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| Copper Pot Still |
Pot stills are the modern descendant of the alembic still. They were one of the earliest still types employed to produce spirits. Pot still are rather inefficient which can be a good thing when producing whiskey. For example, when making neutral spirit with no flavor and high alcohol yield you would use a reflux or column still. For whiskey one needs to make a product which retains the flavors of mash. In this situation the pot still is best suited.
A pot still possesses 4 primary parts: We will look at each one in more detail.
Pot: The body of the pot is typically a cylinder that is wider at the top than the bottom. The pot is loaded with the fermented mash and heated up with fire or perhaps an inner heating apparatus. Nearly all commercial distilleries heat the wort (aka wash) with four hundred degree steam pumped through tubing which is coiled inside of the pot.
Swan Neck: The neck permits the vaporized alcohol as well as some water\flavor to rise up and enter into the lyne arm. The neck is often narrower at the topas opposed to the bottom allowing for non-ethanol compounds to condense around the walls and fall back down into the wash.
Lyne Arm: The lyne arm will impact the amount of non-ethanol compounds that make it into the distillate. For instance, when the vapors rise up the neck and into the lyne arm the temperature becomes cooler and the less volatile compounds (h2o, flavour, etc.) change from a gas into a liquid. If the lyne arm is ascending at a 45 degree angle those compounds will run back down into the wash. This gives you a ‘lighter’ flavour and higher alcohol content in the finished product. Alternatively if the lyne neck was angled down at a forty-five degree angle the less volatile substances will condense and flow down into the condenser together with the ethanol vapors thus supplying the distillate a more flavorful, ‘fuller’, taste.
Condenser: The condenser cools the ethanol vapors to a temperature that is less than the boiling point of the ethanol. As a result, it condenses the vapors into liquid. Condensers may be cooled by the ambient air temperature, moving air (a fan) or water. With a water cooled condenser the cold water is pumped through a coil or around the outside of the tube that carries the ethanol vapors. Different designs will utilize various strategies. The key is to chill the vapors so they drip into a collection container versus escaping into the air.
A pot still possesses 4 primary parts: We will look at each one in more detail.
Pot: The body of the pot is typically a cylinder that is wider at the top than the bottom. The pot is loaded with the fermented mash and heated up with fire or perhaps an inner heating apparatus. Nearly all commercial distilleries heat the wort (aka wash) with four hundred degree steam pumped through tubing which is coiled inside of the pot.
Swan Neck: The neck permits the vaporized alcohol as well as some water\flavor to rise up and enter into the lyne arm. The neck is often narrower at the topas opposed to the bottom allowing for non-ethanol compounds to condense around the walls and fall back down into the wash.
Lyne Arm: The lyne arm will impact the amount of non-ethanol compounds that make it into the distillate. For instance, when the vapors rise up the neck and into the lyne arm the temperature becomes cooler and the less volatile compounds (h2o, flavour, etc.) change from a gas into a liquid. If the lyne arm is ascending at a 45 degree angle those compounds will run back down into the wash. This gives you a ‘lighter’ flavour and higher alcohol content in the finished product. Alternatively if the lyne neck was angled down at a forty-five degree angle the less volatile substances will condense and flow down into the condenser together with the ethanol vapors thus supplying the distillate a more flavorful, ‘fuller’, taste.
Condenser: The condenser cools the ethanol vapors to a temperature that is less than the boiling point of the ethanol. As a result, it condenses the vapors into liquid. Condensers may be cooled by the ambient air temperature, moving air (a fan) or water. With a water cooled condenser the cold water is pumped through a coil or around the outside of the tube that carries the ethanol vapors. Different designs will utilize various strategies. The key is to chill the vapors so they drip into a collection container versus escaping into the air.
Naturally, the distiller must experiment with numerous mash recipes, still shapes and designs to create the end product that the distiller set out to create. Bottom line, take notes, take your time, have fun and experiment.
More details concerning stills, whiskey making, whiskey mash recipes, the how to of distillation can be found online.
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