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HoboTeddy t1_jd66vc7 wrote

Reply to comment by big_sugi in Can you extract a fully concentrated liquid out of an ice cube (like Coca Cola) until there's almost no water left? by Froggiebuns

Did you just call concentrated methanol a "wicked buzz" and not "poison that can make you blind"? Or am I missing something?

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big_sugi t1_jd69th2 wrote

Depends how much you drink. The methanol is already in your cider or wine; applejack or ice wine just concentrates it, along with everything else that’s not water. That makes it easier to take in too much, whereas the sheer volume will slow you down from doing it with non-distilled alcoholic liquids.

Also, as to methanol specifically, the ethanol will help to inhibit the breakdown of methanol in the body into formate, which (I understand) is what’s actually toxic. That’s the reason that a bottle of scotch can actually be used to treat methanol poisoning.

The other stuff, though, isn’t neutralized in the same way.

I think, anyway. It’s been decades since I took a chemistry class, so I might be misstating some of the finer points.

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galacticspark t1_jd6jt9r wrote

You’re correct. The gist is methanol in itself isn’t great for you, but it’s not terrible. The problem is the same enzyme in your body that detoxifies ethanol will actually change methanol into something incredibly toxic. The solution is to tie up as many of the ethanol-detoxifying enzymes as possible so that they never have a chance to interact with the methanol molecules, and you end up peeing out the methanol.

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mikk0384 t1_jd7ocbt wrote

>The solution is to tie up as many of the ethanol-detoxifying enzymes as possible so that they never have a chance to interact with the methanol molecules, and you end up peeing out the methanol.

I thought it worked by slowing down the conversion of methanol to the more toxic compound so the body could keep up with the removal - keeping the concentration low by flattening the curve.

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Indemnity4 t1_jdaez3d wrote

Competitive inhibition.

Both methanol and ethanol compete for access the limited amount of enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase.

Methanol is converted to a toxic compound formic acid or formate. That's nasty stuff and your body can't really clear it. It needs to effectively kill the affected tissue and remove that, which takes days to weeks.

Ethanol is slightly better at binding to the enzyme compared to methanol. So if you have 95% ethanol and 5% methanol, practically close to zero methanol is being converted by the enzyme.

Silly analgoy: myself and a really attractive woman are both trying to buy a drink at a bar from the same bartender. A long enough queue of attractive women and I'm never getting a drink. So I give up and go home.

Methanol and ethanol are both removed by urine (and breathing + sweating). So long as the methanol is still circulating and not reacting with the enzyme, you simply urinate it out.

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lukabratzi_hatzi t1_jd6crwa wrote

I wonder what the equivalent of distilled is for fractional crystallization. Crystalled?

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big_sugi t1_jd6cxn0 wrote

Why not just “crystallized?”

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lukabratzi_hatzi t1_jd7m19d wrote

Haha, true. But since you are taking the byproduct of the crystallization process I thought it might be called something different.

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big_sugi t1_jd7no3b wrote

I had the same thought. It depends on what you’re trying to capture/exclude.

The product of distilling is a distillate, so maybe crystallate? We need an etymologist here, stat!

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scutiger- t1_jd834ri wrote

Crystillation sounds good to me. So crystilled?

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dirtballmagnet t1_jd6c1kh wrote

Historically it appears to have been responsible for some pretty notorious indiscipline in any army that passed through the Valley of Virginia in the American Civil War. Like ill behavior beyond the usual drunken ill behavior.

I think weather permitting applejack to be made on the Blue Ridge and the forcible conscription of volunteers whose enlistments were running out led to a small revolt in early 1862, where an infuriated Stonewall Jackson sent an artillery piece to start firing solid shot into the mountainside where the revolting rebels were holding out.

One wonders if it had a hand in the dissolution of Hunter's army after the battle of Lynchburg, 1864, the surprise achieved at Cedar Creek later that year, or the intensity of the destruction of the Shenandoah Valley thereafter.

The source for the mini-revolt would be likely found in D. S. Freeman's Lee's Lieutenants, Vol. I. but I don't have it at hand.

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