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Review of Spirits Unlimited - Alcotec 48 Turbo Yeast

PostPosted: Fri Nov 15, 2019 1:42 pm
by Boomgate
I am not a Turbo yeast kind of guy... I generally always run a TPW but I was recently set a challenge by my wife to provide some alcohol at short notice and I had no washes on.
I had three days to come up with a buttload of neutral.
In the middle of summer I might be able to get a TPW to go that fast, but in the current climate I knew that was not enough time.
So, I picked up a packet of this yeast. Alcotec 48 Hour Turbo yeast

So First of all the price.
I am a notorious cheapskate, and the price put me off... but the promise of a quick result got me over the line. The yeast in TPW costs half as much, and can be used for 2.5 batches, so essentially from a yeast point of view it costs roughly 5 times more from that point of view... Having said that, you dont need tomato paste, so it claws back a dollar there.

Here is the rub though, the trick of clearing the wash using some gelatine did not work on this wash and I was forced to abort my plans to run my still and subsequently did not meet my deadline. In fact from degassing it took 3 days to clear.

Ease of use.
Actually I have to admit, the instructions were very easy to follow. Simply add 6KG of sugar to water (at the right temp) and dump in the yeast... However to clear it quickly you will need to spend more money on their clearing agent (there is probably a trick for it, but I dont know it).

The result.
I had heard terrible tales of the flavour of turbo yeast, but i run a reflux still so most of the flavour is stripped out. Was it as good as a TPW... No... but it wasnt horrible either. I did decide to run it through my 5 star carbon filter though in the end.
I did not get a good measurement of the ABV, because I didnt get the gravity at the start. However, is produced at least 750ml more than my TPW wash would.

They claim that you can get up to 20% abv by allowing it a full 10 days at the right temperature, I did not test that out.

Re: Review of Spirits Unlimited - Alcotec 48 Turbo Yeast

PostPosted: Fri Nov 15, 2019 11:38 pm
by tipsy
That seems a good fair review..

I might stick to weatbix with a few of wineo's additives

Re: Review of Spirits Unlimited - Alcotec 48 Turbo Yeast

PostPosted: Sat Nov 16, 2019 4:24 pm
by southern45
Interesting thoughts.

I've still got some Limoncello and PIMMS copies that I made with a turbo neutral (through a reflux still) and home brew shop syrup from a while back. To be honest, when it's mixed in with those super sugary premix HBS flavour pouches I can't tell the difference between a turbo wash or a cereal/tpw wash.

I'd never use it again, like you say it's actually more expensive especially if you use the clearing packs as well.

Re: Review of Spirits Unlimited - Alcotec 48 Turbo Yeast

PostPosted: Sun Nov 17, 2019 9:34 am
by wynnum1
If you want a neutral in a hurry using dextrose is going to speed up fermentation and not trying to get too high a percentage of alcohol but if your equipment is too small will be a lot of effort for little result and going to need to filter the wash or use a clearing agent .

Re: Review of Spirits Unlimited - Alcotec 48 Turbo Yeast

PostPosted: Sun Nov 17, 2019 6:24 pm
by PeterC
Boomgate wrote:They claim that you can get up to 20% abv by allowing it a full 10 days at the right temperature, I did not test that out.

The amount of alcohol produced will be mostly determined by the amount of sugar present. 6kg of sugar is about 14% alcohol. Some of these turbos are used with 8kg of sugar and this causes stress and all sorts of nasty flavours. I have used Alcotec Vodkastar Turbo with 6kg of sugar and it is a relatively clean neutral and self clears if you leave it an extra week, so this keeps the cost down. The biggest variation I found is the effect of temperature. At 20C it ferments slower but is cleaner compared to 25C. Even though I have a 5 plate bubbler I strip 4x50L batches and then do a spirit run also adding a packed column. This gives me base neutral for essences, lemoncello and gin.