James Wesley:
The author of the article “A prepper’s guide to Beginning Ethanol fuel distillation” is using the wrong recipe for his mash. Corn will not ferment unless it is “malted” either by sprouting the grain and then drying and crushing it, or by treating crushed corn with the enzyme diastase. The old, illegal, moonshiners did this by sprouting and then drying whole, fresh corn. The enzyme treatment is usually done by incubating the crushed corn with a malted barley high in diastase content, such as malted six-row barley.
When your author ferments his corn/sugar mix the only thing he is fermenting is the sugar. The corn is wasted.
This is because the yeast cannot break down and metabolize starch but rather only simple sugars. The crushed corn is high in starch but has very little sugar.
Even more important: Do not drink this distillate! Not only is this illegal, it is also dangerous. Production of safe to drink ethanol requires fractional distillation because the first, more volatile, components coming off the still are highly toxic. Among these is methanol (wood alcohol) but butanol and other nasty byproducts are also present. There are books available that tell how to do this safely but it is still illegal in the USA to produce alcohol for consumption without a license. Not recommended. – Mark R.