Home Distillation of Alcohol (Homemade Alcohol to Drink)

The First Run

Before you use a still for the first time, be it made or bought, make sure you have cleaned it well - get all the grease, solvents, polish residue etc off it.

To clean a new still, Ted advises :
The first run should be a water-only occasion. Put enough water in it to prevent it boiling dry, and let it rip. The steam will : If you have used stainless steel scrubbing pads as the column packing, you will probably need to first boil these up in some water by themselves, to remove any residue left over on them when they were machined (or else you'll get a nasty taint to the flavours).

Finding Leaks

Do not use your still until you are sure it is leak-free & clean.

Other ways of finding leaks are to : Once you have spotted them, mark them with a water-proof permenent marker, so you can find them again later.
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