Update: Chip Tate of uh, Tate & Co.

Post by **Capn Jimbo** » Fri May 22, 2015 7:39 am

So what's new with the boy litigator?

Many of you will remember - now with fondness I'd hope - of the (literal) trials and tribulations of young Mr. Tate, the micromanaging/macrolitigating guy behind the original Balcones' experimental whiskies. Honestly it was a real soap opera with amazing claims and counterclaims and a series of breath holding lawsuits by Tate - against Balcones, his lifelong friend and co-distiller, his friend's wife, his first law firm, and, and.... Stop the madness! I need to take a breath.

But that all ended the last quarter of 2014 with Tate insisting that he was already breaking ground on his new distillery to be named - what else! - Tate & Company. Or maybe just "Tate!!!", lol. But again, bullshyte walked when not much happened. The next bit of news was that Tate had located a brewery (nope, not a distillery) from whom he'd purchased 50 brewing barrels which he planned to turn into some kind of bizarre moonshine type stills. Go figure. No more actual and competent Forsythe stills from Scotland. Nope, just get out your Sawz-All and your SS welding torch and have at it. Not that distilling using a stainless barrel is all that bad, as the boyz over Home Distilling are proof.

So what happened?

No delivery, no barrels, but yes - another lawsuit to add to his growing portfolio of pissant filings. His second, or is it third lawfirm must be ecstatic. Read about it here, suit filed in March, 2015:
http://www.wacotrib.com/news/business/t ... b6289.html

The result: Tate apparently has had his 15 minutes of fame much to the chagrin I'm sure of his former cult following, who were just sure that this time - this time - their boy would get it right. So far? Not. Oh, and one last note about his rabid followers who swore undying allegiance to the dreamer. Remember that one of them actually set up a crowd funding effort to raise funds for Tate's legal defense (and offense as well, I'd guess). Despite all their loud multiple postings when the rubber hit the road?

Not much.

Despite his huge and allegedly brothers-in-blood following, the funding effort quickly drew but a handful of funders, a paltry $1790 and then - nada for the last 5 months. Like Tate, an initial flurry followed by crickets in the night. Such is life...

https://www.gofundme.com/isupportchiptate

*******
A puff piece, including a pic of the erstwhile new home of "Tate!!"...
http://thewhiskeywash.com/tag/tate-co-distillery/

Post by **Capn Jimbo** » Fri May 22, 2015 10:11 am

The new future home of "Tate!!!"

Is that the "groundbreaking" in the front? All kidding aside, I do hope that this guy will finally settle down and get it together. The godz know that we couldn't possibly ever have too many micro-and-mini-distillers. Still, it remains a very tough road for them as the demand for new, young and unusual make is really quite limited, and distribution close to impossible.

Good luck to him!

Winston · Post by **Winston** » Tue May 26, 2015 10:04 am

Jimbo,

A brewing system's potential volume is measured in "barrels," each barrel being 31 US gallons, or approximately two kegs. The system he purchased can produce up to 50 barrels worth of brewed liquid (wash) at a time, roughly 1500 gallons.

As far as I know he is building brand new pot stills from sheet copper. I think I saw a picture of the copper on Twitter last week.

Post by **Capn Jimbo** » Tue May 26, 2015 11:47 am

If you will Winston...

...and thanks for the info, much appreciated. Accepting the fact that the "brewer" he purchased from the beer facility has a capacity of 1500 gallons, and knowing that brewers don't do what we call "stilling" (ie the controlled heating, evaporation, reflux and condensation of alcohol), but ratheruse what I assume is a large, closed fermentation tank, which I assume is made of stainless steel - well, it would seem we have what is simply a really big single barrel.

To convert this for stilling purposes is not at all different that what home distillers accomplish by converting stainless beer kegs to simple moonshine stills by adding a heating capacity, a copper neck/lyne arm, and a condensation system. Do correct me if I'm wrong. Such crude stills are best used for an initial stripping run.

Although the numbers will vary to a degree, a stripping run will reduce the volume of the wash by about 4/5ths - in other words that 1500 stripping run would produce roughly 300 gallons of rough distillate to be then run through a a much smaller spirits still (or group of stills totalling 300 gallons of capacity).

Comments please... thanks. BTW, if you have a link to the sheet copper project, please do share it...

bearmark · Post by **bearmark** » Tue May 26, 2015 6:08 pm

Here is the copper being cut at the end of April per Tate & Co Twitter feed.

Post by **Capn Jimbo** » Tue May 26, 2015 7:10 pm

Great stuff Bear. Looks like an intricate design with some gingerbread, reminds me of Lost Spirit's homemade still (the one with all the crevices).

Any more? Or a link? Oops, just found it:
https://twitter.com/tatedistillery

Winston · Post by **Winston** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 6:39 pm

Capn Jimbo wrote:If you will Winston...

...and thanks for the info, much appreciated. Accepting the fact that the "brewer" he purchased from the beer facility has a capacity of 1500 gallons, and knowing that brewers don't do what we call "stilling" (ie the controlled heating, evaporation, reflux and condensation of alcohol), but ratheruse what I assume is a large, closed fermentation tank, which I assume is made of stainless steel - well, it would seem we have what is simply a really big single barrel.

To convert this for stilling purposes is not at all different that what home distillers accomplish by converting stainless beer kegs to simple moonshine stills by adding a heating capacity, a copper neck/lyne arm, and a condensation system. Do correct me if I'm wrong. Such crude stills are best used for an initial stripping run.

Although the numbers will vary to a degree, a stripping run will reduce the volume of the wash by about 4/5ths - in other words that 1500 stripping run would produce roughly 300 gallons of rough distillate to be then run through a a much smaller spirits still (or group of stills totalling 300 gallons of capacity).

Comments please... thanks. BTW, if you have a link to the sheet copper project, please do share it...

The brew system likely isn't being converted into anything, rather it serves as the vessel where the wash is created through fermentation. Distillation (from what I gather) will be done in new copper pot stills he's building himself.

Post by **Capn Jimbo** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 7:44 am

Winston, I'm not so sure. He already has three very large horizontal steel tanks that would appear to be the fermentation tanks (pictured at the link above), yet he has purchased this 1500 gallon vertical tank that if I had to guess would make a dandy moonshine stripper (also pictured).

Do you know for sure, or is this just an assumption on your part? Got any pics of the fermentation tanks he made/used at Balcones? Thanks...

Winston · Post by **Winston** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 10:02 am

I could be wrong, but that just doesn't seem like his style. Balcones has always done double copper pot distillation, for instance. The fermenters we started with were some basic open-top stainless steel tanks, roughly 500 gallons. We later brought in some Letina purpose-built fermenters, kind of like these http://www.letina.com/eng/web-slike/tanks/PZP-tip.jpg

Winston · Post by **Winston** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 10:47 am

Looking at the pictures now... so far the only tanks I've seen are three fermenters and a lauter tun