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In this Discussion
- Ak49er September 2015
- bachman September 2015
- brewsmith June 2015
- CothermanDistilling August 2015
- DonMateo December 2016
- Fiji_Spirits December 2016
- FloridaCracker January 2017
- grim April 2017
- Harry June 2015
- jacksonbrown August 2015
- Johnboy September 2015
- Jung September 2015
- Kapea September 2015
- LocalGoat June 2015
- Mickiboi August 2015
- Moonshine June 2015
- punkin August 2015
- razerhawg August 2015
- Schiefe4 March 2017
- Smaug September 2015
- solarpowerscott July 2015
- Telluride August 2015
- TheMechWarrior June 2015
- Unsensibel August 2015
Comments
I was thinking of making mine out of 4" CD piping but put in a couple of site windows. Using the Clear CD section makes sense though. At least you can see if its working.
Probably a stupid question but wouldn't the ultrasound eventually "weaken" the glass somehow? Or at least compromise it?
Loving how this thread has taken on a life of its own. Grim, you guys look like you want to punish the poor spirit with some of this equipment!
Ultrasonics and chipped or scratched glass?
More interesting the fact that processors are using a significantly higher power to volume ratio than we've been talking about. Some of these reaction chambers are downright tiny. The other factor is that in many of these cases they are using shaped horns and boosters on the transducers. For some of these, you are well in excess of 1000 watts per gallon (equivalent).
Beat it until it is smooth or at least agrees to cooperate......
@FloridaCracker - You try this with your new make dunder rum yet?
If a little is good, a more must be good..er.er.
An obvious experiment should be to US a sample for some ungodly amount of time to help understand what the overall impact may be.
A bit out of left field but is a cavitation heater likely do do any good?
Could be machined up for a few bucks.
The heater could even be used in conjunction with a HEX to keep the temp down.
FYI: The Chemical Effects of Ultrasound (PDF)
I remember reading another Scientific American article about ultrasonic horns a few years after this one but I can't seem to find it now.
I guess this stuff is kinda relevant too
Sonochemistry @ Wikipedia
Ultrasonic Horn @ Wikipedia
Absolutely and it makes a difference with everything I use it on. Just takes an edge off of the rum. I treated every drop of my latest batch before it went into my new oak barrel. Smooth going in-Smoother coming out. Now I am estimating about 3-4 months before it comes out.
@FloridaCracker - if you have time sometime, could you do a "low wines only" US treatment? I have this weird idea of a US-Thumper on a pot still, or even US on the first plate of a CD... but that is way more difficult than a US Thumper
which brings up another thought, how US would actually affect what is going on during the phase changes during distillation/reflux...
Not sure why you would do this with low wines. On a volume perspective, it's going to require significantly more energy in comparison to treating distillate directly, upwards of 3:1.
In addition, we have no idea what the reaction products are, and whether those reactions are either reversible during distillation, or whether the resultant reaction products can come through in distillation.
For example - check the literature on transesterification using ultrasound during biodiesel production, especially the lit focusing on ethyl and methyl alcohol esters. Also the lit on longer-chain fatty esters. If that is indeed what is going on here, it's possible that the resulting product is worse, not better, because you've taken the ingredients necessary for the reaction and locked them up in compounds that can't be distilled. Or, maybe that's exactly what you want to do. Who knows?
Saying the end product is "better" or "smoother" is all subjective, sure, maybe there is a qualitative improvement, but I don't think there are very many people on earth that know why this is the case. I really doubt all of this is as easy as just throwing some spirit in the magic blender and automatically getting gold out the other side. I can't imagine all of the sonochemical reactions are beneficial either. I'm a skeptic, and I really don't believe it's as easy as we think.
Gotta disagree with you on this. I would think that the only way that a treated (correctly) sample could not be considered "better" would be if you don't like your spirit smoother. Like I have stated before, I have no idea why it is better but it is.
It may be just as easy as treating it and enjoying it. I will leave the complicated shit to those who are better educated on this subject. As I have also stated, I wouldn't be spending the extra time on it if it wasn't a very noticeable difference. I have a lot of things to spend my time on and babysitting a 2 liter US machine is not much fun.
Ok, so the quick and dirty double blind is on. I had a third party take the treated samples and label them such that I did not know the difference. I also did not smell or sample either bottle, and I won't, so I don't know which is which.
I'm going to start with 40 trials, as random of a set of people as I can find, and I'll post the results once the 40 trials are complete. At that point, after the data is uploaded here, my independent third party will tell us which bottle is which.
I'll pull together the stats as well, hopefully the statistics show whether or not we've achieved a result better than random.
