Clavius Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Pretty cool. Thanks for sharing this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
qman22 Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Very cool experiment! The samples tested lower than I thought they would. It's really interesting that different old fitz from the same era tested so different. Those old decanters are pretty unpredictable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MyOldKyDram Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 That seems to be the biggest takeaway. Ya just don't know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
squire Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Thanks for doing the heavy lifting here Michael, looks like we're safe so long as we don't add any of that 15ppb water. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skidfive Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 I could send you two WT samples from porcelain decanters from 80 and 82. the results you posted are crazy as prior info talked about WT ceramics were supposed to be worse then the porcelains. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michaelturtle1 Posted August 10, 2013 Author Share Posted August 10, 2013 Would gladly test them, i want to generate enough data to see if there are any trends that make it easier to predict which decanters are safe. Only problem with the WT decanters is the juice might disappear before I get a chance to run the test!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alphanumeric Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 My complaint is that you needlessly used 10 mL of FRSBLE when you could've used Old Crow...Great post. The nitty-gritty is the point of a forum like this, and this is as good as it gets. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 My next step is to do a leach test on the decanters themselves. Every piece of ceramic wear that is to be used in a food contact situation needs to be tested for lead. I will use the same methods to test the decanters. What is interesting about the porcelain vs ceramic is that the 2 decanters contained 86 proof Old Fitz Prime. That eliminates a lot of factors and points towards the porcelain being the source of the elevated lead levels Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hn4bourbon Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Great work Michael! Thanks for sharing your testing procedures and the results with all of us. Our geekiness level just rose a few ranks with this thread:) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Special Reserve Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Michael, Thanks for doing this. I appreciate you taking the time to run these experiments. Brings back memories when I actually did chemical analysis.Will Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Restaurant man Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Very cool. Please send me your pappy decanters and ill run them through my gullet tester to check for imperfections. Nice to see some science getting pulled out. Thank you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
squire Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 The science rather dulls a bit of the fun but those who like looking under rocks can still talk about plastic containers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tanstaafl2 Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Fascinating post! I have a Beam decanter from 1971 that it would be interesting to test. Of course I am going to drink it anyway so I suppose it doesn't matter much! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
squire Posted August 10, 2013 Share Posted August 10, 2013 Just watch out for the water. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skidfive Posted August 11, 2013 Share Posted August 11, 2013 Would gladly test them, i want to generate enough data to see if there are any trends that make it easier to predict which decanters are safe. Only problem with the WT decanters is the juice might disappear before I get a chance to run the test!!for the work, Ill send a couple ounces of each if you want, but, you have to drink your portion before you test. haPm me with an address and ill send some samples out this week. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beer&Bourbon Posted August 12, 2013 Share Posted August 12, 2013 Thanks for this, Mike! I know that the medical community has continually decreased the recommended lead exposure levels. A study in Cincinnati has seen fMRI changes in individuals with lead exposure (compared to unexposed individuals) regardless of how low the level of exposure was. While structural changes seem to be more common in children, there are still effects of lead on adults. With that being the case, I wonder what the relative "safe" levels of lead in the water at the time of distillation of each of these products was. It would also be important to look at the relative lead levels in water for when the product was bottled - since these aren't barrel proof and would, therefore, have been watered down at that time. Unfortunately you won't be able to get water bottled from that time, but the safe level should give you an upper limit on what to expect. Do you already have those numbers? I'm sure I could track them down if you don't already have access to them... just send me a pm if you'd like me to look into it.With the community here (and the extensive relative availability of decanters), I bet we could design a better experiment to test the lead levels. It's your experiment, but I'd suggest a few controls:same year porcelain and ceramicsame year glass (or