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Day 3:  We continued with the pressure test work on the two smaller stills and refired the big column still to check that all of the replaced gaskets were in working order.  Tomorrow we will be putting in some new thermocouples for the controller readouts, on the column still.  Big project of the day was to mount the agitator and motor on the 4000L mash tun.  In the pictures you see Junior and Justin lower the shaft down through the hole in the motor mount.  Justin climbed down in the mash tun to hold up the shaft when we placed the motor on and to mount the baffles onto the shaft.  I didn't get  a picture of the actual mounting of the motor as it took all three of us up on top to lift the motor and lower it gently on to the shaft.  It always bites when you find your roof is just a few small inches shy of what you need so the lift can hold the motor while you lower it.  So it was a muscle a job.  This took most of the day.

In these pictures you see Ari passing one of the baffles or blades for the agitator into the mash tun where you can see Justin and Junior down inside this bad boy with one baffle in place.  The other picture gives you an idea of scale with me up top where we just finished attaching the motor.














These two pictures are of a small combo unit which serves as The Mash Tun, Fermenter, and Still.  It is getting some paint and I believe we are going for assembly and set up tomorrow.  I'll post some pictures of that and some better ones as the machine won't be in a poorly lit warehouse.  According to Justin a number of you may be familiar with this unit as it has been utilized to make up a number of test/product development batches for craft distillers.   So this may be a bit of nostalgia for a few of you who worked with Kris and Justin on those projects.