 Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 9/14/2012(UTC)
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Hi All,
My PS2HC will arrive this week (yeah). Can someone tell me what the initial cleaning(s) process is for this type of still?
Thanks, Maddawgs
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 9/14/2012(UTC)
Posts: 515
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 1/12/2012(UTC)
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"Hi Maddawgs,
I just followed the instructions ... which amounts to distilling some fresh water. Then I did a sacrificial run with some old champagne and wine that was sitting around for a few decades.
I've never had to use vinegar yet. When the rig cools down after a run I disconnect my cooling water hose and use it to back flush the column using the pump ... right into the boiler. If I'm not going to do another run in a day or two, I'll sit the copper plugs in some fresh water over night, then drape them over a clothesline to dry out. And I hose down all of the stainless ... the same way I hose down my saltwater fishing gear. Nothing complicated ... never had any problems.
Regards,
--JB"
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 9/14/2012(UTC)
Posts: 515
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Hi JB,
Thanks. Don't have the unit or instructions yet so I was trying to find out what I'll need to do the cleaning runs. Is normal tap water ok or should I use bottled water? We have Poland Spring which actually comes from a spring and is a good tasting water? What would be the purpose of the vinegar run, is it just a better cleaning run than water. Can the sacrificial alcohol (I'll be using some cheap boxed wine) run be used again in another run (I hate to waste anything) or should I just toss it out? Sorry for all the questions and thanks for your help.
Maddawgs
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 1/12/2012(UTC)
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I just used regular tap water. Do a forum search ... there's a lot of information about cleaning techniques, vinegar, that sort of thing ... much more information than I could offer here. I've never used vinegar for cleaning yet. I think it helps more for your copper than for the stainless.
As for the cheap wine ... I used old stuff that I would never have put in a glass for drinking. The stuff I used was abused from many years of temperature extremes ... I was glad to get rid of it! You can also just whip up a smaller volume sugar wash ... and offer it up to the cleaning gods ... or call it the cost education or practice. After the price of a still what's a few dollars worth of sugar? If the purpose is cleaning, I personally would simply discard it.
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 9/14/2012(UTC)
Posts: 515
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Hi JB,
Thanks for the info. Yes I did a few searches on this and the AD and HD forums but there was really nothing specific to the Brewhaus Extractors, mostly a lot of generalized stuff. I'll use tap water for the cleaning and toss the sacrificial alcohol run. Hopefully sometime next week I'll have these cleaning runs and a first run done.
Thanks again, Maddawgs
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 Rank: Junior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 3/17/2012(UTC)
Posts: 118
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I hate to disagree with my learned collegues, but I NEVER did a SACRAFICIAL RUN! I did a FIRST run, which I threw away the first 2 ounces, then sorted and drank. I used a 5 gallon of birdwatcher recipe as per Bayou/Ruler. I ran some tap water in it to check for leaks, after i washed everything down with a water hose. I also spoke with Rick, as I recall, and he didnt seem to understand the need for the Sacraficial Run.
Now like 15 runs later and all is well.
My .02
Farmin
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
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"Hey Farmin, I haven't heard from you in a few weeks. It's nice to have you back.:) Quote:I NEVER did a SACRAFICIAL RUN! I just followed instructions which recommends a ""test"" run -- testing for leaks using only water -- which I think is prudent. A sacrificial run (or a cleaning run with vinegar) is probably most appropriate for homemade copper rigs (rather than the commercially offered S/S rigs) to remove any byproducts from soldering. I have the PSII HC, so I doubt my sacrificial run helped anything ... it certainly didn't hurt anything. But it was a great opportunity to take the rig out for a quick spin while my first wash was finishing.  Regards, --JB"
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Rank: Junior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 3/17/2012(UTC)
Posts: 118
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Hey JB,
its nice to be missed...ive been in the woods alot AND my stinkin modem died on me, so i was out of service a while. I ordered my unit from BH, then started my wash, and BH backordered my unit, so I had alot of time to ponder my existence...or whatever...so when my unit finally arrived i was EXTREMELY thirsty, and wanted to quench my thirst. According to my notes my first run had a average abv of 82.5%, or 165 proof. To say i was pleased is a huge understatement. And i made small half pint cuts, which gave me a clean product.
Regards,
Farmin
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Rank: Senior Member Groups: Registered
Joined: 1/12/2012(UTC)
Posts: 804
Was thanked: 5 time(s) in 5 post(s)
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Quote:so I had alot of time to ponder my existence...or whatever... LOL ... I was sipping my tea when I read that ... now a good portion of it is down my shirt, on my desk, monitor .... Well all sounds good ... I'm glad you're back up and running.
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