Heriot-Watt Brewing and Distilling course

[DocAnna]

Spent almost all day watching the lectures for continuous distillation calculations, and using the McCabe Thiel method for calculating plate numbers and q values for subcooled feeds of binary volatile mixtures .

This continues to be so outside my comfort zone. I think it's time for a subcooled feed of a different nature... there's an oatmeal stout courtesy of @The-Engineer-That-Brews that's calling my name. Phew.

 

[Branny]

You ever tried spending a few months in a old sherry butt?

Sure I once saw that film in my Dads collection.

 

[DocAnna]

Ughhh... spent two weekends near solid working on the end of unit assessment, and I'm fairly sure I've got lots wrong but I have gone over it so so many times. I have learnt an awful lot about malting temperature schedules, air flow rates and heater duties, my brain hurts. I didn't even try to consider heat losses on the malting question. I've still to sort the references on the first question, but right now I'm giving up for the day, the word count is stuffed, over 5.5K. Now I've finished and it's too late to consider it cheating, I'm posting the questions here to give an idea of what I was tackling:

I received my mark and feedback from this assignment, huge relief, I've done pretty well. Comments from the tutor seem to suggest I'd made life complicated for myself in trying to be too accurate, though did get credit for considering some of the extra things too. The module I'm currently doing is on whisky distillation and maturation, and I've realised I made a mistake with the temperature gradient for liquid vapour, but thankfully it didn't impact the calculations much.

There is something vaguely worrying about the 'enjoyment' I find from being pushed completely out of my skills envelope. I am also realising I'm a teeny weeny bit obsessive about brewing and distilling, and all the sciency stuff around it...... I'm sure none of you had really noticed at all .

(I am soooo just waiting to do the module on wort boiling and wading into the 30 minute boil thread )

 

[Rodcx500z]

There is one name in all this who nobody ever mentions, this guy started the rot and it has never gone away Mr austerity George Osbourn remember him and Mr £53-00 breakfast Mr Ian Duncan Smith who attacked the disabled of this country with a venom never seen before, we should be looking back at were the rot started this is how these bastards work 5, 10 year plans then they fade away having done their bit, and they have their plated pensions people in their back pocket for favours down the line

I received my mark and feedback from this assignment, huge relief, I've done pretty well. Comments from the tutor seem to suggest I'd made life complicated for myself in trying to be too accurate, though did get credit for considering some of the extra things too. The module I'm currently doing is on whisky distillation and maturation, and I've realised I made a mistake with the temperature gradient for liquid vapour, but thankfully it didn't impact the calculations much.

There is something vaguely worrying about the 'enjoyment' I find from being pushed completely out of my skills envelope. I am also realising I'm a teeny weeny bit obsessive about brewing and distilling, and all the sciency stuff around it...... I'm sure none of you had really noticed at all .

(I am soooo just waiting to do the module on wort boiling and wading into the 30 minute boil thread )

Have glass or 2 and well done

 

[Deadhead]

I love this so much! Well done!!

 

[DocAnna]

Have glass or 2 and well done

I'm going to sort of assume the first quoted part isn't related to me... as I really have nothing at all to do with politics. But thank you, I have been avoiding any alcohol all week as I am trying to lose weight, but tonight the brakes are off a wee bit. It's also a huge relief as the subject for this week's lecture is energy sustainability, and I'm the clinical sustainability lead for my organisation so I feel on fairly safe ground. Next week is what they euphemistically call a consolidation week, otherwise known as a catch up on stuff you're behind on. I've the second assignment for the current module to write up which was a sneaky piece of maths on a thing called a dephlegmator ( as a doctor this just really doesn't sound sanitary )

 

[Rodcx500z]

I'm going to sort of assume the first quoted part isn't related to me... as I really have nothing at all to do with politics. But thank you, I have been avoiding any alcohol all week as I am trying to lose weight, but tonight the brakes are off a wee bit. It's also a huge relief as the subject for this week's lecture is energy sustainability, and I'm the clinical sustainability lead for my organisation so I feel on fairly safe ground. Next week is what they euphemistically call a consolidation week, otherwise known as a catch up on stuff you're behind on. I've the second assignment for the current module to write up which was a sneaky piece of maths on a thing called a dephlegmator ( as a doctor this just really doesn't sound sanitary )

Sorry Anna i didn't know i double quoted i am not the sharpest pencil in the box when it come's to the internet ( i would be one of those who get sacked for replying to the whole company )

 

[Robin54]

Well done Anna. I have a medical degree, and can tell that your reasoning, and scrupulous - ness will get you through. Remember that in medicine, (well, where I worked) was always to a have a PLAN B.

 

[DocAnna]

Feeling a bit down today, received feedback on my mock press pack submission - which was on a fictitious distillery of our choosing. Apparently it was only supposed to be one side and the person marked it imposed a hard 1000 word limit so didn't read past 1000 words and so anything I said after that wasn't considered. Neither of these were in the brief, and I'd put a lot of work into the piece, so yes feeling a bit meh. Now it's marked I feel I can add in here just for interest...First page shown as an image, and the pdf of the whole thing attached.

