Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

pectinolytic enzyme is sold as pectinase at your local home brew shop or your favourite homebrew shop online :handgestures-thumbupleft:
generally they have a few types of pectin enzymes in

cheers guys, it's gunna be a fun mission :)

i've got a couple 25l tubs(for a trial) with deseeded mangoes packed in, skin as well, and i'l using a flash $40 renderers blenderer to macerate it all to smaller after which i'll add me pectinase and let her rip. i'll update as i go

sorry to post so much but i can't edit me posts so.... i managed to blend one tub to a mush and added in the amount recommended on the back of the packet which is tsp/3g per 5kg of pulp + some water to fill the gaps and 1 tbsp/8.7g per 5 kg of fruit for the unblended fruit (only because my drill was getting too hot and arcing out). they're in airlocked tubs and i'll get the best wine yeast i can find tomorrow. probably gunna use my drill on the unblended stuff tomorrow as it'll be cool again then. time for a drink :)

Keep the posts coming mate :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Should be able to get your hands on some EC1118 yeast it is bulletproof and gives a clean product :handgestures-thumbupleft:

I've got 50 Ltrs down atm, it'll go through the bubbler after smashing...I removed seeds and skins, just trying to minimise the methanol...I think you might get more fores hosts than expected if you leave peel in....so very keen to hear how it goes. I basically did a sugar wash with mango for flavour....family wouldn't part with all the mangoes I needed.

cheers sam, i'll order some of that EC1118 with a kilo or 2 of pectinase as the local shop is out after i bought the last packet. i had sealing issues with me wash tubs as they were second hand and also the mass pulp blocked the airlock which resulted in sweet juice seeping out the sides onto the concrete. teething issues i reckon. since sealing the blended one in a good container it's been going off for a couple days from the natural yeast and the other one, mostly quartered, deseeded fruit has been going steady but i added a vial of some old oztops cider yeast i had lying around just to see what would happen. fungi are reactive buggers and one of the two should win out :)
i'm not keen on a bigger methanol content but might simply have to strip it once i get a couple runs down and make sure that it's a very slow strip with extra off the top.
me boss is getting his shit together next week, getting some used medical ibcs/1000l pods for me to clean and there's 4 ton coming in to fuck with. i was confident before but with the trials going as expected i'm super excited.
thanks heaps fro answering my questions fellas, this forum kicks the shit out of the homedistiller one who just wanted to nitpick and talk legal bs instead of answering questions.
feels like home :)

dammit i found a question. for a 1000l container, am i to simply multiply the ingredients (pectinase, EC1118 yeast) of a 25l wash by 40 to get my answer? if yes, dammit again, does anyone know any bulk places? everyone seems to only have 100g packets. i checked the store here but nah. thanks again

Whiskyaugogo wrote:http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/EC-1118-Wine-and-Cider-Yeast-500g-For-the-Home-brew-Hobbyist-/321691681602?hash=item4ae6518342:g:K1kAAOSwk5FUr3dA

i feel like a retard. thanks heaps :)

Why dont you just clone the yeast.....

Ok so i have decided to have a go at a mango wash as well which went like this:

Took 20L of mango seeds that had most of the flesh cut off and had been frozen. Covered with water and hit it hard with a paint mixer to strip the remaining pulp off the seeds.
Then drained the fluid off and repeat another 2 times till all the pulp was stripped from the seeds which then discarded.

I added this to a 60L fermentor. I then blended app 5 kg of frozen pulp in water and added this as well.
In a bucket i then dissolved 7kg white sugar with 2l boiling and 2l room temp filtered (activated carbon and 3um filter). Once disolved i added a but extra water to being the temp down and added to the fermentor.

I then added 1teaspoon DAP and ~1\2 teaspoon citric acid, and 1 crushed multivitamin tablet (not sure why, just thought some extra minerals might help) mixed and filled fermentor to round 42L. As temp was in low 20s i then filled to ~46L with boiling water to bring the temp up and pitched 2x 5g satchels of ex-1118 at 28 deg C, mixed and closed the fermentor.
3 hours later it still hadn't fired up so i took the lid off mixed all the pulp back in (had all floated to the top).
2 hours later still had not fired up so pitch another 2 x 5g satchels of ec-1118, mixed and left for work.
This was thursday last week and it still has not fired up, no fix nothing.

