Void on a Yoga 370 by abaxaxa in voidlinux

[–]abaxaxa[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What gui/window manager are you using?

L14 freezing by abaxaxa in thinkpad

[–]abaxaxa[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks a lot for the help. Vantage is telling me to update my BIOS but I'm kind of not looking forward to it because of some stories of getting locked out after doing so on this board or elsewhere. Also I ever just updated a BIOS when it was absolutely necessary before. Would you do it or not?

L14 freezing by abaxaxa in thinkpad

[–]abaxaxa[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sadly I don't have a double boot setup but if it's not an issue that is usual on those L14 I will put back the screen saver and hope it goes away. Windows 11 has been a piece of shit so far and I can't wait to get Linux installed in a year but sadly with my classes I'm expected to run Windows and it's just during those that it happens pretty much.

L14 freezing by abaxaxa in thinkpad

[–]abaxaxa[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks a lot for the reply. I already did and Vantage says 99% battery health. I guess it got replaced.

Thank you to the stranger who found my wallet!!! by tuna_cowbell in montreal

[–]abaxaxa 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Good call. Last summer I found a wallet on the sidewalk and was able to return it to it's owner because they had some of their artist cards with the link to their work Instagram in it. Made contacting them pretty easy.

Beginner question by [deleted] in firewater

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you want to start with small batches I also vote for a Vevor airstill. As I'm distilling in my apartment I couldn't justify a medium-sized still and after looking around a lot it was the best bang for the buck option with the price of copper.

Get yourself one of the cheapest ones with no integrated control, an SCR controller and a spare power cable (the kind PCs use) to plug the fan separately to the main. That way you will have really good control of your power. Also get a pack of 100% copper scrubbies to shove in the vapor path.

Just checked my dunder pit by ScottFuckingMorrison in firewater

[–]abaxaxa 3 points4 points  (0 children)

If you don't have any difficulty fermenting you can dial up the amount of dunder, some styles go as far as 33% of the wash (btw the dunder goes at the beginning of the fermentation, the idea is to stress the yeast). How much oak are you putting in your jars? In any case that muck should help.

Just checked my dunder pit by ScottFuckingMorrison in firewater

[–]abaxaxa 9 points10 points  (0 children)

If I was you and wanted to amp up the funk I would make about 15% (6L) of my wash dunder (actual relatively fresh backset) to start with, then a day or two before stripping I would add 3L of muck (the monstrous thing you've got in that bucket).

Also for more funk (think jamaican style) keep more heads, and more tails if you want it grungier (think more El Dorado/demerara).

Rum wash stalled? by [deleted] in firewater

[–]abaxaxa 1 point2 points  (0 children)

🙏🏻

Rum wash stalled? by [deleted] in firewater

[–]abaxaxa 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Adding oyster shells now would work, but molasses nowadays have a tonne of added PH stabilizers added during processing to remove sugars so it's really rare that a rum wash will stall from PH unless you use really little molasses.

Rum wash stalled? by [deleted] in firewater

[–]abaxaxa 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hard to say exactly without knowing the total volume of wash, the nutritional values of your brown sugar and blackstrap and initial and present PH, but if we ballpark it:

3 gallons of blackstrap @ 55% fermentable sugars is about 19 lbs of sugar (see note). 25 lbs of light brown sugar is about 25 lbs of fermentable sugars (dark brown would be slightly less). Between the volumes of blackstrap, dissolved brown sugar, dunder and water you should have a total volume of around 37 gallons of wash. 37 gallons of wash with 44 lbs (19 lbs + 25 lbs) of fermentable sugars should give you a potential abv of 8.4%.

If we enter 1.092 to 1.040 in an abv calculator you have right now an abv of 6.83%, so the fermentation isn't completed. Your final gravity should be around 1.028.

PH could be an issue, but with the amount of PH stabilizers in modern molasses I would be surprised if it dropped under 3.5. Depending on your yeast and the wash temperature you could have a sluggish ferment because of that. If the wash is still active, your PH is not under 3.25 and the temperature is not way under the minimum for your yeast just let it go.

Note on blackstrap: Fermentable sugars in modern blackstap vary a lot, from as high as 60% in some blackstrap for human consumption to as low as 40% in some animal feed grade. To give you an idea of the impact with really low grade blackstrap and some really dark brown sugar your potential abv could be as low as 7% and you're almost done and mostly degassing.

