An idea for maintaining reflux speed

[LWTCS]

The circuitry works just fine....the issue is will it work better than say a well made VM or some such still.

[crow]

Yes it may or may not . I just wanted to explore how efficiently I could make this LM work . I mean I can achieve azeotrope or near as at 95.5 and could well be 95.63 but towards the end of my hearts the distillation output begins to rapidly slow down and sometime after that the ABV begins to drop . Cool except it has nowhere near depleted the ethanol so that begs the question ,Why . This seems from all reports to be the way most of these stills operate and the only thing I can think that would cause this is the higher temp is effecting the amount of theoretical plates involved in distillate production (drying of packing) . I'm thinking If I can find a way for the whole or most of the column to reflux efficiently this should significantly shorten the operating time and maybe increase the amount of hearts . I could perhaps Increase the amount of hearts by shutting down the outlet and allow the column to regain a full equilibrium but this would be at the expense of time and energy plus at a higher concentration of water ect in the wash may induce puking . I think unless someone can say why this wouldnt work I should maybe try it , shouldn't cost a fortune in parts . Thoughts ppl ? :-D

[LWTCS]

Do it for sure.

[stilly_bugger]

This guy seems to be using a similar setup on a packed column. Maybe not for the same reason, but he's doing it:

http://youtu.be/_RPuANJkUm0?t=1m22s

The relevant segment of video is 1:22 to 3:00.

[crow]

No mate thats the reason he's doing it . LWTC's been quite active on reflux splitting and RLM threads (I've been reading up) . Seems like quite a few guys have come to the same conclusion as me and begun to do some experiments . Seems my plan is not much different from Alex Bokkabob's Reverse Liquid management theory/design but I'm not aware of anyone building it , simple as it is . Anyway I just thought of it as a means to an end but it seems the original designer was already thinking of this from the start except his return comes in 2/3rds up the column (got me fucked why) :?

[Anthoney]

Yes I was wondering if a single plate at the bottom might achieve this

That would be a bubble ball and has worked to do just that for several people now. I'm in the middle of building one myself.