When I first learned about thumpers, I assumed that you would just use water in it, but Rick says that water would actually be your last resort. It is also readily available since you’re about to use it to make moonshine anyway, so go ahead and fill your thumper up about halfway and start distilling.
Even though this won’t have as much alcohol present in it as tails from a previous run, it’s better than water because it’s still got some alcohol in there.
Some of Your Current Wash: GoodĪnother option is to use some of the liquid you’re about to distill. As tails are collected, the traces of congeners and fusel oils increases, so your most pure tails are the ones that you got right after the hearts were finished. If you do use tails for this, only go for the ones that you collected earliest. This is because you’ll be able to get a bit of additional alcohol from those moonshine tails as the liquid heats. Ideally, you should use tails from a previous run for the liquid that you put in the thumper. So the temperature of the liquid in the thumper gradually rises and then vaporizes up into the condenser and out as product. This vapor is cooled when it enters the liquid in the thumper, which condenses the vapor while also heating that liquid in the thumper. The way the thumper works is that it takes the vapor from the head of your kettle and travels down a tube into the bottom of the thumper. But what’s the best liquid to use in your thumper when you’re making moonshine? Just water? That’s what I used to think, but it turns out that water is one of the last things you’d want to use. This is the case for our Brewhaus thumpers, but if you are using a different thumper, check with the manufacturer or adjust the fill level as you see fit. Depending on your thumper, it’s typical to plan to fill it about halfway with liquid. Making moonshine with a thumper instead of a pot still is great because thumpers essentially perform two distillations in one-without stripping the flavor the way reflux distillation does.