Hello from Australia

[JEM Australia]

I'm an aussie brewer and have been brewing on and off for about 4 years.

I'm glad I found you guys. We don't have a lot of in-depth Australian made literature over here. You guys in the US are much more into the "science" of brewing than we are. I'm not one to just follow instructions without knowing why, so I have invested in a few US written books etc. Hopefully I will find some friendly contacts here to bounce ideas off.

 

[NUCC98]

I'm an aussie brewer and have been brewing on and off for about 4 years.

I'm glad I found you guys. We don't have a lot of in-depth Australian made literature over here. You guys in the US are much more into the "science" of brewing than we are. I'm not one to just follow instructions without knowing why, so I have invested in a few US written books etc. Hopefully I will find some friendly contacts here to bounce ideas off.

Hey there! Welcome aboard! I've found a LOT of great help out here, as a new brewer.....heh.....uniting the world through beer....I always knew it'd happen sooner or later!!!

 

[smorris]

Greetings. Do they allow the making of spirits, whiskey and such in .au, seems I heard that somewhere. Not exactly permitted here in .us but I would like to try it someday.

 

[arachnyd]

however, if you would like a good basic understanding of the making of spirits, let me suggest The Alaskan Bootlegger's Bible by Leon Kania

of course you can't legally make any, but in case you need to know how...

 

[smorris]

of course you can't legally make any, but in case you need to know how...

I just want to use it for sterilizing bottles....

 

[arachnyd]

Kania describes a still made with two woks and a pot that comes apart and is stored in the kitchen cupboards - no parts are modified, so nothing indicates that it has ever been part of a still.

Interesting concept.

Basically your mash (beer) sits in the bottom of a large pot that is raised with three cans to a level high enough to accomodate a can of sterno

also in the pot is a jar of water to hold up a small wok above the level of the mash. On top of the whole thing sits a large wok full of ice water.

as alcohol evaporates, it condenses on the bottom of the large wok and runs down the curve of the wok to drip into the small catch wok.

Drawbacks - there is no way of monitoring progress without lifting the top wok - which you need to do to harvest the distilled spirits anyway.

Remember, alcohol and open flame is a potentially dangerous combination.

 

[JEM Australia]

I just want to use it for sterilizing bottles....

Making spirits is legal in Australia, as long as you use a spirit kit, but the catch is that these only allow you to make a 20% strength spirit. We are not allowed to distill pure spirit. The craziest thing is that we are allowed to own a 5 litre still for the purpose of making distilled water or essential oil. Therefore all the big homebrew shops sell stills, but they are only to make distilled water or essential oil.....yeah right!!.

Obviously our authorities have better things to do than check everyones still, so distillation of spirit is a common hobby.

Just out of interest our kiwi cousins in NZ are allowed to distill spirits as long as their stills are not bigger than 25 litres (that's like 6.5 US Gallons)...whoa!!

Check out these sites: brewcraft.com.au stillspirits.com

 

[skark_burmer]

I have seen some sites that show how to make a still that has pretty much three parts if i recall correctly. I have the plans at home if anyone is interested but i haveent looked at them in a few months.

#1 is the large container over the fire, the top of that is #2 a coiled copper hose. As the vapor boils off it cools in the copper tubing and collects into #3 a pot with a spigot at the bottom. Lol, sounds simple enough.

they sell the ingerdients also and i have been thinking of trying to make a still. actually not to drink it but more for the science part of it. Im sure i will taste it to see what its like but the whole going blind part sort of freaks me out.