by karrotbear » Tue Aug 06, 2013 1:43 pm
I have been pondering the same thing (about police rocking up).
Back in the day when I went to the HBS to first explore stilling, I asked about the trusty T500 and its associated 25l boiler. They guy said that you can claim that the boiler is a crab pot, and then have a 4l stock pot somewhere that can fit the T500. Would you be able to get away with that (iff you had no home distilled alch anywhere on your property) and just say you use it for water?
When it comes to our hobby type stills (home made) we all pretty much have a 50L boiler (probably a keg) and then the 2" pot/vm/bubbler connecting onto it. Is there anyway that you could say the keg is for mashing/fermenting - even though you have the 2" ferrules welded onto the side for heaters - and then just have your 4l pot off to the side. And when they point out that it can fit onto the keg (triclamp connection) you play dumb and say 'oh wow, never thought of that'. Is there anyway for them to prove, if your modular still was completely dismantled, that the still was used on the 50L boiler and not the 4l pot?
When it says that the still cannot have a capacity of more than 5L, it alludes that the still is the complete package. What if you are caught with a still head (be it a bubbler/vm/pot WITHOUT a boiler) is it still classified as a still? What about a (somewhat very simple) continuous still sitting on a 4l pot, is it still a 4l capacity (seeing as that is how much the pot can hold) or can they say it has an infinite capacity?
tl;dr - Still head without a boiler still a still?