Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

Pulled the bottom plate off the T500 boiler to check out the thermal cutoff switch and thought someone might find a gut-shot useful so here it is.

Interestingly it uses 2 separate elements wired in parallel. The inner one is one is 800 watts, the outer one is 1200 watts.



Cheers,
Prof. Green

Thanks for putting that up Prof. Green :handgestures-thumbupleft: . Very helpful.
Cheers.

fishingbrad wrote:Thanks for putting that up Prof. Green :handgestures-thumbupleft: . Very helpful.
Cheers.

+1 thanks for the info..

makes you wonder this :think:

Not sure but have i seen a switch on the new T500 boilers? mine turns on/off from the power-point.

being 800W and 1200W they should ave 2 switches on the boiler. one for each element.

What i mean is if you want to use 800W for a pot spirit run you can switch on 800W element and have the 1200W switched off, and as the run progresses switch the 800W off and the 1200W on.
and for stripping have both switched on


Just seems like the best solution to me, a switch for each element ;-)


come on Still Spirits what are you doing :violence-smack:

Would be easy enough to install a couple so long as you can get some heat resistant cable. Not sure of the t500 base but I'm assuming its just a simple plastic stand. Drill 2 holes, attach toggle switches, put live feeder wires through switches.
Bit of ginning around but if you don't have a power controller you would have 3 settings. 2000, 1200 and 800 watts. Not too shabby at all and probably easier and simpler to install than even a simple (safe) power controller.

warramungas wrote:Would be easy enough to install a couple so long as you can get some heat resistant cable. Not sure of the t500 base but I'm assuming its just a simple plastic stand. Drill 2 holes, attach toggle switches, put live feeder wires through switches.
Bit of ginning around but if you don't have a power controller you would have 3 settings. 2000, 1200 and 800 watts. Not too shabby at all and probably easier and simpler to install than even a simple (safe) power controller.

thats what i was thinking, cheap and easy as long as you know what your doing.

That was my first thought when I opened the base and found the two parallel elements.

Mine has a power switch with a light in it. The light stays on even when the thermal cut-out trips. :angry-banghead:

It would be fairly simple for a sparky to disconnect the elements from each other and wire them independently with a waterproof switch for each one.

The base of the boiler is just plastic so it would be easy enough to fit the extra switch or switches near the main switch.

Cheers,
Prof. Green.

I realise this is an old thread but looking for some advice, have looked at the elements on my T500. I have a 1500w and a 500w element, would the 500w be enough to run a 23l wash through a pot still or will I neeed the 1500w?

I run my 1" 5-6l pot at 500w or so on a spirit run
Get a power controller :handgestures-thumbupleft:

:text-+1: on a power controller. They're not expensive and you'll get much better control over your run.

:text-+1:
I’m using one of those 25-30l boilers. At under $45 for the power controller it’s a no brainer really. I reckon a couple of switches, wire, sparky labour etc. would be well over that price. I’m finding that with the small boiler subtle tweaks are required during the run to keep the pot or reflux gurgling along nicely. Just having two or three power settings is not really enough to get the balance that you want. The same power controller is used on a 5l boiler for gin runs resulting in a win- win.

I did a 10l cleaning run with the reflux head and the 1500w element only. I was trying to do a slower run and took 5 hours.
Thanks guys for the advice, I have read about controllers on the forum and will look for hints on what to buy.
When running a controller do I adjust it on how big the output stream is?

Forgot to mention, mates a sparky so he checked the elements out for me.

Yeah when running a pot still the slower you go the less smearing there will be. It's a balance between being patient and getting the run done in the time you have available. Run too fast and heads and tails blur all the way through hearts. Most members with pot stills will be able to tell you how fast they run theirs. Perhaps someone else will be able to chime in with advice for running the t500 with the pot still attachment.

I’m using the same controller that the 5 Star Store sells. By winding back the power, the output stream is controlled. There is a slight delay before you see a change in the output. My boiler has a 2000W element so when using the controller I run flat out until I’m just about up to temperature. I then wind the controller back to reduce the output to get a slow collection of Foreshots. (Stripping run on the pot still) The controller is then wound up to collect the low wines as quickly as possible. On a spirit run using the reflux still, the element is usually run between 60v and 80v during the run (voltage readout on the controller) which equates to somewhere between 500 to 670W. I run heads slowly and tails quickly.

Hi Les
I have run the pot for the stripping runs (23l in 2hrs) for 5 generations of a CFW now ready to start a spirit run. I thought I would run slow through the pot to keep as much flavour as possible. You mention using the reflux still for the spirit run, would I lose flavour using the reflux still on the T500.

Squid boy wrote:would I lose flavour using the reflux still on the T500.

Yes, you'd strip all flavour.

I did a short run on the pot still trying the 1500w & 500w elements separately. The 500w did not have enough heat to run even with the water cut well back, the 1500w element with water full on ran well but I would like to try to slow the off take more. Will have to make the time to source a controller as sugggested to let me play with the off take rate.

Look no further:
https://www.5stardistilling.com.au/prod ... r-kegland/

Thanks Stig, order is in. Will have a bit of a play and learn to use it now.