The elusive Plated all-rounder

[crow]

Ok we did a little experiment with a five plater and a sugar wash. The aim was to get dead neutral azeotropic ethanol with the smallest amount of expense or effort at the speed of a normal plate run. Did it :D :dance: the ethanol was 95.5 and devoid of any flavour at all, even the normal slightly sweet flavour associated with ethanol was undetectable and all with the simplest little mod. I'll post some pictures and explanations soon

[kelbygreen]

please do! man this is great news haha, my dream rig just got better :D

[emptyglass]

So I guess your going to make some outrageous claim that this was done from a possibly incomplete ferment, sloshed around in the back of a car for a while, and treated with neglect.

:banana-gotpics:

[crow]

let not brag but yes :D

[emptyglass]

:text-worthless:

[crow]

yeah, yeah phone is charging

[emptyglass]

Yeah, thats what they all say. 8-)

[bt1]

Come on my new 6 perf plate beast!

95abv...temp corrected i take it?...it's over the the max but then I've got 2 pts diff in between 2 alco meters same brand, batch etc...work that out???

I've a country trip this week around 1500km any one got a wash ready?

bt1

[Aussiedownunder01]

:text-worthless:

Its a great looking rig

[crow]

No bt1 (hell opening myself up for a kicking here) its showing around the 96 mark at temp temp correct everthing from 4 different hydrometers (3 diff brands) I no not possible but MR got the same result and couldn't explain it) so lets call it 95.63 azeotropic ethanol to save the condemnation . Anyway the fact is this ethanol is without any character or flavour what so ever so pure laboratory grade ethanol in my view . I expect good results but not quite to this extent

[MacStill]

:text-worthless:

:text-imwithstupid:

[crow]

Ok phone was flat and the charger wasn't switched on :roll:
So this is what we did: We took a 600mm long 4' section with a prorated plat in the bottom and fill it with some very porous volcanic stone 2/3 then filled the rest to around 100mm from the top with finer scoria and attached this to a normal perforated 5 plate 4' column and ran it like you would a normal plate run. it didn't run quite the same as a 5 plate (EG can elaborate) but the results were nothing short of astounding . This could be the way forward for obtaining this type of product from this type of still. Once set up this process of adding or removing this section would take less than 2 min and the cost of this packed section would be negligible. The product the came out is not like anything I have ever achieved or have seen anyone else achieve for that matter, it would be very versatile due to the complete neutrality of it. had it to soft drink and it tastes like, well soft drink you sort of feel a bit of a kick but hell ya can't taste it

[MacStill]

Similar results have been had with a very short column extension packed with scrubbers :handgestures-thumbupleft:

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=365&start=840#p28276

It would be great if it's all that's needed to get a spot on neutral from these things.

[crow]

Yes I know ppl here and at HD were getting dangerously close with scrubbers and spp packing but it always seemed just shy of the mark. Mash rookie on HD has been doing different experiments with volcanic stone and his results were beyond astounding. I wonted to try this with just a section and with coking coal but really see no need now as the very best result could only equal it . The trick is going to be finding out how short this packing can be while still maintaining the same purity and what product will allow the shortest refluxing section. I'm starting to think that these stones with their enormous surface area are increasing the theoretical plates by many many times as well as micro filtering resulting in a very slightly higher than azeotrope reading around the 96% mark
Just that some well understood laws of physics seen to be being defied here meaning either all 4 hydrometers are reading wrong or several thermometers or there was some sort of vacuum,not really likely or that the packing was involved in some very fine filtering and this seems most likely

[MacStill]

I wasnt saying anyone was first mate, just pointing out I like the idea :handgestures-thumbupleft:

I'm trying not to get too involved lately as everything I do and say is under scrutiny from others, even though they've mass produced my innovations and call them their own, then flog em off to you guys with 300% mark up :laughing-rolling:

[olddog]

even though they've mass produced my innovations and call them their own

I know the feeling well.

OD

[MacStill]

even though they've mass produced my innovations and call them their own

I know the feeling well.

OD

Perhaps I should've said "our" innovations, as it's not just us mate ;-)

[emptyglass]

It ran no problems, the only difference was the bubbling action was a bit harder, guessing with the extra resistance from the packed section. A thermo just under the reflux condenser would be handy, as mine are fitted to the top of the column, not the condenser itself.

I gotta say, it did make a nice drop. I was pleasantly surprised at how such a simple mod worked.

What might be nice to try would be a short plated column section (similar to kimbos set up in the link above) with a longer packed section, say 800-900mm. Then you would have a flavored still, and with a simple packed section have a neutral maker. Possibly a more price effective way to go....

[crow]

:handgestures-thumbupleft: yeah that's why I wouldn't have minded if we had of left the 3 plate rum configuration you had and ran the whole 600mm packed, can feel a new experiment coming on ;-)

[emptyglass]

I need a few more runs under the belt with the 3 plate setup to see if I'm happy with that one, output was not as stable as I'd like.

I think for every cut in plate numbers/packing, there will be a drop in quality. Its just a case of finding how few plates and how little packing will do the job. There's probably a calculator out there that can work it out, but...