Checking in from country SA

by **Zak Griffin** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 9:34 am

G'day all! Just joined up, thought I'd drop in and introduce myself. Haven't built a still yet, but I'm working on it.

Only found this site a couple of days ago, but it's looking good so far... I've been reading everything there is to read on homedistiller.org for the last couple of months and learnt heaps, but I'm glad I've found somewhere that uses the metric system now haha.

As the title states, I'm in country SA, which can make supplies hard to find... My family owns a farm, though, which means they haven't thrown anything out for the last 50 years, which means that we've got a bit of copper etc laying around. So far I've found a length of 3" copper pipe about 1.2m long, and a couple of old copper water heaters, along with a heap of 1/2", 3/4" etc pipe.

Plans at this stage are for a 3" copper Bokakob on a stainless keg boiler, that I will probably run mostly unpacked to make UJSM etc. I have no interest in using essences, and I don't drink a lot of vodka, but I'm going with the Bok because it seems to be the best of both worlds, and an easy way to start. Eventually, I can see myself making an all-copper pot still out of one of the water heaters I found, but I don't want to get ahead of myself!

Looking forward to learning a bit from you guys, hopefully I'll be able to share some of my knowledge as well.

Cheers.

by **JayD** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 10:02 am

Welcome to the forum... :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **blond.chap** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 10:22 am

Welcome mate, SA guys are always welcome. Let us know if you need to offload a copper water heater.

by **tipsy** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 10:55 am

:greetings-waveyellow:

by **Sam.** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 11:14 am

Welcome bud, if that's your real name you might want to PM Macstill to change it!

by **BackyardBrewer** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 11:15 am

Welcome, glad to have another fellow south Aussie.

by **Mfkerg** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 11:19 am

Welcome, I'm fairly new also and have a 2" Boka that takes forever to run but gets me 95 % spirit and a 3" pot that is quick and fairly user friendly for rum, ujsm, whiskey.

The bubbler chat on here and the shiny stuff that people are getting will soon make you wish for more.
Enjoy the journey

by **crow** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 11:38 am

Hi ya Zak sounds like ya got a good plan going. Reckon if ya had the copper spare I would make the pot first as they are such a cheap easy thing to make (mine was about $50 all up) and the Boka second :handgestures-thumbupleft: (can always do an all copper pot down the track)

by **Zak Griffin** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 11:56 am

Cheers for the warm welcome guys.

Plan is to build one boiler (probably gas fired at this stage) and build both a Bok and a pot head for it... I'm a bit confused as to what to build my pot head out of though. From what I gather, size (diameter of pipe) isn't such an issue with a pot as it is with a Bok? Plenty of people saying that 3" is perfect for a Bok, with 2" being too slow, but I'm not seeing much info about what the optimum pipe diameter is for a pot...

Then later, when I get a bit of still building practice in, I'll put an all-copper pot together :)

by **crow** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 12:34 pm

Mines 2" and its pretty damn fast , say 1 and 1/2 hrs go to whoa on a 50 keg but 3" would be considerably better :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **MacStill** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 1:00 pm

sam_and_liv wrote:Welcome bud, if that's your real name you might want to PM Macstill to change it!

No!

I'm getting tired of everyone wanting name changes, the name you sign up with is what you get :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **Zak Griffin** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 3:27 pm

It's not my real name, I'm not that stupid... Just an alias that I came up with when I was a kid.

What I build my pot head out of will depend entirely on what I find, I'd say... If I come across another length of 3" stuff, I'll make it out of that. Will see how I go.

I'll have a proper scrounge around the farm one day and stockpile all of my copper... I wouldn't be surprised if I find 3 or 4 copper water heaters. Might be able to come to some sort of trade agreement for some supplies that I can't find around here.

by **MacStill** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 3:31 pm

Zak Griffin wrote:It's not my real name, I'm not that stupid... Just an alias that I came up with when I was a kid.

Excellent, and welcome aboard :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **Kimbo** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 3:32 pm

Welcome to the forum Zak :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **Zak Griffin** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 4:45 pm

Sorry to anyone in SA who distills who is actually called Zak Griffin...

by **Potmash Boka** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 4:58 pm

Welcome Dude, read,read and read some more. I'm in the process of building a 4" played column and a 4" pot for stripping and rum, I've seen guys use 1" pots and they produce some really good stuff

by **Sam.** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 6:50 pm

Had to ask, there has been numerous occasions of people posting personal info :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Interested to see now if there is a Zak Griffin in SA :think: :laughing-rolling:

by **Zak Griffin** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 6:59 pm

https://www.facebook.com/zak.griffin.509?fref=ts

Sorry buddy! haha

by **Sam.** » Tue Jul 16, 2013 7:05 pm

Meh, he rides a toy horse, 1 2 3 :laughing-rolling:

by **Zak Griffin** » Wed Jul 17, 2013 10:16 pm

Pretty successful day today! Found a keg for my boiler at the dump, along with a couple of bits of random copper... A length of soft 3/8 pipe, and what looks like a really old aerosol can, made out of copper... About 2.5" diameter and 20cm long. I'll get some pics tomorrow.