distill your own alky at home

[flaboy]

I've noticed a lot of talk on the board here about alky injection, and seen some people talking about the expe3nse of alcohol, but I'm surprised to see noone mention how easy it is to produce your own alcohol at home. The Still i use only stnda about 5 feet tall, took maybe 40 bucks worth of materiuals to make, and produces 98% pure ethanol. A few hours running, starting of with a 20 liter wash and ill get around 4 liters of ethanol out. The wash is cheap, about 4-5 pounds of sugar or molasses, 20 liters of water, and a packet of distillers yeast, let it ferment for a week or so, and im ready to go. the best part is, its totally legal. Runnign a still to produce beverages is illegal, but you can very easily get an Alcohol Fuel Permit from the ATF which allows you to operate a still as long as you dont use any of it as a beverage... but i gotta tell you, if you water down that 98% pure ethanol to about 80 proof, it tastes miiiiighty good, and no hangover (much less fusel oils and other contaminants than in commercially avaiable vodkas and whisky). theres a LOT of information out there for anyone interested on building a still like this.. best site out there is http://www.distiller.servebeer.com it has all the info youd ever need. its mostly for guys making stills for beverage use, but the same designs make great fuel alky. I've been adding some of my alcohol to my 67 Skylark GS 455 as an octane boost to keep the knocking down on hot florida summer days (no longer though... wrecked my baby, now im drining a f**d truck )Just thought I'd pass this info along in case any of you alky burners out there would be interested in a cheeeeep source of ethanol.

[stevemon]

You're not related t a guy named Red Regal T are you? ;)
I bet he'd salute your idea.
Anyway, that's the 1st time I ever heard of going DIY alky all the way. Send me some pics and I'll post them on my alky page.

[flaboy]

heres some more websites to help anyone interested out:

this one gives GREAT instructions for building a still, my still is almost ecatly like their valved reflux design

Http://www.Moonshine-Still.com



this is a great site resource for producing fuel alcohol

http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel_...rth/meToC.html


My still looks almost exactly like the one pictured here... oinly difference is I use a large stainless steel pot (from a turkey fryer) instead of a keg.

[Travis]

how much we talking for the still and then how much per gal to make it.sounds cool real cool realy real cool uuh what was i saying

[ULYCYC]

That looks like a nice setup. I could be a Yankee moonshiner

[Razor]

Gotta say

Once I thought I knew it all, then comes this. Wonderful

Gotta add this to my memory banks.. who needs a source of methanol... here ya go..

[flaboy]

Hey razor, I didnt notice you were in Tampa... I'm over in the 'Burg. I'm sort of in the market for a GN, which is why i decided to check out the board. I was driving a 67 Skylark GS with a built 455, but a few weeks back, it got totalled Now I'm in the market for another kick-*** buick, and i think this time its gonna be a GN.

As far as the still goes.. I saw how much interest there was in alcoho injection and stuff, and I thought some of you guys would really get a kick out of being able to make your own stuff. Someone asked for some general prices. The still itself really is pretty cheap to make. If you know how to solder copper pipes, all you need is a few lenghts of 2", 3" and some 1/2" copper pipes, and a handful of fittings, tees, etc. The expensive part is generally the boiler. You want that to be stainless steel, which makes it a lil pricey, but if you get creative you can make something work without having to spend a huge hunk o cash.. a lot of guys use old kegs,m or SS milk cans, big SS pots, etc. As far as the cost for the wash (the stuff you distill to get the ethanol), its real basic.

Pretty much, its 20 liters or so of water, about 4-5 pounds of sugar or molasses, and a package of turbo distillers yeast. Mix it all up in a fermenter (big jug with a one way valve... lets the bubbleing CO2 escape, but doesnt let oxygen in which would stop the fermenting process). A week later, youll have about 5 gallons of 10-15% alcohol wash (you can actually get drunk off this if youre really desperate... it tastes like a real nasty funked-up beer). Then you put that in your reflux still, and let it cook for a few hours once youve reached equilibrium, and youll get 3-4 liters of almost pure ethanol (depends on how effecient your still is, etc.) While some of it may sound a little complicated, its really very very very simple. If anyones planning on attempting this, i would STRONGLY suggest you read through every little bit of information on the www.distiller.servebeer.com site. This guy has put all the info youd ever need in one spot, and makes it very accesible. Plus, there are some dangers you need to be careful of (alcohol vapors can go boom pretty easily) but as long as you follow some sinple precautions and use common sense, its safe as can be. If you have enough technical know-how to work on a car, especially a turbo'd one, then building and operating one of these is definitely within your grasp. And anyone in the tampa bay area, lemme know next time theres a gathering of GN folk. I'll bring some of my homemade whisky and some of my rum. My grandpa, a bourbon drinker from WAY back has declared my brew superior to any commercially available whiskey hes ever had. And my rum, well, its pretty damn good too

If anyone decides to try and build a still like this, lemme know and I'll give you some pointers from someone whos been there, so hopefully you wont have to make the same mistakes that I did. Plus, theres a few improvements I have thoght up that I'd like to try on a still.

Keep em rollin!

[Razor]

I'm actually in the 'burg myself. I just list Tampa becuase most dont know where St Pete is.

Come by saturday night with some samples to the BK car show on US19 and 110th.. anytime after 6:30 ish..

Good luck in your quest replacing your toy.

Heres a question, what happens to the sugar? Is the alcohol being produced sugar free?

[flaboy]

I'm no chemist, but heres the basic process as I understand it.

When you mix all the yeasts together with hot water, they sorta wake up outta their coma, and get to doing what yeasts do, which is make maore copies of themselves. To do this they need a lot of food, and oxygen. So in the fermenter, at first they reproduc like crazy, cuz theres lots of both of them around. After a while though, all the CO2 they produce as a waste product fills up the fermenter, and they use up all the oxygen available. So at this point your little packet of eyast has made a bunch of copies of itself. Heres where the magic starts. All these yeasts are looking around for oxygen, but there isnt any, so being the the ingenious little critters they are, they start tearing apart the sugars in a different way when they eat them. Since sigars are carbohydrates, they contain oxygen. But the process these yeasts use to get that oxygen produces alcohol as a waste product. This is why you need the valve on the fermenter, cuz if the yeasts have a ready supply of axygen from fresh air, they never get with the fermenting. So all these these yeasts struggle along trying to stay alive until the alcohol content becomes so high that it kills them. Diffferent strains of yeast have different alcohol tolerances, so depending on the yeast you use, you'll get different strengths in your fermentation. Most quality distillers yeasts can handle up to like 15% or more before they die off, which is pretty darn good.


If I can, I'll be there at BK. I havent gotten up the motivation to go to any cruise-ins since i trashed my car, so it'll be nice to see some nice rides again. Maybe ill see you there!