JavaScript is disabled
Our website requires JavaScript to function properly. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser settings before proceeding.
I mistyped proof when I meant percentage in a few posts, but not that one - I was going for 100 proof/50% ABV

I would like to get to 70+% for sanitation purposes.
Its easy to distill fermented mash or fruit juice to get 70% ethanol. Or higher. Just not higher than 95%.

The optimal range for use as a disinfective is about 50 to 70% ethanol. Higher than 70 tends to coagulate the surface of cells or mucous drops very rapidly, leaving the inside unaffected and still infectious. A lower % of ethanol penetrates cells and mucous clumps more slowly but more thoroughly. in a micro biology lab we kept squirt bottles of 50% ethanol around for spraying on bench tops before use and then wiping clean with paper towels. The 70% we diluted ourselves from 95%, standard lab alcohol. That was preferable to using higher concentrations because we really didn't want to routinely breath the high concentrations of ethanol you get when you spray more concentrated ethanol solutions around. We didn't use ethanol solutions for sterilizing glassware. We used autoclaves--giant pressure cookers--for that. For sterilizing tools such as scapel blades or bacterial loops between dips into different kinds of bacteria, we flamed them. We would dip them into a small container of 100% ethanol, then pass the wet end of the tool through the flame of an alcohol lamp burning nearby. That is, we depended on sterilization by fire, not alcohol solutions.

That was for relatively routine laboratory work involving relatively routine bacteria or viruses that either weren't very dangerous or weren't airborne. Anything infectious to humans normally handled only in a glove box. The sterile tools and sources of bacteria or viruses, plates with sterile media, sterile tools, etc were all put in a glove box, which was sealed before the bacteria or viral material was opened. You put your hands in the gloves and did what you needed without ever sharing airspace with the materials. The glove box was itself in a hood under negative air pressure.

For the most dangerous sort of work, biohazard level 4, the materials are only handled in a special room operating under negative air pressure, with air locks between the ordinary world and the level 4 facility. People need highly specialized training to work in the facility. They wear the equivalent of space suits which have a separate source of air from the room. That's where stuff like biological warfare research, aggressive or defensive, happens. That's how you should do it if you studied anthrax, for example. That's probably how you should have been operating if you were doing gain of function research on covid. As best I can tell, many, maybe even most dangerous agents escape even biohazard level 4 sooner or later.
 
Last Edited:
Interesting that all the googled advice on sanitizing with alcohol says 70% is the minimum?

Part of what I want sanitizing alcohol for would be for surfaces, say in an ad hoc infirmary. The other would be for instruments/etc. in said infirmary, since in SHTF we would not have an autoclave. I do have a gallon of methanol in the shop for industrial use.

I would want ethanol for tinctures/etc., and maybe some other chemical uses.

Getting 90%+ alcohol would maybe be useful for water contaminated gasoline.
 
Interesting idea. I'm reminded of the instructions for making stills in the old Foxfire books. Less than $150 is not bad at all and may be worth a go. On the other hand, that can buy a bunch of cheap vodka that could be used for various purposes and stores until the end of time.

If you do acquire one, looking forward to test results. Cheers. :)
 
Interesting that all the googled advice on sanitizing with alcohol says 70% is the minimum?

Part of what I want sanitizing alcohol for would be for surfaces, say in an ad hoc infirmary. The other would be for instruments/etc. in said infirmary, since in SHTF we would not have an autoclave. I do have a gallon of methanol in the shop for industrial use.

I would want ethanol for tinctures/etc., and maybe some other chemical uses.

Getting 90%+ alcohol would maybe be useful for water contaminated gasoline.
70% is more like the maximum given that higher is counterproductive, that is less effective. 50% is what we used for surfaces. You can sterilize instruments in a pressure cooker. Bring to full pressure. Sterilize for 15 minutes at full pressure. Note that some of the effectiveness of wiping surfaces is simply the wiping. You're going to be breathing whatever you use. And absorbing it through your lungs. Ethanol is an ordinary part of our biochemistry. Methanol is poisonous.

I don't know whether 90% ethanol would help or harm the situation when added to fuel. 95% will burn, but decidedly less vigorously than 100%.
 
Freeze distilling apple cider is a way to get certain things. Not sure how much proof it gets that way but is an option during the winter.

Actually. Its called "fractional freezing" and can be used as a way to desalinate sea water. It also is used for biodiesels.
 
