Vodka Yeast or Bakers Yeast?

[Arismac]

G'dy all,

I have decided to go with Lalvin EC-1118. I have mixed one satchet of 5g with the multi-vit capsule and a little sugar into 100mls of warm water. An hour later and the yeast is well active and will be ready for adding to the TPW very soon.

[coffe addict]

For neutral it probably won't make a huge difference as it'll be refluxed till no flavour is left but if making a sipping vodka the higher quality yeast will be noticeable.

5gm into a tpw is a low pitching rate. The pack usually gives ideal pitching rates. Ie how much yeast to wash.

You can breed up the quantity by making a starter as you have and the amount of available sugars and oxygen will determine how much yeast you get. Usually yeast in half strength wash will double in two hours.

[Arismac]

Thank you "Coffe Addict". Many years ago when brewing my own beer I always sent my yeast off to nursery school for a a couple of hours or so before adding to the fermentor. I did this with the EC1118 today and at the end of two hours a very active 100mls to pitch. This went into a total of 21ltrs and 8kg of sugar at 28C. I expect things to be well away by tomorrow morning.

[Dig Brinker]

Wow 8 kg in 21 litres? That's a lot. Double what you should use. Aim for 1kg per 5 litres to give a 10% wash.

[Arismac]

Trust me for overdoing it. Oh well fingers crossed. I will report further and hope you do not hear distance explosions and see mushroom shaped clouds. :-D

[coffe addict]

:text-+1: 8kg is what a turbo pack advises. The yeast will make no difference when running into the 20% mark. By that I mean no yeast known to man can produce clean spirit at that strength.
General consensus is 10% is the absolute maximum and 6% to 8% is better but less yield.
Most would be 4 or 5kg with 21L.

Edit posted as you did.
It'll just create more of the undesirable alcohols and will need to be run slower to separate them.

[Arismac]

OK, looks like the wash is heading for the Cosmetics Den to be used as ethanol in our aroma diffusers. Next batch will be cut well back in the amount of sugar. Thanks again.

[coffe addict]

If you have room in the fermenter add more water or split into two fermenters if you have a second fermenter.

[Arismac]

Thank you "Coffe Addict". I certainly have room in the fermentor. It is rated at 30l so will add more water immediately. I will make sure that the "top up" is at the same temperature as the wash. Many thanks.

I hope this is not "illegal" in the forum but this is the fermentor that I own. http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/like/112144275004?chn=ps

[warramungas]

That's a whopping 380 grams of sugar per liter. Hopefully NOT 8kgs of sugar the top the fermenter up to 21 liter or your yeast is going to s**t its pants with a major case of sugar overdose. Reason I assume is that my 30 liter struggled to fit a full 8kgs and 21 liters of water.
Maximum I used to push my yeast was 300 grams per liter for high abv turbos. Once upon a time.
I'd just stick to recipes mate for now. I used the sugar head bourbon washes and use the feints for vodka when I've got a nice quantity built up. Makes really good neutral.

[Arismac]

I really, really did try to stick to the recipe. Problem is that I changed the yeast without changing the amount of sugar. I am learning. So will I get closer to where I should be by topping the 21l up to 30l which is the fermentor capacity?

Perhaps I should have said that I dissolved the 8kg of sugar and then topped up to 21l.

[coffe addict]

Yeah top it up as full as you can without puking (overflowing with the foam)

[mattcoffs]

Trust me for overdoing it. Oh well fingers crossed. I will report further and hope you do not hear distance explosions and see mushroom shaped clouds. :-D

I'm curious, why did you differ from the recipe?

[the Doctor]

Whilst a long time fan of ec 1118, for the last four years we have been using Uvaferm 43 as our vodka yeast... we aim for a very neutral profile, as our vodka is used mostly for cocktails, it is clean and light... we are generally discarding about 57 % of the run and have achieved a very good result with this practice. Our pure vodka was recently reviewed in the Australian Spirits Guide (Luke McCarthy) and was favourably compared to Reyka, which I have long held to be the best there is... Is it the yeast.... well yes and no... I believe EC 1118 to be as clean in it's finish, but a bit slower and less aggressive. In all the hundreds of washes we have done, we have never had a stuck ferment, that is testament to the yeasts mentioned as ours is a challenging environment with wide temperature variation and aggressive indigenous yeasts... If you are working in similar conditions I can recommend Uva 43( ex winequip melbourne)
Cheers
Doc

[maddogpearse]

Someone should start a thread named, "all the pearls of wisdom the doctor has left us" and copy and paste every post doc has ever made into it...
Thanks so much for all your contributions to this forum doc! You have some very valuable knowledge that I'm sure we all appreciate you sharing so openly with us!

[Arismac]

A BIG plus one ...

I am avidly consuming his wisdom on this forum.

I perhaps also should have mentioned that the current SG of my fermentor is 45 taken from a sample out of the tap.

[Arismac]

Waht a turkey. I can't even read the Hydrometer correctly. I should have said that the SG is 1.145. Sorry about that.

[mattcoffs]

Waht a turkey. I can't even read the Hydrometer correctly. I should have said that the SG is 1.145. Sorry about that.

So did you pitch your yeast already? Have you had any activity?

[Arismac]

I have pitched the yeast about 24 hours ago. No discernable activity yet in the fermentor but the yeast was well active in the "nursery" dining on a little sugar and a multi-vit capsule.

[Doubleuj]

Stick your ear to the side of the fermenter and listen for fizzing or take the lid off and look/ listen