Small benchtop still

[C2H6O]

Have a couple of mates that have been looking at the t500, because of its size. Was thinking i have enough scrap in the shed to throw something like this together, my thoughts are make a
1)600mm packed section CM style still with a shotgun reflux and a liebig condenser
or
2)600mm packed section Boka with single wound coil with cold finger

Understand that both of these will not run beautifully, but it comes down to the parts i've got..

Its not for me to drink but will help me by preserving my special drop.
So what are your views option 1 or 2? Will either of these rival the output of a t500?

Cheers

[northernbrewer]

Have you looked into spp packing. I have read somewhere that guys running it find they can make do with shorter columns in comparison to other types of packing

[ENTITY77]

The T500 uses a cold finger style condenser. It sucks in that it is easily overwhelmed with higher vapor volumes such as with spirit runs or if you try to condense higher temperatures vapor.
On the flip side the cold finger design isolates the coolant better from the column which gives you finer control of the vapor fractions that get condensed.

Kinda hard to understand unless you have played with the designs. I modified my T500 by using a copper cap to replace the plastic top cap and joining that to a copper liegig condenser. Result was that I was able to condense greater vapor volumes but I had to run the reflux water output at 5 degrees hotter with absolute minimal water flow in the PC before any distillate got through to the PC as heat was being drawn from the feed tube resulting in the lowest temp vapor being condensed in the feed tube and running back into the column.

Work around would be to add an angle to the feed tube so the lower temp vapor distillate runs into the condenser rather than back into the column and increase the feed tube length to buffer the condensers cooling effect some what.

The leibig design will add some versatility to the still if done right.

[C2H6O]

Cheers Northern that packing looks pretty cool, might have to give it a look depending on the outcome.

Entity77 I saw the mods you made to you t500, looked pretty cool, has to be better than the plastic top they provide.. I have read a lot that people are able to get a consistent 95% out of the t500, if i could achieve this for the lads it would be a win.
Thanks heaps for the advice mate, i appreciate the input.

[SBB]

Ive ran a T500 a fair bit when I first kicked off with distilling, here are a few of my thoughts on your first option, 1)600mm packed section CM style still with a shotgun reflux and a liebig condenser
Ages ago ( pre Bubbler) ,I thought about a similar thing, I was going to try and make a bigger better version of the T500, but not that much bigger. Something that would still sit comfortably on the original T500 boiler.
Dunno really were to start but anyway , ill have a crack.
For starters T500's are not perfect, but for what they are and for such a short column they do pretty well.
In my opinion anyone whose claiming a consistent 95% out of one needs to learn how to temp correct their spirit ABV or buy a new alcometer.
92% -93 is about as good as it gets, you might get high 93's if you run it it really really Slowwwwwwwwwww!

Ok so just incase you've never seen inside a T500 here are a couple of photos.
Note the size of the reflux condenser, not real big is it, it wouldn't be hard build something better would it? Without going to the trouble of a shotty type condenser
It amazes me that you can get full reflux with them, but you can and they do it well.



My feeling is that if you knocked up something similar to the T500, with a slightly longer column, and a small liebig to cool the product you'd have something at least as good as a T500 and probably a tad better, bare in mind that CM's are said to be fiddly buggers to run, A cheap Bronze/ brass needle valve to adjust water to the reflux condenser will help make it less fiddly.
What boiler do you intend running this on if you do go ahead with the Idea??

The T500 uses a cold finger style condenser. It sucks in that it is easily overwhelmed with higher vapor volumes such as with spirit runs or if you try to condense higher temperatures vapor.

Ive run mine with a boiler full of low wines at 40% and with straight washes at around 10-12% and never had any problem with either reflux or product condenser being overwhelmed.

[C2H6O]

Hey SBB, appreciate the in depth answer mate.
Firstly the boiler will most likely be something like the T500 boiler, maybe a modified urn.
There really is not much to those rigs is there? This is what has got me thinking that I could put something similar together with scrap from the garage.
Guess the reason I was thinking shorty was because I've never made one, but hey I might save that for a bubbler..

Do you think that a CM will have a benifit over a boka?
Both will be easy to make I was just thinking that the boka might be better to extend in the future, or is there a reason why a small boka would suck?

[Redux]

isnt a vm faster.... bokas are notoriously slow....

[SBB]

Guess the reason I was thinking shorty was because I've never made one,

I was just trying to save you a bit of work and materials, as you can see you dont need much, even a rough reflux coil or a small cold finger has gotta be better than what the T500 has.

Do you think that a CM will have a benifit over a boka?

Mate Im only a hack when it comes to reflux stills, their are a heap of blokes here that know a shit load more than me about them.
On a short column I dunno which would be best. I just put the idea out there cause Ive always thought about building one that way, just for the hell of it, just to see what can be achieved I guess.
CM reflux stills have always got a bad wrap for being fiddly to run, that's why most don't like them, personally I think they have a lot of potential.
I'm pretty sure they got the bad rep in days gone by when people didn't have easy access to needle valves to control water flow to the reflux coil.
From what Ive read they do one thing better than a lot of the other reflux's, and that is keep tails back till the very end.