plastic) bottle (as a control for lead in the water)same year, same product, different proof (experimental group to determine the contribution of higher alcohol in leaching lead)same year, same distiller, different product, same proof (might not be possible - help determine if the composition of the bourbon alters leaching)It'd be nice to get all of those from the same year, but close years would be useful as well (esp for the water control since the recommended levels likely changed slowly over time). It'd be even nicer if you could get the same samples from 5 years apart (say 1971 and 1976) to compare old vs. new samples. There might also be considerable variation comparing products from different distilleries - either due to lead in the local water source or from the factory used to produce the decanters. You could look at a similar product from the same year from a different distillery to look at this.I'm certain you don't want to run the astronomical number of samples I'm proposing here, but you might consider which ones you'd like to see for your experiment. I have a number of Jim Beam decanters at different proofs. I'll have to check to see what I have when I get home, but any of my bottles are available for this experiment. I also have multiple bottles of the same product bottled at the same time, same proof, which would help tell you how much variability there is even within an individual bottling. Come to think of it, this is probably the best thing to look at first since it would tell you the extent to which you could rely on the other data (i.e. if two bottles with the same product, same proof from the same year exhibit high variability, you would know that a general trend would be difficult/ impossible to see with a small sample size and, therefore, each bottle would need to be tested on its own to determine the relative lead level).Anyway, I'll try to post my bottles tonight - feel free to pm me if you'd like samples from any of the bottles (I'll send enough for you to try them as well obviously). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michaelturtle1 Posted August 12, 2013 Author Share Posted August 12, 2013 The level dropped from 50 ppb to 15 ppb in 1991, I am messing around with a few things in the near future and am going to put together a chart of some sort based on the samples I currently have on hand.. I want to see if there are any interesting trends before I reach out to others on this site to do a full blown analysis.. But for the full blown analysis I want to do bourbons from the same year and same makes both from decanters and not. Since the late 60's -early 80's was the most prolific decanter time I will concentrate on 3 seperate years in that time period. What I would want to do is total lead in the bourbon and also a leaching test on the decanters. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kcgumbohead Posted August 12, 2013 Share Posted August 12, 2013 This is why I come to this forum. Thank you, great stuff!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WAINWRIGHT Posted August 13, 2013 Share Posted August 13, 2013 This is an unbelievably in depth test and thank you for you efforts here Michael,truly interesting stuff and I look forward to even more updates in the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T Comp Posted August 13, 2013 Share Posted August 13, 2013 You can't get enough kudos for this Michael. Thank you and great work. Next step is getting you and all your testing equipment out to the Bardstown gazebo table :cool:. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michaelturtle1 Posted August 13, 2013 Author Share Posted August 13, 2013 Starting phase 2 today. I will be leaching the empty decanters with 3% acetic acid (vinegar) over night and then after the 24 hrs will test the vinegar for lead. This test is performed on every piece of ceramic that is used for food contact in the US. It looks at a worst case scenario of a high acid food or liquid being in contact with the surface to see how much lead comes out of it. Usually this is done on new items, but it will still be interesting to see how much comes out of these decanter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Posted August 13, 2013 Share Posted August 13, 2013 Very cool stuff Mike! Thanks so much for carrying out these tests! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wryguy Posted August 13, 2013 Share Posted August 13, 2013 Just read this thread for the first time, and it is impressive on many levels. Kudos Mike! I'm definitely interested in reading further results. There are probably too many variables to nail down on this one to come to a definitive conclusion methinks, but what an interesting discussion. Moral of this story seems to be a bit of moderation in imbibing decanter juice. I'm especially interested to see what tests on old juice from glass bottles turns up. Not that any of this makes drinking dusty juice any less enticing... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mosugoji64 Posted August 13, 2013 Share Posted August 13, 2013 Great stuff! As Roger pointed out earlier, checking samples from old bottles to determine lead levels in standard bottlings will be very interesting. I've also wondered if any lead is present in old whiskey due to higher levels in water supplies and from distilling equipment. Thanks again. I'm looking forward to future findings! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TribeDoc Posted August 13, 2013 Share Posted August 13, 2013 Really interesting stuff Mike. Thanks for sharing! Looking forward to phase 2! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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