Distilling wine in a reflux

by **BackyardBrewer** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 8:21 pm

I ran about 10L of red tonight. Got given 12 bottles of red that had been stored in a shed for several years with no insulation.

The heads lasted at least double a TWP wash, so pungent and burny.

However once the heads dropped I got a nice stripped neutral out of the reflux still - very clean after fores & heads.

It's airing now but hearts will be maybe 10% so close to a litre of 95%.

Worth it for a quick after work run, but wow - could I smell the acetone and methanol at the start of the run.

It would be good practice for a newbie to do a wine run and pick fores, heads and hearts. Interestingly tails were not as stinky as usual, but I knew by temperature I was into tails.

by **Sam.** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 8:23 pm

BackyardBrewer wrote:
Worth it for a quick after work run, but wow - could I smell the acetone and methanol at the start of the run.

.

Probably a good reason why you wake up with a cranking hangover after having a gut full of red wine :violence-smack:

by **Phil** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 8:31 pm

I noticed a 5L cask of white advertised for around $12 in this weeks spam mail. Still not cost effective for a practice or cleaning run compared to TPW but maybe nice to see how the neutral comes out in comparison.

by **kelbygreen** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 8:41 pm

yeah I always pondered on this. As say your ran a beer or a wine your not making the different compounds just extracting them in the run. So if you drink a wine your drinking everything that would be coming out in your run.

With distilling washes they seem to be fermented higher and have more sugar then normal in say a beer so you will expect the wash to taste like arse and you can cut them compounds out in the run anyway. But if you have the time (which you should as even with a pot I got about 40 days of booze and thats brewing lightly :P) you could ferment the wash at a good temp and if you used proper yeast and the right amount, at a guess you should produce more hearts as you wont be producing as much of the unwanted compounds in your wash so there will be less to extract.

I could be totally wrong but with beer if brewed on the lower scale of the yeast its alot better and no hang overs as your not producing unwanted compounds in it.

But on the other hand is wasting that extra % cheaper then the power bill of running a fermenting fridge?

by **BackyardBrewer** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 8:55 pm

I would say if you can lay your hands on 12.5-14% prebrewed wine at clean skin, low cost prices then it's worth doing.

Especially for a newbie.

Sam the red wine headache is totally a thing - it's all the compounds and complexities in it:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_wine_headache

by **Sam.** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 9:21 pm

BackyardBrewer wrote:Sam the red wine headache is totally a thing - it's all the compounds and complexities in it:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_wine_headache

Yeah have heard of that before mate, but I reckon it all might be a big yuppy conspiracy to cover up how weak they really are ;-)

I have never had a headache at the time of drinking anything.

Had a lot of headaches the next day. But they seem to be decreasing :handgestures-thumbupleft:

If they winge after a glass of red, give them a glass of the good stuff :D :laughing-rolling: :laughing-rolling:

by **BackyardBrewer** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 9:30 pm

GOLD: "never had a headache when drinking ... however the next day...different story!"

When it comes to red its usually quantity or quality. The better the red and the less you drink then the less the headache.

I do agree with that Wikipedia article tho. As they say both red and white can deliver that brain ache.

by **Sam.** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 9:32 pm

I agree, but maybe thats the problem, they need to get rid of all the sulfides by running it through the still :teasing-tease:

by **BackyardBrewer** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 10:03 pm

Yeah me too. I got offered the booze and as soon as I heard it had been stored badly in the heat I thought "mmm...that would be a really nice neutral through the reflux..."

by **crow** » Mon Mar 04, 2013 10:23 pm

Some SA wineries sell cheap as krusty white in bulk for very little (per ltr) but you would probably need to buy a 44 gal or even the 1000 ltr cubes to get the really good prices
I get a headache before I even get drunk with VB, 4 to 6 will do it , as will two 30 packs of West End :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **bt1** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 6:59 am

geez crow,

not a single mention of a coopers...what's going on?

bt1

by **BackyardBrewer** » Tue Mar 05, 2013 7:40 am

bt1 wrote:geez crow,

not a single mention of a coopers...what's going on?

bt1

You can tell he's not a local anymore eh?

:-)

by **Canadoz** » Fri Apr 19, 2013 1:59 pm

Phil wrote:I noticed a 5L cask of white advertised for around $12 in this weeks spam mail. Still not cost effective for a practice or cleaning run compared to TPW but maybe nice to see how the neutral comes out in comparison.

Aldi has 4L casks white or red for $9 each.

by **DrunkASAskunk** » Fri Apr 19, 2013 2:15 pm

Just looking at VB makes my head hert

Ow and love the avatar Canadoz :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **onmeth** » Fri Apr 19, 2013 7:48 pm

Hey i got 2 red 4 litre casks and 1 white 4 litre can i put all three together i cant hack wine won it in a shitty (doggy you could say) raffle do i top boiler back up to 25litre and run it??
Thanx

by **kiwikeg** » Sat Apr 20, 2013 6:06 am

Just add enough water to be sure your element will still be imersed at end of run.

by **kingy** » Sat Apr 20, 2013 6:14 am

Yea mate Doesn't matter what colour it is. And yea if you have an element I'd top it up. If running gas dont worry,cheers.

by **kiwikeg** » Sat Apr 20, 2013 6:24 am

And put some copper mesh in the vapour path so the sulphites drip back into th boiler and don't taint yor distillate.

by **onmeth** » Sat Apr 20, 2013 3:54 pm

Thanx kiwi keg iam on it now :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **rat3het** » Sun Apr 21, 2013 12:00 pm

I have done the following from a post by Braz from the other site

using a reflux still with the copper mesh removed

Run it as fast as you can in pot still mode but hold back some of the wine. Make a foreshots cut but keep everything else all the way down to about 20%.
Dilute the low wines to around 30% and put it back in the still. Add the undistilled wine you held back. (I like to have the boiler charge be about 10% undistilled wine. A 10 gallon still charge would get an additional 1 gallon of wine)
Now run it slow, collect in small jars, air out and make your cuts. There is likely some good flavor in the tails so don't be afraid to add some to your hearts cut. Just taste and see what you want.
Age it on oak and add a little bit of maple syrup and maybe a small handful of raisins.
You should end up with a very passable brandy.

works real well