Have not been home to check the pH but had thought it shoukd have been in a reasonable range. Dont think i should be too much sugar as didnt think mango carried that much that woukd be covertable based on the prep done. Yeist was still good as used some in a diff batch with some native forwst fruit 2 weeks earlier and it fired strait away.

Thoughts any one:
Not enough yeist, shouldnt of added the multivitamin tablet, too much sugar, too much citric acid?
Now wondering if it will be recoverable when i get home on Saturday or i i should just ditch the lot and try again next year when i get more mangos

Hmm...yes, the pulp always floats in my Mango wash too...I did a fairly similar method to you, couple of KG's less sugar...but pretty similar....
and mine fermented out just fine....are you sure you've got a good seal on the fermenter? That much sugar + yeast should be going well,
irrespective of the mango pulp....
I wouldn't ditch it, uet it run and give it the taste test, nothing lost but a week or two of fermenter time...
The more stilling I do, he less...um "careful" I've been with my ferments and I'm yet to have one stall or fail.

Thanks for the commentary darwin. Seals are definately tight on a fairly new fermentor. Double and tripple checked them last thing before i left since it still was not showing signs of having fired up. Was more conserned about getting an off flavor carry over if i can get it to fire after 8 to 10 days of in activity. Putting it through a 4 plate bubbler.
I'm with you where by best approach is not to over analyse and it usually works a treat. Thinking ph might be too low or not enough yeist. Had thought that you didn't need to add too much ec-1118 compared to lowans. What yeist do you use and roughly how much for your mango wash?

OK sorry...had to ask bout the fermenter ;-)

Darn... at work atm, and don't remember the yeast exactly...but I used a white-wine yeast and it fermented out no problems.
I've made mango and apricot washes before without too much drama...have you tasted it? I've only ever had one ferment go bad on me and
that involved a scummy white film on top and an astoundingly bad taste....
after ferment my mango washes tasted like a slightly bitter flat beer....not bad at all.

It does seem odd that you're getting no signs at all of fermentation, maybe check your yeast isnt all kaput? I.E; make up a cup of sugar and add a bit of the yeast you used to see if it kicks off?

OK,
I've just completed the cuts + combination of 2 x 30 ltr runs of Mango wash, I used just the flesh (I have read elsewhere best to include the peels as well for full flavor)...I didn't freeze the flesh either...added ~ 3Kg of white sugar and fermented with White wine yeast "QA23"...
I ran both through the bubbler with 4 plates, nice and slow, post cuts, I got ~1.2 ltrs at 90% from each, I was expecting low yield so no problem there....I've diluted down to 64% which gives me a whopping 3.4 ltrs after all that peeling, fermenting and stilling :laughing-rolling:

Again, low yield was kinda expected, the thing is, the flavor isn't strong, it's clean and nice off the still and maybe I cut the tails too hard, but, what do you think? Oak it? I'm tempted, but I don't want to loose the mild mango taste to a wood flavor....maybe oak half and see how it goes?

Water a shot down to 40% and see how it tastes.
Might bring out the mango a bit more.

So after a week of inactivity on my wash i got home. Ear to the fermentor and next to no fizz. Sat and waited andwas getting one bubble through the airlock every 10 min or so.
So i cracked the top off and had a taste as per Darwins recomendatiin. Still sweet as. Had a 3.5 inch layer of pulp covering the surface. Gave it all a real good mix in and stirred the while fermentor up of anything that had settled.
Put the lid back on as tight as it was when i took it off and 20sec later it fired and bubbled its arse off from the on.
My conclusion was that the temp was too low when i pitched the yeist and must have been hindered by the layer of pulp when it did start to fire. Not sure why and figured it may have been holding the CO2 in solution and not releasing to atmosphere.
Just gave to wait till it stops fermenting now to run it. Last time i used ec1118 it fermented for 4.5 weeks.

How much flesh did you use darwin. Did you macerate the flesh or just chunks.