[C2H6O]

Thats some great food for thought there mate. Makes you think there has to be some reason why the T500 design has persisted.. Will think it over but making a bigger T500 clone could be interesting.

Cheete

[huggy_b]

Thats some great food for thought there mate. Makes you think there has to be some reason why the T500 design has persisted.. Will think it over but making a bigger T500 clone could be interesting.

Cheete

If you get to the point you can't be bothered, I'll be offloading my 2 x T500's in the next week or so (reflux and alembic pot) if your mates are interested.

[C2H6O]

Thanks for the offer mate, will ask and let you know via PM.

Cheers

[ENTITY77]

The T500 uses a cold finger style condenser. It sucks in that it is easily overwhelmed with higher vapor volumes such as with spirit runs or if you try to condense higher temperatures vapor.

Ive run mine with a boiler full of low wines at 40% and with straight washes at around 10-12% and never had any problem with either reflux or product condenser being overwhelmed.

Yeah I should clarify that statement lol.

In was talking about the T500 condensers operation on its own without the refluxer running. If your going to all the trouble of making a reflux still you might as well build some versatility into it and make it capable of a pot style operation I reckon.

[crow]

This is the double wound dimroth or helix coil out of a hubs Ultra Pure still. With minimum water flowing through it it will knock down any amount of vapour you can push through a 2" column :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[Stoney]

why is everyone so addicted to 2 inch columns ?
mines only 33mm ID (air conditioning size) and 62cm packed and so far have got great results. alcometer says its 96.5 but decided its out by up to 2%.
I could fit a 2.5 or 3" section to the top to make a boka with a total height of maybe a metre. hard to get any sort of fittings for this size though.
made it with no T pieces however so zero cost having it offset and its a little shorter than an equivalent boka. not as robust either but its survived a few falling overs onto concrete with no breakage.

[Zak Griffin]

So your 33mm column clamps straight up to a standard keg?

[Yummyrum]

why is everyone so addicted to 2 inch columns ?
mines only 33mm ID (air conditioning size) and 62cm packed and so far have got great results. alcometer says its 96.5 but decided its out by up to 2%.
I could fit a 2.5 or 3" section to the top to make a boka with a total height of maybe a metre. hard to get any sort of fittings for this size though.
made it with no T pieces however so zero cost having it offset and its a little shorter than an equivalent boka. not as robust either but its survived a few falling overs onto concrete with no breakage.

Agree with you that there are all sorts of sizes that could be pressed into service .....but some constructors aren't as creative as you when it comes to joining it all up .A standard size makes getting fittings much less hassle....and as Zac said, there's the boiler connectivity issues as well.Either just solder an easy flange straight on or use ferrule and coupler ...having said that ,I've bashed an easy flange on the end of 1/12" to fit a keg so it wouldn't be imposable to stretch it a little more

Also 2" will let you run much faster than the smaller sizes before it floods , ....an important consideration when carving 2-3 hours of a 10 -12 hour run

[Stoney]

So your 33mm column clamps straight up to a standard keg?

nope, but its only one connection. I will be modding it for a triclamp this week I hope if mine arrives from bangladesh or upper iceland, wherever its on a slow boat from.
will let you know how it goes.
only mentioned smaller column as this thread is called 'small bench top still' and it just seems to be still 2 inch but a shorter column, why not go a narrower and shorter column and keep the reflux ratio.
I assumed a keg doesn't even come into the equation on a bench top jobbie. so its going to be a custom fitting anyway.

[Sam.]

why not go a narrower and shorter column and keep the reflux ratio.

Because the less diameter means it's going to be slower to run. Fine if you want to take all day for a run but I ain't got notime for that ;-)

[Yummyrum]

only mentioned smaller column as this thread is called 'small bench top still' and it just seems to be still 2 inch but a shorter column, why not go a narrower and shorter column and keep the reflux ratio.

Yes a shorter column will need more reflux ratio to obtain the same high ABV output as a longer column...I think you are missing the point about reflux ratio though .It has nothing to do with length /diameter ratios .

Reflux ratio is the ratio of how much condensed vapour drips back down through the packing verses how much is drawn off through the valve .

Because you require much more reflux in a shorter column ,then there will be much more vapour and liquid in the packing and therefore a larger diameter column will be better suited .

If you used a small diameter column then it would flood quicker so you wouldn't be able to run with such a high reflux ratio and therefore you would have low ABV.

I guess it's all about matching boiler power to column diameter

[Stoney]

yeh sorry, got my terminologys mixed up.
i meant amount of refluxing, plate ratio is it ? quality of vapour.

I get that a larger column will give you more vapour so if you ran the same output you get a larger reflux ratio. there is a trade off between maximum column height and quality though.

then, like you say, how many watts has this 'small benchtop still' got feeding it and whats the total volume being heated as thats going to determine how much eth is present and thus, how long the run takes. power limitations determining ideal column diameter.
how long would it typically take you guys to clear 20l of 9/10% wash to 95% ?

how long is a piece of string though.

not interested in making a small pot still as I want to make some ouzo, with herbs in the wash, say starting with 5l of 40%.
recipe may need adjusting so several small runs woukd be the go. certainly don't want to make a dozen bottles first attempt.

so researching smaller designs but the column size thing is making me curious.