight/pure separations, but are reactive distillations. We are creating new compounds as part of the distillation process, and a major factor of that is heat. You can find lots of examples of products that utilize flame-heated stills in a very beneficial way, Maillard products, etc etc. Esterification of acids in a column or thumpers. Too much to dive in to here, just keep in mind that temperature isn't bad. Take those two factors together, and you can see how it's not necessarily a better/worse process anymore, but different. Now, also consider the fact that as your reduce pressure, vapor speed in the column begins to increase significantly. Column diameter needs to increase significantly to compensate for the high vapor speed. Plates begin to become less effective, because the higher differential pressures make it difficult for reflux to drain through the downcomers. Typically why you only see packed columns used for low-pressure distillations. I'll post the math once I have some time to show it, but you end up in a situation where the vapor speeds are so high that entrainment and flooding become major issues. You begin to require some fairly massively sized columns to reduce vapor speed. As you reduce pressure, control issues start to become big problems. Bumping, surging, stability of vacuum control, etc. The lower the pressure, the faster and easier it is to upset the system. For example, completely vaporizing all the held-up liquid in the column, puking up the boiler contents through the column in about 1 second time. As you reduce pressure, the equipment begins to get very expensive as the design pressures and material thicknesses increase. It's fairly easy to spend a small fortune building a system that has absolutely zero benefit over an atmospheric system. Love it for gin, I rotovap gin components all the time. You want a beautiful cucumber flavor? Vacuum distillation all the way. Sorry, but distilling cucumber at atmospheric, the end result is stewed sh!t in comparison. You want to emphasize light, delicate aromas? Flowers? Totally. Love big gin? Don't bother, heavy flavors act like a sledgehammer to your taste buds, you'll never taste the difference. Solvent extractions of botanicals are where low-pressure distillation really shines. Want to talk really low pressure distillation? I have the dry ice bath condenser for my Buchi. I can run acetone and dry ice in the condenser at about -70c. I've got a pretty wicked three stage lab pump that can pull single digit torr, and a really good vacuum controller than can hold it there without disaster. I've done botanical extractions as low as 10 torr. That's boiling at room temperature. No water bath at all, just heated by the air in the room. Just breathing on the boiling flask is enough to almost make it surge out. Super cool stuff, being able to extract the aroma of a flower at a temperature no greater than it would see on a warm spring day. I can distill even cooler, but it's a pain in the ass, since you need to cool the boiling flask, immerse it in cool water, and hope it doesn't warm up faster than you can finish the distillation. Sound awesome? Yeah, it makes great marketing, but really, the end result even distilled warmer is the same. Wah wah. As much as I love this stuff, I've played around with it to know that it's just a tool, not better, not worse, but can certainly yield a product better, or worse, depending on the situation. Can you rebuild a european motor using only SAE tools? Maybe, but it's going to suck.
  26. 0 points
    Hi Brian, Did I sell you this boiler 7 or 8 years ago? If so, this was the first piece of equipment that I sold to a distillery and I used the profit from the sale to start Affordable Distillery Equipment which has since sold over $17,000.000.00 worth of distilling equipment.
  27. 0 points
    Hello folks, Check out the link below to see one of our continuous systems in action at @Stumpy's place!!