This was commercial aged bourbon, transferred to a non-descriptive bottle/closure with no label. US treatment, 1 hour, 40kHz.
grim, I cant wait to see the results of a multiple double blind.
I am actually doing 2 stripping runs today so I can run some tests. I'm thinking about what Mike brought up about the US actually "hurting" the strip negating any esterfication or who the fuck knows what with the spirit run after. What kind of tests do you want me do do?
Check with michiboi or grim, but I would say run one strip through your US before the strip, the other one just run it normally. Your a winner floridacracker.
Grim, Now I understand when you say Double Blind or it don't count, No one knows what it what not even the distiller!
Thanks. I have done many tests on rums over the last few months and still have many more to go. I'm also glad that the US thing is gaining some credibility. It seems there are two camps on it; those who have used it and see the benefits and those who haven't and are skeptical.
Haven't heard one account where someone used it and found it worthless.
I've got a small one that I use for cleaning. Maybe I should set it up on the coffee table to use as a coaster ;)
So you haven't tried it on spirits?
Wouldn't dare, it's had some pretty nasty shite in it. Maybe with a bit of water in it and sit the jar in that.
Its not heat we are after, its ultrasonic energy. Heat is a by-product of the ultrasonic process and with the cavitation heater, all you want is heat. The ultrasonics the cavitation process produces is a by product of that process and it is also what you would probably more correctly term ultrasonic white noise. It would be composed of literally thousands of different frequencies simply because of the way it is produced, similar to a propeller on a boat or submarine. Who cares if your water is subjected to ultrasonics in the cavitation process as long as the water gets hot.
But having said that build the cavitation heater, put some shit in it, get the analysed before and after samples and taste and see what the difference is. Who knows it may be that simple. It would be interesting to see on a spectrum analyser what the frequency spread is and power levels are.
Although I thought the heating of the spirit caused by the ultrasonics would be beneficial, people a hell of a lot smarter than me have pointed out that it does sweet FA. The temperature inside the gas bubble can reach thousands of degC before it implodes on itself. Im just a dumb arse process control engineer surrounded by chemists, scientists and the odd professor who have taken an interest my hobby and are very keen to help out when time and equipment availability permits. Raising the temperature of the liquid from 25 degc to 45-60 degc during the ultrasonic process is nothing compared to the rise generated by the ultrasonics during that process. We are talking about a thousand fold increase + here, 40 degC wont do anything. The way it was explained to me, its the destabilisation of the rogue atoms by the ultrasonic wave and thousands of degrees heat generated in the ethanol bonds and the liberation of these rogue atoms during the implosion that makes the change. Once released I have been reliably informed that those rogue atom bonds wont rejoin.
+1 There is a difference. Its smoother and more rounded. Can't describe it any other way than that. I wouldn't have gone to the trouble and spent the hours I have if there wasn't a noticeable change.
Heat is just a byproduct of a cavitating pump too. The fact that a few companies are tiring to market it is is the difference.
Non contact heating for microparticulation of proteins is the only use I've seen.
The mechanisms are actually very similar between this and ultrasound.
If I was going to play with it I would actually put a HEX in there to keep the overall heat down.
When the bubbles colaps you get the plasma stuff happening, it it's the same for both.
Well I finished a ujssm run a couple days ago one I infected with a lacto bug. It tasted smoother than normal ujssm with a creamy sort of feeling in your mouth I pulled the U.S. Cleaner out the cupboard and threw my hearts in gave it 10 mins at 165w before the run it smelt like ujssm during the run it smelt like acetone at the end of 10 mins smell had almost gone loads of tiny bubbles on bottom of cleaner the whole time. I decided to run it again proofed it to 65 and chucked in used heavy, med, American oak and a vanilla domino. Gave it 10 more mins. Now it smells like brandy and has dark colour put it into 2x1L jars on the same dominoes reckon I may need to pull the dominoes so as not to over oak it. Taste isn't to bad after couple days. Definitely a marked difference will experiment some more and report back.
@Johnboy, I have found it very easy to over oak if you add the oak to the US bath. It will color up quickly but I didn't get the results I wanted. What I did find was that my treated white spirit colored up quicker than non treated. Even when the oak wasn't in the bath while the US was working.. I have no idea why this is the case but something to watch for.
this is one of the units that was made to clean household blinds... $20-30k new.. you are getting a lot for your $400 if you are close and could pick up, may have to get the power supply worked on..........
large cleaner ultrasonic parts washer machine ultrasonics International corp @ eBay
Well, that would certainly solve my small capacity problem. Then when I am finished with it, they could bury me in it.