Possibly Off-Topic Question

[mr_beer]

I have decided to use BeerSmith to help with preparing wort for use in distillation. Depending on some nomenclature issues that wort may be called mash and the verb is mashing. Those nomenclatures issues do not bear on this question.

For those who do not know, the preparation of a wort for distillation is essentially identical to preparation of wort for a beer. Fermentable ingredients are added and adjusted until the OG desired is achieved. Water is added and adjusted depending on batch size. And then a steep activity occurs to release the starches prior to cooling and the introduction of yeast to ferment the result. No hops addition and no boiling activity, just steeping.

BS does a great job of helping add/adjust various fermentable ingredients and water to achieve OG goals. Grain absorption of water and the reduction of volume by boiling are good and the resulting volume of wort is fairly close for a beer.

What BS does not do is have a “Type” that does not involve boiling and the associated reduction of water during the boil.

Is there a way to ‘fool’ BS by adding a Type or some other method to not consider the volume reduction based on boiling – essentially have the “Est Pre-Boil Vol” equal the “Batch Size” minus the amount of liquid absorbed by the grains.

Any help would be appreciated.

Possibly a ‘new’ expanded market for the BS software.

 

[BOB357]

You can create, or adjust an existing equipment profile, and set the boil time to zero.

 

[mr_beer]

Thanks BOB357 -- a great suggestions. I wanted to fiddle with Type and never considered an equipment profile approach.

Tested on sample recipe and if I added more grain the amount of water to add went up -- most likely in consideration of the liquid absorption by the grains.

This works well but new users might not have your insight. Somebody might want to add to the documentation to reflect this cleaver approach.

 

[BeerSmith]

I was going to suggest using Cider or Mead as the method, but that won't handle the mash properly.

Probably the best option is to set the boil to near zero - either set time to zero or boil off to zero

 

[mr_beer]

Well I tried the Type -- cider and mead and did not work well because (I suspect) the grain absorption was not considered.

I made a new equipment profile entry and set the boil off time to 0 and the loss amount to 0 -- actually set everything to zero I could see.

My suggestion is a short addendum to your help menu or FAQ for this matter. In the long term an addition to the Type area might be more understandable for the user since it is actually a different 'Type'. If that 'Type' is selected then jam the boil off values to zero or have an 'internal' equipment profile that does the same thing.

If the 'Type' approach is selected it is more user friendly and understandable. If you go that way, PM me and I will provide my spreadsheet where I take the BS data and 'tune' it for the essential equivalent of a "Distill Steps" process to help the user and record the results along the way. With those more extensive additions you could possibly claim a new feature and market.

If you decide to go for the expanded approach then there will need to be some consideration for enzyme additions for non-malted adjuncts (corn, rye, etc.) and possibly a consideration for yeast additions during the ferment -- DAP (or equivlent) and possibly yeast start booster -- I am a big fan of Go-Ferm to kick everything in the pants to get going. For real guilding on the lily, you could list amounts for the foreshots (discard) , heads, hearts and tails.

My view is that over time good software embodies the 'best practice' of any particular area of concern -- accounting, inventory management, beer brewing, etc. The user looks at the software as an embodiment of the best practice for that particular area.

 

[BeerSmith]

Thanks - I will make a note to add "distilled" or something similar as a type in the future.

My big concern here is that it is illegal to distill here at home in the US without a license, and also that I simply don't have much expertise in the area since I can't do it at home.

 

[mr_beer]

I cannot provide you legal advice on this topic. That said the market is at the embropynic stage and I will make some observations...

• There are hundreds of web sites and associated forums on this topic. See https://homedistiller.org/forum as an example
• There are many thousands of individuals in the US that do this as a hobby
• There are many venues worldwide that do not have legal restrictions on this activity
• There are (at my last count) over 172+ vendors providing equipment for this type of activity
• Many vendors are providing complete systems and advertising them at fairly modest pricing
• When I started beer brewing it was not legal. The landscape changed by fits and starts over time as I am sure you recall. It makes me smile as I cap a bottle with the 1930s made bottle caper I received from my mother' estate. She insisted it was for "making tomato juice". My dad used to smile.
• My modest equipment is essentially the home brew equivalent of large distilleries. Based on the time involved and fiddling it well qualifies as a hoby interest for all involved.

Regarding expertise, there is always a new opportunity to learn and integrate prior knowledge.

Thanks for taking the time to review my notions.

 

[BeerSmith]

Thanks - I will do some research for the next version.

 

[homebrewer117]

Found this thread as I'm trying to do similar. Used Beersmith for many years for homebrewing and now am playing with adapting to home distillation. I'd add to post #7 reasons that Beersmith might want to consider adding this capability would be the growing number of craft and micro distilleries that are popping up in US. Listening to podcasts a common thread is many started out home distilling and may continue to use home scale distilling equipment in development of recipes same as microbreweries will test new recipes on pilot systems that are essentially the same as what larger scale homebrewers use. Perhaps some of these nano distillers would be willing to share experience with @BeerSmith to support a module design (I'm thinking they may have same need as your beer pro customers). Perhaps also some of the equipment vendors could also contribute knowledge as a way to get some of their off the shelf equipment packages included in the equipment list.

One big difference I'm running into in trying to adapt Beersmith for this purpose is I'm fermenting on grain. So my preboil volume is essentially same as my total mash volume and again same volume into the fermentor. Because that volume includes the grain this gives me an unreasonable measured efficiency. For now I am estimating grain absorption and backing that number out of my preboil and into fermentor volumes. After separating the grain from the wash I will call the final pre-distillation volume my measured bottling volume but this doesn't seem to impact efficiency calculation.

@mr_beer I'd love to see that spreadsheet you mention in post #5...if you would be willing to share please send me a DM.

 

[mr_beer]

As an October, 2023 addendum to this thread, it is clear that there are legal issues and Brad probably does not want to get into that goo.

Recipe Guidance
One of the concerns is that your mash should not have a OG higher than your yeast can tolerate. In general terms for most grains a ratio of 1.8 #/gal to 2.2#/gal are acceptable and keep the OG within tolerable limits for my preferred yeast -- US-05. Other yeasts will have different characteristics. If in doubt, use same grain percentages but more water or less grain.

On Grain use...
What I have done is to set the boil time to 0, Batch Size = amt, BH Efficiency to 85% and select the 'type' to be All Grain. That way the grain absorption is considered for mashes.

I do not sparge these mashes -- seems too much trouble for the small amount of residual sugars. Instead, I have started grinding all grain to fairly fine amounts -- what you might consider as .011 for a 'roller' spacing. With that fine grind the absorption is higher -- not much but some. Finer grind gets better/faster conversion. You will get better at estimating the additional absorption as you move forward.

This establishes the amount of material that will be in the mash pot and the amount of space required in the fermenter if the fermentation is going to be on grain. It is not perfect but my results show the OG to be within .006 every time. With this approach you can fiddle with the amounts of various grains as you tune the recipe. BS has good approximations for the material/water space and reasonable calculations for the OG since I do not want the OG to be greater than10%.

Off-Grain use ...
For a mash that will not be fermented on grain like barley, wheat and some other grains, then the process can assume a BIAB approach. Mash your grains as you would normally and after conversion drain and squeeze the bag. Then squeeze the bag some more. The remaining amount of liquid will be fairly close to the Batch Size.

Using this approach you can fiddle with the recipe to optimize it for your mash pot size, desired OG and fermentation vessel.

 

[homebrewer117]

ok to take my pending post down if this is against TOS on this platform. Apologies...I can't figure out how to do it.