  28. 0 points
    Georgeous, You could distill lavender oil for them in your still by placing the plant material in your pot along with water then heat up to 212F and distill off the hydrosol. It would be best if you put the plant material in stainless bags and better if you had a false bottom You will need to clean thoroughly afterword to get the lavender flavors out of your still. You will need to remove your parrot and put an oil water separator at the output of your still. This is one way but not the best. We build special steam stills for essential oils that have false bottoms that separate the plant material from the water. The water is below the false bottom and the heat source to boil the water is electric or gas. The stills are large straight sided vessel and the whole top is removable so that they can be loaded easily. Ours tilt like cement mixers so that they can be easily dumped. The best way in my opinion is to use our vacuum stills with a solvent like ethanol. First you do an extraction in a wash vessel and then the oil laden ethanol from that extraction is pumped into the reclamation vacuum still. You pull -29.5 inHg and distill at around 80F. The ethanol is reclaimed for future use and the oil is left in the still pot and drained. This makes the very best oil. It is cleaner and a much lighter color because it was distilled at lower temps. We primarily sell these systems to hemp to CBD processors. For Hemp to CBD processing we include equipment to winterize and remove lipids, waxes, chlorophyll and THC. Our CBD oil is very high quality and only contains CBD, CBG, CBN and terpenes. These are all cannibanoids. We also have lab equipment to create CBD isolate. Winterizing and removal of waxes lipids and chlorophyll is normally done at the point of extraction but our equipment does it post extraction so our process costs a great deal less than the processes and equipment sold by our competitors. Our 8 gallon system will process 40 lbs of hemp into 4 to 6 lbs of high grade CBD oil per day. The still is capable of doing a run in 65 minutes. The complete set of 8 gallon equipment including the chiller wash vessel, winterizing vessels and everything costs less than $20,000.00 Hi quality bulk CBD oil brings $10.00 per gram. You can do the math. The equipment pays for itself the first day. I don't know of anything more profitable than processing CBD to hemp. The 8 gallon system is the smallest we have. We have sold hemp to CBD processing systems that will do 5,000 lbs of hemp per day.
  29. 0 points
    J Norris and others have it right. The direct statement of the prohibition is Sec. 19.351(c), which is headed removals from processing. It states, "Except as provided in paragraph (b)(2) and (3) of this section, spirits may not be transferred from the processing account to the storage account." Why they bury such a basic tenant so deeply in the text is a mystery to me, but they do. The two exceptions mentioned relate to deposits into the production account, not the storage account, but I'd read (c) as saying you can pass them through the storage account on the way to production. I think someone must have had a need for that and petitioned for it. It otherwise makes no sense, but then I can't think of a rationale for the one way gate into processing rule either. The regulation sites nine sections of law on which it is based and none have a one way rule. The operations you may conduct in the storage account are limited. There are rules that allow filling packages, changing packages, mingling and blending, and adding oak chips to spirits and caramel to rum or brandy, all subject to restrictions, etc. That's it. Under §19.325 you can change packages and barrels are packages. However, and I can't find any direct provision affirming this, if the repackaging results in a change in the class and type, it must be done in the processing account. That suggests a detour into the way repackaging bourbon is different than repackaging rye, but I'll not go there now. I can't find any direct requirement that all operations that change class and type, must be done in processing, but there is an indirect path to that conclusion. The indirect is through the requirement you must designate spirits by kind when you put them into a package (barrel) and that you may not change the designation you have given them without the written permission of TTB (§§19.487(a) and (b) respectively]. An approved formula constitutes such written permission. Section §19.348, which is a processing account rule, requires that you must have an approved formula before you "Blend, mix, purify, refine, compound, or treat spirits in any manner which results in a change of character, composition, class, or type of the spirits, including redistillation as provided in Sec.19.314; or produce gin or vodka by other than original and continuous distillation. Section 19.343, which also a processing account rule, provides that you must make a dump record when you dump spirits for use in the manufacturing of a distilled spirits product and when when spirits are dumped for redistillation in the processing account. It also provides that you must prepare a batch record to record the dumping of spirits that are to be used in their entirety in preparing a batch of product manufactured under an approved formula and the use of such spirits in preparing a batch of product manufactured under an approved formula. The dump/batch record is a processing account record (§19.598). Finally, all "manufacturing," which is a term defined only by the context in which it occurs, occurs in the processing account. But its meaning, as TTB uses it, is clear from the definition of processor. A processor is "any person qualified under this part who manufactures, mixes, bottles, or otherwise processes distilled spirits (§19.1)." Further 19.591, which is in the subpart that addresses processing operations discusses manufacturing records. Thus, one an, be a string of syllogistic logic, deduce that specialty items, which are formula products, are all manufactured in the processing account, and so may not be transferred to the storage account after they are manufactured, unless you want to redistill them to neutral spirits.,any It's all a tangle of rules that someone, not me, should set out by type of spirit. A "for bourbon you may," "for American type whiskey other than bourbon you may not," "for whiskey designated as distilled from malt mash you may, but need not," set of rules, saying what you must, must not, and may do with that type of spirit; the criteria and rules for doing anything that you must or may do; the account in which you do it; what records you must keep of the operations and transactions; and what those records must show.