I can remember those Foxfire series. Think most of the series was acquired & read, then life got in the way. Looking at the big picture of SHTF, a moonshine still and related activities are a large endeavor.

When stills were a common item on the farm the product was a way to use the remainder after human food, livestock, etc. were taken care of first. The shine could be stored or bartered. Think about the planning of life off the grid, no electricity (SHTF). Might need a few acres to grow the grain, farm equipment (fuel??) livestock to plow etc. Way back then someone had a water powered gristmill to grind the grain. The miller received a share for their efforts.

Zipping back to the 1800's now in the year 2021...........not many will make the transition.

Foreverlost,
 
When stills were a common item on the farm the product was a way to use the remainder after human food, livestock, etc. were taken care of first. The shine could be stored or bartered. Think
Actually, hard cider was the most valued product of apple trees, and appleS to eat fresh and winter apples to store were more the byproduct. Before the era of understanding of germs and hygiene, water for most New England city people was badly contaminated. People drank cider instead of or diluted with water. Most laborers received part of their wages in hard cider. Johnny Appleseed, who planted apple trees across the country, planted seeds from cider pressing pulp, not cuttings that would produce good eating apples. Just about any apple could be made into cider. Apples to eat fresh or store for winter were nice. But alcoholic cider was a matter of survival.

The Harvard commencement traditionally starts when the Provost says these words: "Mr. Sheriff, pray give us order." Then the sheriff, wearing top hat and tails and carrying a silver headed staff, goes to the mike, turns and bows formally to the President of Harvard, the President of various governing boards, etc. Then he bangs his staff on the ground three times and says "As the High Sheriff of Middlesex County, I declare that the meeting will be in orrrdder!" Why were these academic festivities opened and closed by the Sheriff of Middlesex County, with LE generously represented? Because everyone was pretty much drunk all the time. That's why. And good conduct was not likely at such a celebration without serious efforts to assure it. Our founding fathers and mothers founded the first college in what was to become the US of A, gave rise to a new nation, wrote the Declaration of Independence, etc pretty much all while drunk.
 
I looked around on the internet a bit. You can "freeze distill" your hard cider by setting the barrel outside and removing ice from the top as it forms until the volume was reduced to about 10% of the starting volume and it was about 30% ethanol, that is, 60 proof. This concentrated the methanol as well as other damaging impurities instead of removing them, as is done in regular heat distillation into brandy. Applejack had a bad reputation and was outlawed in many places because of causing blindness and even death. It was ordinary hard cider, the equivalent of wine, which was ordinarily drunk. New England and the upper Midwest did not have a wine industry until the last century or so, after plant breeders, led by an uneducated farmer in Wisconsin and Minnesota, crossed European wine grapes with American wild species and after several generations developed wine grapes capable of surviving and producing wine in the upper Midwest, New England, etc. Cities in Britain and the rest of Europe had contaminated water too. So they survived by drinking wine or beer. Even so, cities worldwide were population sinks. The death rate was higher than the birth rate. Cities survived because they were supported by migration.

Hard cider is a fine product, just like wine. The recipes on the internet are for crap. Good hard cider is made from real apples, and includes special bitter sharp apples used only in cider. After fermenting, it does not particularly taste like apples. There is a hard cider industry in both Oregon and Washington. Great fresh cider used to be a fall tradition at farmers markets.. However, the USDA outlawed it for fear of diseases supposedly. You can't pasteurized cider. If you do, you have apple juice, a totally bland product.
 
I buy Simply Apple cider at Winco when it is on sale (about a $ off) and put it in the freezer. Drink about a half gallon a week.
Real raw cider is illegal to sell. What you're buying must be either pasteurized, ie apple juice. Or alcoholic hard cider, which is like beer or wine and does not need freezing for long storage.
 
Real raw cider is illegal to sell. What you're buying must be either pasteurized, ie apple juice. Or alcoholic hard cider, which is like beer or wine and does not need freezing for long storage.
I don't know if it is pasteurized or not, it is in the cooler section. They don't call it cider, but it looks and tastes like cider to me, not like the clear apple juice. Local orchard sells apple cider they make, and I don't like it as much. To each their own.
 

Upcoming Events

Tillamook Gun & Knife Show
Tillamook, OR
"The Original" Kalispell Gun Show
Kalispell, MT
Teen Rifle 1 Class
Springfield, OR
Kids Firearm Safety 2 Class
Springfield, OR

New Resource Reviews

New Classified Ads

Back Top