Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

For the first time last weekend, I tried to run my T500 outside, connected to the garden hose. Complete disaster!!
I had been to almost every plumber in town to find an adaptor to connect the standard T500 needle valve to the garden tap, but no luck at all. So ended up putting a few bits and pieces together and using a small type of gate valve. Totally useless - absolutely could not refine the water flow accurately enough to maintain temperatures etc etc.
.
So......I'm wondering.....has anyone here managed to find a foolproof way of either:
1 - connecting the standard valve to a garden tap, or
2 - putting together some other pieces that allow sufficient control over the water flow??

Hi Nudder,

Not sure how much you have used the T500 so sorry in advance if I’m telling you how to suck eggs.

The T500 does not need a lot of pressure from the tap, if you are having trouble with the hose leaking excessively I’d suggest Turing the pressure down (maybe only half to three quarters of a turn on)

Biggest issue I found with the T500 is that it’s very sensitive to pressure fluctuations like someone else in the house flushing the loo or using another tap.

The manufacturer of the T500 also sell a flow control which has a small pump, tank , float and needle valve which worked really well for me. (Approx $80 from memory, can get from local HBS)

I used to distill outside with the T500 and even if a bit of wind picked up it would change the flow rate,
so in colder times of the year I would insulate the column.

Hope this helps.

Cheers

HG

hgwells wrote:The manufacturer of the T500 also sell a flow control which has a small pump, tank , float and needle valve which worked really well for me. (Approx $80 from memory, can get from local HBS)

I used to distill outside with the T500 and even if a bit of wind picked up it would change the flow rate,
so in colder times of the year I would insulate the column.

HG

Thanks. Coincidentally, it was very blustery outside last weekend, and I did wonder if that was having any effect.
I'll look into the flow control system.....any idea if it will connect to a garden outlet, or does it have the same tap fitting as the standard flow valve?

Comes with some plastic tubing, clamps and a hose fitting, I’ve bastardised mine a bit, but you should get the idea with the pic

Thanks for that

A Flow control system will prevent pressure variation from the tap but will not stop the effects of wind in my experience. A woollen blanket (non meltable material) around the base of the column and around boiler will do that.