Copper Question

Txbrewing

I love open discussions.

It was stated at the top of the thread, but this really is a great forum.

Having said that, I pulled back from the SD pot set-up I was leaning toward for a few reasons, but not because I think copper is the Alpha-Omeha of distilling. 1 was money, when i get my Dragon, I don't want to be building based on how much $$$ i have to spend. 2 was I wanted to build my first still myself to gain an understanding and be part of the tradition.

I have already starting saving for the Baby Dragon.

TXB

grim

Dollar for dollar - looking at active surface area and copper contact time - the best bang for your buck is copper on the plates.

Copper up, stainless down is probably the clearest and easiest rule of thumb.

Txbrewing

@grim said: Copper up, stainless down is probably the clearest and easiest rule of thumb.

But what about Front to Back and Side to Side.....

grim

Then I let the Alpine play, bumpin new sh!t by NWA.

Goin old school, I like it.

FloridaCracker

@grim said: Unfair comparison, in the bubble cap scenario, the distillate will have more overall contact with the copper (surface area X time), even through the surface area is lower, purely due to the action of the reflux. Even in a low reflux scenario - 4:1, molecules will go up and down an average of 4 times before exiting, and this isn't including the dwell time on the plates.

I agree and you can't discount the surface area/ contact time with the copper caps as well. The overall surface area of a ProCap would greatly increase copper surface area.

Ardoyne

Interesting reading. So, for the inexperienced fermenter/distiller would you recommend including copper or not when running in pot mode for a stripping run?

grim

Not including copper. It hides the flaws that you need to understand to master fermentation.

Get nutrient, temperature, and yeast husbandry right, and you won't need copper to deal with sulfur problems.

Dollar for dollar, fermenter temperature control and fit-for-purpose nutrient will have more of an impact on spirit quality than fancy copper parts.

Smaug

@Kapea said: Fermentationist!

lol

Txbrewing

@grim said: Not including copper. It hides the flaws that you need to understand to master fermentation.

Get nutrient, temperature, and yeast husbandry right, and you won't need copper to deal with sulfur problems.

Dollar for dollar, fermenter temperature control and fit-for-purpose nutrient will have more of an impact on spirit quality than fancy copper parts.

+1

I learned early, and the hard way in my beer brewing that controlling the fermentation was one of the most important aspects of creating quality beer.

TXB

EZiTasting

@grim said: Copper is a crutch for those who can't manage fermentation properly.

Bam, I said it again.

Can you link your statement to a "fermentation Basics" or "Fermentation for Idiots" type ... I'd love to improve this aspect of my hobby! I am certain there are flavour aspects I am missing out on that I would love to capitalise on!

There are rumours that more than one yeast will create certain flavour profiles... above and beyond the grain bill... but details are sketchy at best.

Kill_Devil_Spirit_Co

@EZiTasting that is absolutely true. Though your grain bill will ultimately decide your flavor profile, yeast plays a very significant role in that profile. This really goes back into (as you mentioned) fermentation basics. Play around and learn from experience, it's fun I promise! Remember some yeasts will be more dominant than others.

I'd visit the white labs site, they do a decent job of listing flavors that are attainable (in beers) using their different yeasts. I've done tests using both their American and Tennessee Whiskey strains separate and 50/50, the end results of the beers were noticeably different, after oaking not so much.

To stay on topic, I used a full copper column/condenser set up in that particular experiment. I don't know anyone with a pure SS around here and the batch size was too small to use the SS/copper plate/SS. hard knock life.

CothermanDistilling

@RedDoorDistillery used all stainless in the first ever 8" CD... many of rusty's stills were pure stainless...

Craigarino

I thought they would have only used copper because of heat conductivity and availability! I reckon they fluked the whole taking sulphites out thing! And I only use it cos I think it looks better

Sunshine

nice!

richard

Nice thread.

I had been meaning to ask regarding use of copper, where the best place is to place copper.

@grim said: The fast answer is that you aren't going to have a problem. In addition you'll have more control over the final product.

The slightly longer answer is that all copper is not better, and there are studies to indicate that copper after the column may result in higher levels of EC (Ethyl Carbamate), which is a carcinogen. In addition, copper after the column is correlated with higher levels of copper in the distillate, which is also a problem due to bioaccumulation toxicity.

Okay so we place either BEFORE or IN the column.

So if we are BEFORE then we are in a liquid state prior to distillation (for continuous) and for IN we are in the vapour state within the column.

So which is better or does it not matter.

grim

I would argue placing in the column is going to be the most effective, especially in situations where you are running moderate levels of reflux.

In a situation where you are running 10:1 reflux ratios, think of that as meaning that every volatile compound in the distillate has gone up and down the column 10 times before coming out.

