Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

When I started out 2 years ago, the HBS guy advised me that my old beer fermenter was too small and I must buy a new 30 litre one for adequate headspace.
On the weekend I decided to do 2 ferments since I was given a large amount of dextrose, (I usually use sucrose-white sugar). I had a hunch that my old 25 litre (or so) fermenter would be OK, if a little full. So I put the 8kg of white sugar in the small fermenter and started a double run of Alcotec 48. After 3 days the activity is starting to slow, at 25 degrees, and there has been no overflow or problem. I expect after the usual 5 days it will be fine.

With beer fermenting, I can see that this is more critical since beer worts are foamy. Sugar washes however have not much stuff that allow emulsions to form and consequently don't get very foamy, despite the tremendous acivity of a turbo yeast.

Bloke,

You realise that 3 strikes and you start researching and testing all ideas out yourself...Next you'll be re inventing a few grain recipes...look forward to hearing about when you do...

cheers
a sceptical
bt1

ahh yeah must be ya yeast me thinks . my sugar washes go beserk and my molasses wash is like my sugar wash with a fatal amount of steroids

I feel sorry for guys who have mugs running their local HBSs. My local is a top bloke. Yeah, he pushes the products he sells. If he had his way everyone would produce neutral and use essences. I can't blame him. Owning a HBS is no license to print money. But he's also really helpful and if I can find something that he sells for cheaper elsewhere, I tell him. He doesn't cry about it. Hell, sometimes I even go in there looking for this or that and if what he sells isn't quite what I need he tells me where I can get exactly what I need.

Oh the bloke in town is not to bad his recipes are all malt jobbies as he sells malt ;-) and if he trusts ya he'll show ya the method and product but ya have to just realize they will mostly show ya the methods that provide them the biggest turnover , its not sinister it just business . he told me he makes more from t500s than U P stills but if someone asks him which he thinks is the best he'll tell them as he does with reflux verses pot . cause he flogs that shit yeast because that stuff requires a number of other products and is the type one of his main suppliers pushes (ss) thats business and some turkeys prefer it but hes got good shit in the fridge if ya want specific gear so all in all he's pretty helpful , but he ain't likely to be advising me to nip in to elders a get some chook feed and bread yeast hey when hes trying to sell the same sort of gear in food grade for more ;-)

also the HBS nearest me is limited in what he can stock ie a large distributer of HBS products will not supply him their products if he also stocks their compeditors products.
so he has to choose.... Product Range A or Product Range B

Foaming up of a ferment is caused by a whole bunch of fun things. Primarily protein concentration. Hence head retention in beer and not champagne. There can also be a foam caused by formation of colloidal matter through action between calcium and pectins. This is seen in cider production, a process called 'keeving'.

Sugar washes shouldn't have a crazy amount of protein in it. Unless the yeast added has a high turnover rate (in which yeast are feeding on the protein of other yeast) or added hulls for nitrogen and micronutrients.

Geoff wrote:When I started out 2 years ago, the HBS guy advised me that my old beer fermenter was too small and I must buy a new 30 litre one for adequate headspace.

For HBS dextrose/turbo crap then yeah - a load of bollocks.
but if you try a Deathwish Wheat Germ then yeah - you will need *lots* of headspace


Mind you - you waited two whole years to test this out???