My First Ethanol Batch

By: Jera Jones

August 25, 2009

This was my first attempt at the distillation of ethanol, although I have fermented before. I started with a 5 gallon bucket full of carob pods which I soaked in a trash can with water for 12 hours, then laid out on a screen and watered with a sprinkler twice a day for 30 minutes for about 2 weeks. (Not sure what this accomplished, I was trying to sprout the seeds in the pods, but only one seed sprouted.)

I bought an Essential Extractor PSII High Capacity Complete Distiller from Brewhaus.com for $399 plus shipping. The kit came with the 7.5 gallon boiler, 6' (about) x 3" stack, all the copper mesh necessary to pack the stack, a laboratory grade thermometer, an aquarium pump, all the tubes and valves necessary for cooling. I also ordered an alcoholmeter, 100 ml measure, hydrometer, pH meter, 6 packs of Black Label Turbo Yeast, spending $490. The hydrometer arrived broken, so I ordered another one from ECKraus.com.

I put 1/3 of the carob pods in 2 gallons of water and gradually brought them up to 60ºC or so in a soup pot on a 1500 watt hotplate I bought from acemart.com for $150 while I broke the pods apart into 3 or 4 pieces by hand until the water became too hot to place my fingers in it. After reaching the 60ºC mark, I poured the carobs and water into a 9-gallon fermenting container I had bought from ECKraus.com for $47, then did another 1/3 of the pods, using 6 gallons of water altogether.

When all three batches were in the fermenter, I let it cool and adjusted the pH to 3.9 with the juice of 3 lemons using a digital pH meter I had bought from brewhaus.com. When the temperature of the mash had fallen to 39ºC (according to the lab thermometer which came as part of the distiller), I added 1 package of the alcohol yeast (90 grams), mixing it first with a pint or so of the mash, than mixing that in with the rest. I was unable to check the specific gravity due to the hydrometer having arrived broken. I did taste it, and it was kind of sweet, but not very.

While the beer was fermenting, I assembled the distiller in the garage, testing it with a gallon of water on the hotplate. The steam seemed to start when the thermometer at the top of the stack was reading about 85ºC.

After cooling the unit, I took it apart and rolled the copper mesh into plugs which I inserted in the stack. I assembled the cooling hoses and tested them with the aquarium pump that came with the distiller.

I was a little concerned that I never heard any air bubbling through the fermentation lock even when I turned the fermenter sharply side to side to agitate it which I did most days. I let it go 12 days, then opened it up and it smelled like brew. I suppose I could have checked the specific gravity having acquired a hydrometer from ECKraus in the interim, but I didn't bother since it is the before and after fermentation readings that together indicate the amount of alcohol in the brew.

I allowed the beer to drain into a large pot from the handy spigot near the bottom of the fermenter. The carob pods, remarkably, didn't completely clog the opening, just slowed it down a bit. Then I poured the beer (about 4 gallons I think) into the boiler of the distiller using a funnel, replaced the column, and turned on the hotplate which I had placed under the boiler.

I prepared a trash can full of water for cooling. The pump was slow to get the cooling water to the top of the stack, and about the time I thought I was going to have to use the hose connection (which was also supplied) it finally completed its circuit.

I had prepared several glass bottles to catch the distillate. I didn't notice that I was getting distillate until the temperature on the thermometer at the top of the stack (which I had to stand on a step-stool to read) had reached 73ºC, so I lost the opportunity to discard the methanol, which would have come right before the ethanol. Oh well, nobody is going to drink this anyway. The hotplate was too hot on high, so I moved it down a couple of notches. I had to constantly fiddle with the valve for cooling water to the stack and the hotplate setting to keep the temperature to optimal (a slow drip-dripping). I let it get to about 75º for the first 80 ml (the minimum needed to test with the alcohol meter). It was 75%. The next 80 ml, and the one after that were 85%. The next one was 50% and the drip drip dripping had stopped until the temperature got past 90º. I ended up with just over a cup of 83% ethanol, and less than a cup of 50% ethanol.

I am surprised that it even worked at all since I didn't totally crush the carob pods nor boil them until they got soft. I am very happy with the way the distiller performed, and look forward to trying again with a wort of sweet fruit. (The sapote tree is loaded with fruit, and there is always scads more than we can eat. Soon it will be raining sapotes.) Automating the temperature control would be nice, as would the ability to do larger batches in order to have some actual fuel. All I got this time was a healthier kind of rubbing alcohol.