With even a moderate number of plates, this means the total effective surface area of the column is going to be significantly larger than the surface area of the kettle. If the effectiveness of the copper is highest when it's in direct contact with high concentrations of volatiles, you could almost even argue that it's only the portion of the kettle above the wash that's acting in the most efficient way, not the entire kettle volume.

Not to mention, manage your fermentation correctly, and your total concentration of volatile sulfur compounds is going to be small to start with. This has more impact overall than anything that copper contact could fix.

Smaug

@grim said: you could almost even argue that it's only the portion of the kettle above the wash that's acting in the most efficient way, not the entire kettle volume.

Hence the Copper Top kettles that we sell,,, and do our best to convince the copper fanatics that a 100% copper kettle is just not a requisite.

Myles

Have to agree with this. There are strong arguments in favour of a stainless boiler combined with copper in the vapour path. Most efficient use of the materials where they do the most good. A copper top stainless boiler is on my wish list.

DonnyBuoy

@grim said: Copper is a crutch for those who can't manage fermentation properly.

Sounds like an argument for more copper, to me. :)

grim

Great spirits are not made in the still, they are made in the dirt, the mash, the ferment ... and then aging.

Distillation just separates what you’ve already made. You can’t take a marginal starting point and make it into a great spirit. If you have a large amount of sulfur compounds, you likely have other problems to contend with. Garbage in, garbage out.

Sunshine

@grim said: Great spirits are not made in the still, they are made in the dirt, the mash, the ferment ... and then aging.

Distillation just separates what you’ve already made. You can’t take a marginal starting point and make it into a great spirit. If you have a large amount of sulfur compounds, you likely have other problems to contend with. Garbage in, garbage out.

Amen to that!

CothermanDistilling

I would say that although great spirits are not made in the still, they can be 'broken' in the dirt, mash, ferment, still, aging, etc Go to ADI or some other place where you can get a Nancy Fraley nosing class and see this first hand... worth every penny...

I can say with 100% certainty that the 8" copper helmet we started using this year on our 380L improved many if not most of our spirits made from both molasses and from malted barley...

Now the rum 'beer' I could not tell the fermentation quality of, but the beer, since I get both fermented wort and occasionally finished beer with a slight flaw, I could, in fact, judge the product before distilled... I am a BJCP certified beer and mead judge, and the beers were very drinkable, tasty even. It would take a side by side taste test with a flawless version of the beer to pick out a small amount of yeast autolysis or a phenol... On more than one occasion, I had beer-expert friends sample several liters of freshly arrived product before I added the ultraferm enzyme to it... They agreed that it was very tasty. Distilling these with a stainless helmet first and then comparing to ones distilled with the copper helmet, we did notice an improvement... but the most improvement was the rum... so maybe it is a crutch, but in our mind, it was well worth the price of admission to get the full copper boiler. As a bonus, having both lets us stop any smack talk from people, including and sharpshooting tourists and other distilleries that own just one or the other...

CothermanDistilling

@Smaug said: Hence the Copper Top kettles that we sell,,, and do our best to convince the copper fanatics that a 100% copper kettle is just not a requisite.

I will let you know one way or the other in a few months... ;-)

grim

You ferment your rum temperature controlled/jacketed?

CothermanDistilling

we pitch at about 89-90F in the summer here in FL, and have a fan on a controller that keeps it at 93 or below, but the heat is concentrated at the top of the fermenter, very noticeable to the hand on the plastic conical. we have the probe at the top layer, so unless someone is pumping fermenting wash continuously, they do not have a true single temp...

-edit - in the cooler months, if the wash drops to 80, it does not ferment well at all... we are getting jacketed 7bbl conicals as soon as possible. Curious, what did Arroyo have for temp control back 70 years ago?

zymurgybob

Hey, we had all kinds of stuff 70 years ago, electricity, thermostats, airplanes, pogo sticks, all kinds of stuff. We were _very _modern. :)

CothermanDistilling

not in FL or the Caribbean! -snicker-

grim

Arroyo's opinion on fermentation temperature control, from his 1949 paper in the International Sugar Journal. The tldr is that he doesn't like high temperature fermentations, and he doesn't believe you can produce quality rum fermenting at high temperatures.

grim

Also 1949 - The Arroyo Process for Fermentation of Light Rums - this one details the fermenter cooling setup. He sets the top limit for light rum fermentation at 91f.

grim

In his earlier paper on The Production of Light Rums from Blackstrap...

"Strict temperature control should be maintained during fermentation." - after which he sets an ideal fermentation range of 27-31c (80.6f to 87.8f), even cooler, and describes a similar recirculating cooling process.