I think I may have done a beginner's mistake regarding pitching my yeast. First off, my recipe:

5 lbs. corn sugar
5 lbs. cane sugar
1 lb. organic barley malt syrup
3 lbs. flaked corn
5 gals. purified water
5 Campden tablets
3/4 cup orange juice
Alcotec 48-hr turbo yeast

I melted the sugar and barley malt syrup in 3/4 of the water, stirred frequently and slowly heated up to 140 degrees F for about 45 minutes to make sure everything mixed well and was fully converted ,I know flaked corn is pre-gelatinized, but what the heck,. I set a small ,sanitized, bowl aside with 77-degree F water to start the Alcotec 48-hr Turbo yeast. It started nicely, almost right away. I stirred, stirred, stirred the big pot, working to cool it all down ,after only adding 1/4 of the water as 'cool down.' And therein may have been my first mistake.

I added the already frothing yeast to the primary fermenter ,after transfer, and stirred a bit, but the temp was still kinda high -- approx. 95-95 degrees F ... the yeast package mentions 104 degrees as the temp to mix. Then I read somewhere that over 92 or so will kill yeast. When nothing seemed to be happening after about an hour, I figured I had killed the yeast. Hello! 'lag-time' ... Duh! -- I added another package of the same turbo yeast. Boy, that got things rocking pretty much right away! Started getting a bit foamy on top, but not too radical. Put the lid on and it was soon off-gassing CO2 like nobody's business for much of the night. Didn't even need an airlock.

Then, I found some info that said too much yeast will create sulfur-smelling distillate and too much nutrient can cause blue distillate, although copper packing in my stainless column might take much ,all?, of the sulfur smell out ... and adjusting the pH of the wash ,after fermentation, might prevent the 'blue wash syndrome' during distillation.

Also, I forgot to add water to my 3-piece airlock until the CO2 was much less ,just a 'trickle',, but I think that's alright. Late last night ,after about 26 hours of fermenting,, I added water and the airlock is bobbing up and letting out a 'blooble' about every 4-6 seconds or so.

I should add that my ferment temp ran a tad high ,81-82 degrees F,, but I cooled it in a tub of water to 76-77 after the first five hours. 36 hours in, it's about 72, so I just put a heating pad around the fermenter to get it to 76 or so.

Is the extra packet of turbo a wash-killer? Should I start over? Things seem OK, but I'm sure I should have pinned a few things down before I jumped in with both feet! I should add that all my sanitization was good, all my equipment. Am I worrying too much?

Hello Patrick,

Your post suggests that you will be doing a fractional distillation of your wash to obtain ethanol ,assumed because you mention a column and packing,. If this is indeed your goal your method is very costly. For Tubo Yeast all that is needed for a five gallon wash is 20-25 pounds of sugar ,which costs $1.87 for five pounds here in North Carolina, dissolved in 2.5 gallons of water on a stove top...The water does not need to be heated to the boiling point to get the sugar in suspension just heat and stir until dissolved, at this point use more patience than heat...Pour this syrup into your clean ,not necessarily sterilized, carbouy or fermenting vessel...Add room temperature water, slowly at first, to fill to just under the 4.5 gallon mark ,this will take less than 2 gallons of water,...With some practice, at this point, the wash temperature will be about 95 degrees Farenheight...I now add a large can of frozen concentrated orange juice and a small can of frozen concentrated grape juice to a half gallon pitchure and fill with room temperature water. Once the juice is incorporated add yeast stiring to dissolve yeast and to wash...The orange and grape juice add a nutrient for yeast that I do not think is in the Turbo...I get 23-25% alcohol yield at 185 proof ,4.5-5 quarts,

Sulfur or fartty smell is the result of distilling the wash without having removed all of the yeast from the wash...It has nothing to do with citric acid. This smell-taste can be removed with activated charcoal

If you are trying to make a 'whiskey' with a barley-corn flavor you need to use a pot distilling method...Fractional ,cloumn, distilling strips the flavors ,read esters and tyrosenes, yielding a product that is separated by boiling point in this case pure ,depending on technique, ethanol...

The directions on the Turbo package yield 17-19% alcohol for me ,not adding the orange and grape juice,. I also allow the yeast to work for longer period than directions indicate; ten days to two weeks in the dark.

Your recipe is reminesent of a beer wort I use...Save yourself the agro and