The SS Turbo 500 (T500) and Me

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The SS Turbo 500 (T500) and Me

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Started 5 months ago by Andy
Latest reply from Phantom

Andy
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The Good:
Easy to use.
Easy to erect.
3.5 liters @ 96% (I don’t lie)

The Bad:
Very tall.
Temps hard to control.

The Story.

I started with 6kg Sugar, 21 liters water and 1 pack SS Turbo Classic yeast.
After 3 days the wash had finished.
Day 4 I added the SS Turbo Clear.
Day 5 I ran the SS T500.

I managed to get 22 liters of wash out before it started looking cloudy, so that’s what went into the still.
After 1 hour exactly the temp shot up and it started to produce the goods (or bads) and I started the water flowing.

I didn’t measure the water flow at first, I just ran it till the temp came down to 50 deg C
I collected 100mls and discarded (better to be safe than sorry)
I watched the temps continuously and it was a real job over the next 4 hours to keep it around 50 – 55 deg C.

Every 500mls I tested the Alcohol content and it was always 95 or 96%
After the 3rd 500ml check I decided to check the rate of water flow, in the instructions they say 500mls per minute, to my shock I was running 850mls per minute.

By hour 5, production had slowed to a couple of drops per minute so I switched off and begun cutting the spirit.

After cutting I did a quick taste test, now I have hard decision to make – to filter or not to filter.
I decided not to filter as (in my opinion) the spirit is better than what comes out of the filter after the air still – I might try filtering with the next wash.

So, I made a 2250ml batch of Calypso Gold Rum and started drinking LOL.

Summary:
I spent AU$600 on a new still that saves me 2kg of sugar, saves me about 7 hours distilling and tastes better and as a bonus I get a better yield.
I am happy with this still, much happier than I was with the end result from the Air Still.

Sorry for rambling.
Cheers
Andy

Posted 5 months ago #
Opus 27
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Andy
In your Pictures you show a plastic jug under your collection tube, 95% ABV may cause you a problem with leeching nasty stuff from the plastic. Nice bit of kit though.

Opus 27

Posted 5 months ago #
Andy
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The plastic just was just to collect the first 100mls.
I then used the glass demijon to collect the good drinkable stuff.

Posted 5 months ago #
hoppinmad
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Andy, thanks for the post it sounds amazing, I am using an air still at the moment and am very much a newcomer to this distilling lark, nice to see what's ahead tho once I've learned a bit and don't some saving, cheers

an amateur practises till he can get it right,
a professional practises till he cant get it wrong.

Posted 5 months ago #
hoppinmad
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Done some savin rather, grrr bloody spellchecker

an amateur practises till he can get it right,
a professional practises till he cant get it wrong.

Posted 5 months ago #
Andy
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I was a little apprehensive about using the reflux still, you hear all sorts of stories.
For a first time user, I must say it was not as bad as I thought it would be.
The hardest part was keeping the water flow hence the temps correct.
If you have the room hoppinmad, I would say do it.

Posted 5 months ago #
Bottleofrum
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Nice one mate, Great review, Ill deffently be getting one of these!

Posted 5 months ago #
Andy
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I have just completed my second run, the results are exactly the same as the first with one exception.
I had a little extra time and managed to get 4 liters @ 95%
The last 500ml took an extra hour.

With this batch I am going to run it through the carbon filter (making vodka) to see what (if any) difference it makes.

Posted 5 months ago #
Phantom
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I have just completed my second run, the results are exactly the same as the first with one exception.
I had a little extra time and managed to get 4 liters @ 95%
The last 500ml took an extra hour.

With this batch I am going to run it through the carbon filter (making vodka) to see what (if any) difference it makes.

Well done. Nice info.

when you say it's "very tall", how tall are we talking here ?

Only, because I've been using my "normal" SS super reflux, as per the instructions provided by the "kiwidistiller" over at homedistiller.org and while I'm ready to do a distillation run, before I do, I decided to pack my reflux chamber with copper mesh and do a "single" run i.e. run a batch of wash that's ready for the still for the first time. I did this before and it took a long time to get to a point where I wanted to finish.

So yesterday I packed the mesh into the reflux chamber, to a height approximately to the top of the reflux water jacket. I just tamped it (the mesh) down gently with a wooden spoon as I have absolutely no idea how "dense" the packing mesh should be.

Using copper mesh instead of rashig rings or saddles in the reflux chamber is a little strange, it seems to take a lot longer to distill a bucket (25ltr) of wash, but it also seems to be much easier to control the temperature. I managed to keep it at about 79 degrees C for the most part. I started it at about 1pm but switched of the still at midnight. it's given me about 3.75 litres at 88% ABV. So I'm guessing that the superior refluxing facility and temperature control offered by the the T500 is proof that it's probably a better still, though it does seem a hell of a lot more money for the superior control.

Next weekend I'll be running a "distillation" run i.e. of the 3 gallons of lower strength spirit I've got, I'll let that down to 40% and then run it. Hopefully it will average over 90% as the quantity of alcohol in the run is that much greater.

I'll post back then........

What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away. Tom Waits.

Posted 5 months ago #

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