 

[Deadhead]

For what it's worth, I think it's very smart! Well done!

 

[Buffers brewery]

I agree with @Deadhead doc. I’d be interested to know where the 1000 word cut off was? Twas all a good read

 

[Wobbly13]

Feeling a bit down today, received feedback on my mock press pack submission - which was on a fictitious distillery of our choosing. Apparently it was only supposed to be one side and the person marked it imposed a hard 1000 word limit so didn't read past 1000 words and so anything I said after that wasn't considered. Neither of these were in the brief, and I'd put a lot of work into the piece, so yes feeling a bit meh. Now it's marked I feel I can add in here just for interest...First page shown as an image, and the pdf of the whole thing attached.


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@DocAnna can understand your frustration of they didn’t mention the 1000 word limit. I would appeal that as you obviously put in a lot of effort. When I was doing one of my Masters degrees the average word count per assignment was 6000 words but the Human Factors lecture limited us to 2000, much harder to complete. As Winston Churchill said “If I had more time I would have written you a shorter letter.”

 

[RichardM]

How's the course going @DocAnna ? We haven't had an update for some time.

 

[DocAnna]

Thanks for the nudge Richard, there's a lot to update on. I've been away from the forum for a couple of months, in part due to the extensive damage done to our extension by the botched flat roof work, damage to my brew kit and having no time. I'll post more once I catch my breath, but it's still pretty full on.

So on Sunday I submitted my final assessment on the distilling module. The module focused on whisky but included all forms of distilling including gin and clear spirits. The first few weeks were pretty intense as I described in February, with calculation methods for equivalent plates for distillations. On reflection looking back that all seems fairly straightforward now but that's only because I've done lots of the chemical engineering questions since. I felt a bit down about the mock press pack mark but have since got over that but it did make me nervous about the essay part of the final assessment. I'm going to admit something, and I hope people here take it ok, but on the 2nd assessment on chemical engineering I lost just the one mark , and I felt a complete numpty when I realised what I'd lost it for. So generally I reckon the maths part of the assessments I'm pretty sound on.

This last assessment had a chemical engineering and an essay section - the biggest headache was sticking within the 2000 word limit which I've established they are strict within 5% for. I don't think I'm allowed to post the whole question so here's the short version - and I've removed one of the more discursive parts of the question in section 2.

1. With the use of diagrams, appraise different distillation systems within Scotch whisky production, and the effect they can have on the characteristics of the final product.
2. Distillation from a Chemical Engineering Perspective
   1. The two pot still setup as commonly used in Scotch Malt Whisky production typicall separates a 7% ABV wash (equating to 5.6 weight% or 2.3 mol% of ethanol in water) into a distillate of 40 mol% ethanol (70.5% ABV) and pot ale and spent lees with a residual ethanol concentration of <0.05 mol%. If this same separation process was to be performed in a single continuous column, where the wash entered at bubble point:
      1. Find the minimum reflux ratio.
      2. Find the number of stages required if a reflux ratio of 2 was used.
   2. A wash still charged with 20,000 kg of a 7% ABV wash at 30 °C produces low wines at 20% ABV and pot ale at 0.1% ABV. The still is heated using steam at 1 bar, where only the latent heat of the condensing steam is utilised for heating the still contents.
      1. Find the mass of low wines produced.
      2. Find the mass of steam required for the wash distillation, ignoring heat lost to the environment

I'd be happy to share my essay/answer on direct messaging if anyone is super interested - the deadline for submission has passed now. It gets complicated as heat capacities vary with temperature, and some of the approximations based on linear averages mean the errors are multiplied as subsequent questions use previous answers. I used MS excel for all the calculations so trying to avoid any rounding errors.

I'm rather pleased to be giving it a break for a few weeks since the day job is a bit intense as well at the moment.

A x

 

[RichardM]

Thank you for the update. I'm really impressed by how you are doing this, full time intensive job and dealing with the roof.
Re.

I'd be happy to share my essay/answer on direct messaging if anyone is super interested

It's that I'm not interested, but most of it would be completely over my head.

 

[DocAnna]

On reflection, I will post one of the diagrams I did which summarise the processes for Scotch whisky distillation.

 

[Deadhead]

Loving this!


Kudos for doing this and working full time and dealing with the roof and life and everything else. Wow!

 

[Sadfield]

Very impressive. Does the restriction on home distilling make that side of the course harder? I think I would be less engaged with not being able to put the learning into practice. Being less academic wouldn't help.

 

[DocAnna]

Very impressive. Does the restriction on home distilling make that side of the course harder? I think I would be less engaged with not being able to put the learning into practice. Being less academic wouldn't help.

Thank you, I don't find not being able to distill any more less engaging than not being able to floor malt grain or brew at an industrial scale . Though to be fair - I did go along to a lab based distilling practical which did help me appreciate the impact of cut points and speed of distillation on the new make spirit. It really is fascinating, and i'm loving the course overall

 

[The-Engineer-That-Brews]

On reflection, I will post one of the diagrams I did which summarise the processes for Scotch whisky distillation.

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Blimey - when’s your book coming out?