So the new still is referred to as a beer still and thumper. We'll keep our taste profile consistent with our current whiskies by running whiskey off the new still at a lower proof. This leaves more flavor in the white dog, which interacts with the barrel to make very rich tasting whiskey. The new still is a 12 inch column, 25 feet tall. It has perforated trays in it all the way from top to bottom. The beer is pumped up into the still through what is called a beer heater, where it is heated from vapor produced in the still. The mash is then fed into the side of the column onto the top stripping tray. Live steam is fed into the bottom of the still. As the beer works its way down the still, plate by plate, the live steam strips the alcohol and flavor from the beer and the vapors continue to climb to the top of the still. They pass through a solid copper rectification section which refines the spirit, then into a solid copper Thumper. The Thumper is called so because of the thumping sound it makes as it operates. It is a pot still that lets the vapors pass through uncondensed. They loose some heat and impurities in the thumper, thus giving it an effective redistillation, but it leaves a lot of flavor behind. Then the vapor passes through a copper condenser, turning back into liquid. The liquid (white dog) then enters the tail box, where the proof is checked and a sample can be pulled by the distiller to make sure the flavor and aroma is correct.

There are some people in the micro-distilling industry that claim that Potstills make better whiskey than Continuous Stills. They claim that it takes the "craft" out of the process, but we disagree completely. We'll still be handcrafting our products and fermentation will still take place in small batches to control quality. I will continue to distill by making manual adjustments to everything based on what I'm smelling in the white dog coming off the still. We believe that the new still will produce just as good a product as we have been producing on our Potstill. I have a hunch that the product will get even better. A Continuous Still and Thumper will strip less taste out of the white dog than our Potstill did, giving us a richer, more flavorful product in the bottle."