Thread: How to make ethanol

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Hmmm, seems there's a few old "Ethanol " brewers here, have downed my share of the lightin', never tried it in a car, hell gas was/is LOTS cheaper than alcohol...

If you are serious about burning home-brew fuel and can find a legal loophole there is another problem I should have mentioned from a chemistry point of view. That is that when you start from a mash with water in it and you distill it you cannot achieve 200 proof pure ethanol by distillation beyond about 190 proof due to the formation of an azeotrope mixture of about 97% ethanol and 3% water. In order to get rid of the water you have to dehydrate it somehow. See this site for some details:

http://www.ethanol.org/documents/drymilling.pdf

Here is another site with a comparison of ethanol and gasoline:

http://www.tribune-chronicle.com/New...articleID=6568

Perhaps in a personal use situation the added water in the fuel could be treated by adding "drygas" (which is really methanol) to make the water more soluble in the ethanol but over some time it is probably not a good idea to keep using water in the fuel, although it might actually improve the octane rating in the same way that water injection does. Still the verdict on water injection is that it may be good for brief use with a turbocharger but not good for steady use due to milkshake oil and added corrosion. Thus I think the idea of home brew fuel will be difficult and ethanol production will have to be left to commercial producers, mostly in the grain/corn rich mid-west.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder