by Mitcon » Sun Feb 10, 2019 5:17 am
Well did my first run with the T500 yesterday, while it was 5 hours roughly for the run and that seems slow I strangely found it fun and exciting...lol well it was my first time, I can't believe I sat watching a pot boil for 5 hours 8-} but hey it's better than Tv anyday.
Did lots of things wrong, first mistake was I should have made sure the temp probe fitted more snug. I had read that others have had water jets lol, well I washed the roof down yesterday lmao. But many towels later and a bit of PTFE thread tape, back on the water goes hehehe. I was only doing a turbo-wash using it as a practice/cleaning run (got TPW already fermenting and will stick with those) so all good, forgot to use the included foaming control liquid :teasing-blah: so on the boiler goes and about 45 mins it's starting to boil.
Slowed water flow down to get drip...drip...trickle... and left it there (temp was low 40's) I adjusted the flow every so often to maintain a drip...drip..trickle.. though I noticed the temps go up slowly, I know keep the flow rate and don't go by temp. But is there a temp we shouldn't go above as once it went above 65c I was a bit concerned but had not got a decent amount of product out of the still, so I just get the drip..drip..trickle...Temp hit highish 70's, I thought at this stage I'd get more product overall in output but thought I don't like the temp and only late tails now anyway almost finished just stop it now.
End of run!, took out the first 180-200mls of fores (is this any good as a cleaner etc) then took 3 x 150mls of heads, then collected 1.5L of what I think was hearts and about another 1L which still tasted/seemed the same. I think I collected in all just under 4L (was expecting around 4-5L or close for some reason) to be honest I can tell a difference in the different cuts but they all kinda taste similar and none of them taste bad lol. Not sure my taste buds work well. I did leave a litre or 2 in the bottom of fermenter, that black turbo crud does not look appealing and didn't want it in the still. Maybe why I got slightly less output but meh, it's all fun and new atm.
Left everything open airing (with tissue over tops) and will revisit tasting them after watering down. It was fun, just how high should we allow temps to go before having to worry? I think it all worked ok but, meh I'm a noob and looking forward to the TPW wash. Used 300L of water (half filled my 600L ibc) no idea if this is too little/normal or who cares lol.
Last edited by
Mitcon on Sun Feb 10, 2019 5:26 am, edited 2 times in total.