Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

has anybody had any experiance with running a form of helix/grahams condenser on a pot still
building a stripping 3" pot still, cant decide what form of condenser to build, so many options and so many reasons either way
but space is a restriction i want to put on myself, dont want a big metre long liebeg

How about a shotgun at around 400mm? Lots more knockdown power than a grahme of same length..

Like bluc suggested, I personally had plenty of discussion with professional still builder who advised me a vertical shotgun wins hands down on a pot still. Due to my pot still design I went with 3" shotgun hanging at 45 degrees from the expansion chamber above the pot :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Seems to be a bit out there saying shotguns at 45deg don't work, deffently the easy option would be a shotgun if they do work on angle

Fireplace01 wrote:Seems to be a bit out there saying shotguns at 45deg don't work, deffently the easy option would be a shotgun if they do work on angle

What's the logic behind it not working on an angle? :think:

Fireplace01 wrote:Seems to be a bit out there saying shotguns at 45deg don't work, deffently the easy option would be a shotgun if they do work on angle

I seen mine running and it was knockin down vapour and running like a tap, they definitely work :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Also fireplace if you plan to have a 45 degree set up you can see for yourself, I know it's a bullsh#t TV show but check out that 50 gallon still that Chico runs. I actually knew the bloke who built it and watched a run video after it was made long before it turned up on tv, It ran perfectly fast or slow depending on the amount of gas they threw at it. Surprisingly the alcohol % was very high, not as high as the bubblers but that's a whole other thing not related to the condenser :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Fireplace01 wrote:Seems to be a bit out there saying shotguns at 45deg don't work, deffently the easy option would be a shotgun if they do work on angle

I think it's not so much that they don't work, it's just on an angle there is a place where liquid can pool at the upper end plate. Possibly causing a small amount of smearing. Mine is vertical but I wouldn't have any problem with using it on an angle

Guessing this is that moonshinners program?
The theory being that syphoning inside the cooling chamber can occur, creating pressure and no or bugger all cooling flow, but then that's industrial chemistry, water tends to follow the pipes rather then stick to the pool
But if people do it with home stills, I am sweet, just hadn't been able to find anything on people running on angles
Cheers folks this place is a wealth of knowledge

Are you talking what is happening in the cooling water side and not the alcohol side of that?

Also yeah, if your talking industrial type equipment such as refining etc then all the shit that doesn't matter too much at hobby level does matter a great deal.

There's not going to be any pooling at the top plate because the product is still vapour at then top of the PC...

Zak Griffin wrote:There's not going to be any pooling at the top plate because the product is still vapour at then top of the PC...

:text-+1:

I run my PC at 45 deg and haven't had any issues.

Also, take a look at the 4" pot picture on the FSD web site...

Cheers,
Prof. Green.

Fireplace01 wrote:Guessing this is that moonshinners program?
The theory being that syphoning inside the cooling chamber can occur, creating pressure and no or bugger all cooling flow, but then that's industrial chemistry, water tends to follow the pipes rather then stick to the pool
But if people do it with home stills, I am sweet, just hadn't been able to find anything on people running on angles
Cheers folks this place is a wealth of knowledge

Water should go in at the bottom and out the top. Then you won't have this problem no matter what angle your condenser is on

Zak Griffin wrote:There's not going to be any pooling at the top plate because the product is still vapour at then top of the PC...

There will be pooling to begin with as there is passive reflux all the way through a pot still until the still heats up properly. Any reflux occurring after the highest point in a pot still will form liquid that will trickle down to pool on the top end plate of a shotgun at 45 degrees. This happens though when the foreshots and heads are coming through and since the heads have a higher boiling point than the foreshots then any foreshots condensed at the top of the end plate will boil again. The condenser will eventually reach equilibrium where the top of the condenser is not so cold that it forms a pool but the vapour condenses further down the tubes.
But then the amount of pooling is going to be very little since it will only be the distance between the wall of the still to the first shotgun tube.
I guess the only real difference is that there would be extra smeering of the foreshots throughout the heads.

I have a shotgun PC on a 2" pot still at around 45 degrees - It's about 400mm long, and handles 2400w no problem. Waiting for FSD to restock the 2400w elements to add a second to see if it can handle 4800 in stripping runs.

works well on my pot still with 5Kw up it

Hey P3t3rpan, what's does the valve arrangement you have on your water inlet do?

Minpac wrote:Hey P3t3rpan, what's does the valve arrangement you have on your water inlet do?

Full flow ballvalve and needle valve bypass for the plated column you can see on the bench

here is a better shot of it