soooo
i have been running my still for a long time by output abv and had a really good result to the end product
its a 50l boiler usually charged with approx 37 ltrs of 30% stripped ffv
3" colum 1.5 m packed tight with scrubbers the last 200mm is copper mesh
vm head with butterfly vavle just cracked
power is 2.4kw the whole run
abv is 95% solid
now the temp entering the pc is 80deg and the end of the run is 82deg.. is this a real no no ??? the product had no smell was very neutral and 95% for 90% of the run and had a nice wheat tone to it. no burn at all . so i would say that's good.
however the temp worried me so i put another probe in the take off tube 4" before the pc and after the butterfly valve and put another run through the still
strait away i had to put the scr on to the still and wind back power it settled down to 78.3 deg and stayed there rock solid through the whole run till tails but late into tails is when it climbed . out put always reduces before my temp goes up during the end of the run.
now the interesting part the abv was 92% and i was runing the still slower than ever before and i could not improve the abv evon runnig slower did nothing to it .
the product has a smell to it right through the run and there is burn to taste in all jars collected . like heads the whole way??
i might get a pic of my still so you can see design but here is the layout
50l keg 2400w element 4" outlet . column is 3" 1.5m long scrubbers packed 4" reduced to 3" . t-piece has temp gauge in middle of t . on top of t is 7" r/c then open top . side of t is butterfly valve and p/c ....
this is so hard to explain but i feel as though i have no issues running the still with higher temps based on collection rate and quality of product being abv 95-96% taste quality