  30. 0 points
    Yeah, moving to roof-mounted dry coolers is going to be a big shift for us. We would need to do closed-loop glycol and HX to the existing water system, or bite the bullet and shift. Our chillers are inside - great during the winter. Awful during the summer, especially with 100f degrees expected this weekend. Don't mind me, I like to argue.
  31. 0 points
    Keep in mind that you can really only use a refractometer for your starting gravity, and ideally you would have calibrated it against a known hydrometer for your type of wash (grain, fruit, sugar, etc).
  32. 0 points
    Grain in we use refractometer , tried hydrometer on strained wort wasn't happy with it . We do test strained samples during fermentation but I don't put alot of weight in the results.
  33. 0 points
    Yessir, the still is pulling more "heads" than required and we are actually recycling that product back to the beer well at the moment. At the end of the run, the user can concentrate those heads if desired and remove or simply continue recycling. Honestly, we've found that we like the distillate better when we recycle that stream for extended periods of time. Ya...don't get me started on Corson unless we can sit down in front of a bottle of bourbon and trade war stories over drinks! StillDragon is the POLAR OPPOSITE of Corson. Quality equipment and amazing service.
  34. 0 points
    Keep in mind, the reason why carmine has been one of the most popular colorings for the past 500 years, it has the best stability of any of the natural red coloring agents. The most stable when it comes to light, heat, and oxygen. Safe in food. Anything else is a far, far away second place. Color shift to brown is a real problem, and unless you can move product quickly, and have it consumed quickly (don't we all wish), it's going to become a product perception problem. Stability is going to come down to reducing oxygen exposure. This might mean changing your workflow to ensure you aren't adding oxygen at any stage in the process, it might also mean needing to add stabilizers. You are going to need to get into some hardcore food science: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1541-4337.12244
  35. 0 points
    Well here is my 20c worth :-) A column is only needed when you want to rectify the spirit. Some Gin distiller insist a column is essential most do not. A column can strip out some of the botanicals. Assuming you are using a good NGS as input, then a basic pot still with a Gin Head will work. A lot of Gin Distillers get very complicated with still configuration and design, claiming it is essential to their formulation. They key is experimentation. Produce what you can sell. Its that simple. Very small batches will give you consistency problems. But you dont want your entire working capital tied up in un-sold stock. In small startups, I find the still budget therefore size answers this question. This is down to personal taste and what you desire in the end. Some botanicals respond well to spirit maceration well before distillation, others do not. The general rule of thumb with gin is a gin head in the vapour path yields better results. Experiment, you will probably need both methods to produce your final design. eBay When you say Asia, can you be more specific? Its a big place. The alcohol laws in Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Thailand are utterly draconian for a distiller, but improving. This example is a common trend in Gin production where they are distilling all the botanicals separately and blending the individual spirits afterwards. Its a popular trend outside of Europe as the ROW often struggles to get batch after batch consistent quality with botanicals purchased. One order the junipers are plump, un-ripe, and carrying way too much moisture, the next are dry, dusty mouldy old bullets. in Asia, Thailand is one of the biggest suppliers of quality glass. Note when I say quality. Most of the glass from India and China I have found to be of very unpredictable quality. France is still the king of high end glass (SaverGlass) and Italy (BruniGroup) a close second. Glass always becomes an issue of the practical minimum buy, versus the cost of shipping. Remember a pallet contains about 600-800 bottles, so 1 pallett is often a good starting place. For a vintage reproduction check SaverGlass and Bruni. A custom mold, and minimum run costs can cripple a start-up. Look to a catalogue design, think outside the square with regard to ink, coatings, labels to give the effect you desire. The cheapest place I am finding for custom glass and molds at present in Eastern Europe (Romania, Poland, Czech Rep) In my opinion 90% of start-up distilleries fail because they fail to establish a distribution model. Great product, good back story, funky design and bottle, no customers. The second aspect I see is crap product. If it aint a great product, no amount of customers will buy it (well a second time LOL). Growing your own botanicals could be a great back story, as long as you don't become a farmer above being a distiller.
  36. -1 points
    too complex for me i was more curious if anyone else was doing this
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