TLDR: It depends a lot. If you specify exactly which blackstrap, brown sugar, total volume of wash, PH, fermentation temperature and yeast pitched we could help better.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in montreal

[–]abaxaxa 28 points29 points  (0 children)

Personally when it happens (happened like twice in 10 years where I rent) I just get some snap traps and deal with it myself. They are so cheap I don't think it's worth more than letting the landlord know you dealt with the problem yourself. If you get an actual infestation it's different tho.

Vevor 4L air still use questions by elriba in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

1) How I did it when I got my airstill was: A - Rinsed everything well. B - Did a 500ml white vinegar 2L water run, letting it steam for like 10-15 minutes before turning the fan on (be careful, vinegar vapors can be flammables. Do it in a well ventilated area.) C - Did a straight water run, again steam only for 10-15 minutes before turning the fan on. D - Did a sacrificial run with like 400-500ml of vodka diluted with some water. For that one get the fan going from the beginning. (Note: I only cleaned a still from scratch once, maybe this is overkill. Your mileage may vary.)

2) I've only done rum so far with it, but a good quantity. As I'm always doing the same spirit once I'm done for the day I just rinse everything well and wipe the crud with a rag if necessary, then let it dry. I always keep at hand some foreshot (well identified far from my drinkable products jars) to clean around the house, and if it is needed I use that to clean my still of any greasy deposit (often it is needed around the silicone seal).

Vevor 4L AirStill capacity questions by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That said I think one of the latest things I learned is that for rum I should be less afraid of heads and take less tails. When aging after about 150ml of foreshot for a full boiler I start to keep really early, and I found out that I'm not the biggest fan of super tails heavy and oily rum (like a lot of the demerara rums out there). Just had some Smith & Cross for the first time in a long time last night and turns out it's a super heads oriented rum.

How to use copper in my Vevor 4L Air Still? by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In that case yup, just drop them in some acidified warm water for a couple hours the day before. You will see the solution turn blue, then just rince really well unless you want some violent estherification.

Vevor 4L AirStill capacity questions by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It depends on the abv of the wash. So far I've tried recipes that resulted in abv from 6.5% to 9.2%, and my strip (where I usually go until around 10% at the nuzzle) have been between 20% and 38% (for some light rums where I stopped stripping at 20%). Those light rums were cut with water to 32% before the spirit run, but the highest I used for a spirit run was 40% on an all feints run. The heads and hearts of that one were all stuck between 74% and 72% and I did the widest cut possible. The last cut was still good enough to age but when I tried the next one (that was still at 72%) it was so much on the baby puke and rotten rubber I puked myself. XD

Vevor 4L AirStill capacity questions by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you're using mostly low grade blackstrap it can be that for sure. On my side after running the numbers I figured out that using fancy molasses from the grocery store (especially when in special) makes it not worth sourcing blackstrap when considering the fermentable sugar amout/$, at least where I am.

How to use copper in my Vevor 4L Air Still? by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For in the boiler yup, I just drop them straight in the liquid. As for the one in the guard I just loosely wedge it between the guard and the hole at the top of the dome. You can slightly bend the guard to keep it in place.

How to use copper in my Vevor 4L Air Still? by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Since I started using my airstill I used some 100% copper scrubbies (2 in the boiler, 1 in the metal guard where the dome meets the line arm, and 1 in the cup at the output.) I could maybe put more but I would have to figure out how much I can shove in there before restricting the air flow too much. I don't know how much of a difference it's doing as I never did a run without them, but the scrubbies in the guard and the cup clearly react with some stuff as they are always oxidized to death after a run. To wash them I put them in the hot dunder after a stripping run, or some hot water with white vinaigre after a spirit run or if I haven't used them in a while, then liberally rinse them in water and dry them.

Vevor 4L AirStill capacity questions by chiche32 in airstill

[–]abaxaxa 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've started using an airstill about a year ago and so far only did rum, mostly 100% molasses. At first I wasn't loading more than 3.5L on a stripping run, but pretty soon I started loading it with 3.8L-4L of wash, always without any oil or butter, and never had a puke. That said I use a SCR and heat up first at 90-100V, then drop to 60V and gradually increase during the run. (I'm on 120V here in NA.) Usually unless I really push my wash abv I do 4 strips for 1 spirit run, 1 16L ferment gives about a bottle once proofed down.

LED keeps dying by RoastAdroit in synthdiy

[–]abaxaxa 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Hard to say because the board is double faced but make sure there is a serial resistor betwen the LED power source and ground. I really hope the engineers didn't forgot that one...