stilllearning's Glasser Build

[Doubleuj]

Awesome mate :handgestures-thumbupleft:
How do you test for water tight with out the inlet/ outlet hoses?

[stilllearning]

I made sure everything was dry, then filled it up to the brim with water through one of the inlets, blocked one with my finger then blew as hard as I could into the other... didn't leak a drop as far as I could see.

Probably not as good a test as mains pressure running through it but my gate valve will be before the condenser so it should never see much pressure anyway.

[Doubleuj]

Ah I see, said the blind man to his deaf son, she's going to be an amazing rig mate, well done. :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[rumdidlydum]

You may want to test it on mains when you get the ports done. The gate valve won't reduce pressure to your rc it will only reduce the flow.

Nice work tho mate you make it look real easy. I definitely need to try soft solder :O)

[Doubleuj]

Nice work tho mate you make it look real easy. I definitely need to try soft solder :O)

:laughing-rolling: it's not that easy for mere mortals like us rum :laughing-rolling:

[scythe]

Yeah thats what i thought about my RC, mains pressure might burst your bubble tho.
Good luck tho.

I found that when trying to rework the job you need to put a fair amount of heat back into it to get the solder to flow again, it is almost easier to do it all in one go.

[stilllearning]

Managed to sneak in a little work tonight before bed -

Soldered on my threaded ports, everything went fairly well, I discovered that solder is a little shy when it comes to taking to brass. The end result looks like hell, but I can always grind that up a bit to get rid of the excess. The left port in the photo looks like it hasn't taken to the solder at all - but it definately did, just a bit of a shadow / optical illusion in the photo.

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I reckon using MAPP is miles better than butane for this kind of work, I would have thought that more heat would mean more chance of effecting surrounding solder but with MAPP you seem to be able to work quickly and when you get the joint up to temperature you can just feather the flame off and on to get the job done. When I was using butane earlier in the build, you need to really hold the flame in there for ages to get enough heat for the solder to flow, and the heat seems to have time to spread around the copper and effect everything around it. I was literally soldering about 3mm away from the joint between the 4" and the end plate, and the solder there didn't seem to melt even with fresh stuff going on so close to it.
I really doubt I would have had this much success using butane now that I've had a chance to compare the two.

Dummied up my cooling lines, the dangling lines to the right are obviously for the PC later on.

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I wanted both the main lines in a straight line down, one behind the other, to almost give the illusion of it being a single line. The trade-off is that the top T piece is tilted back about 15 degrees so the water out line can slip past behind the other.

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[woodduck]

Nice build mate, coming together nicely :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Glad to hear your having such good success with the soldering.

Won't be long now

[Dig Brinker]

Nice work, SL :handgestures-thumbupleft:
You should be right with the cooling water tubes, will only need minimal heat to get them stuck in there. I have the same amount of tubes in my RC but didn't worry about a baffle plate. Sort of directed the water flow to where it looked like it would create flow & turbulence around the vapour tubes. Seems to hold the same temp throughout, no hot spots at all. I'm using a gate valve on mine, and you need bugger all water through it to hold reflux and the tiniest adjustments to change.
Keep up the great work :O)

[WTDist]

Nice work, i found map better too. used to use propane and like you said heat travels along the whole job before the spot is hot, map keeps it more located quicker :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[googe]

Looking good mate :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[stilllearning]

Managed to "reach the summit" today, got the reducer and top bends all made up. Had a fair bit of trouble getting everything squared up but it ended up near-perfect after a bit of fiddling.

Cleaned up the RC ends with a Josco coarse flap disc, came up pretty nice, no holes. Put some garden hose fittings on and tested it with the tap full pelt - still no leaks so pretty happy. Flushing it dislodged a fair amount of solder dags from inside, spent a good 10 minutes shaking the shit out of it to get them all to fall out.

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Made up the reducer and top bends, the tri-clamp is just sitting there for the moment. I found it easier to make this as one part so I could square it up against the top of the table (just the two elbows and the 2" in between). Then I soldered the "neck" and reducer in one hit, with the other side propped up to keep it all level. I'll cut it in half down the track and put on easy flanges.

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Cut the 2" for the PC ready for next weekend, and test fitted the plumbing with some cable ties to see how it all looks. Pretty happy.

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Total height now is almost exactly 2400mm. Pretty tall but again I doubt I'll run it at full size that often, I'll have a play with various setups to see what works best down the track. I can reach the top from the ground, but it's been hard to measure and mark stuff so I've been using the milk crate as a stool. I'll probably make a nice little hardwood step later on to go with it.

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Hoping to get this thing wrapped up within the next 4 weeks, next weekend will be the PC.

[SJC]

Rig looks unreal mate :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[Dig Brinker]

If I do another 18 tube RC I'm doing the end plates that way. Great job :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[stilllearning]

If I do another 18 tube RC I'm doing the end plates that way. Great job :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Yep, they were a little experimental but worked fine in the end. A hammered-down easy flange made from 1/4" is roughly 2mm thick, I used 2mm plate, so just seemed to make sense to cut the end plate wider and simplify the whole lot. Was worried that they wouldn't pull tight and seal in a tri-clamp but seem rock solid so far, we'll see in a little while if they are watertight.

[WTDist]

Never mind this post...., my answer was answered in the last post

[stilllearning]

PC all done this weekend, I used pretty much the same method as I did for the RC, soldered on the combined end plate/ferrule, drilled out the water holes, fed in the vapour tubes, dry fitted the other end plate, soldered in the vapour tubes at the flange end then soldered the entire other end in one hit. Water fittings went on last.
Had a little more trouble getting good solder joins around the vapour tubes this time, some of it was done with the PC lying on it's side so obviously gravity was not my friend.
In the end, mains pressure tested, no leaks, good to go. The end with no flange will be getting a reducer later on this week, hopefully I don't stuff the vapour tube solder when that goes on...

Finished the top easy flange, and the flange for the PC.

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PC, with ends cleaned up. 4" over 4 x 1/2" vapour tubes.

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For some reason the PC "swings" a little from the easy flange, as in it is not pulling tight on one side. The tri-clamp wingnut doesn't seem to be seated properly either. I think this is because of a solder dag somewhere in/around the joint messing with things, I'll file it all up next weekend and see if it comes good.

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Even though I checked and checked all my measurements for this one, I still somehow ended up about 10mm too far away on my water in connection, This is with the braided hose pulled firm - any tighter and it will kink at the higher connection. I think when I set it all out I forgot to allow for lap in the threaded connections. I'll grab some all-thread and replace the joiner to make it that little bit longer.

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All in all, another good day. Had a few little drama's but I was getting a bit too keen and rushing some of it. Next weekend: 1/2" extensions to bench height and parrot.

[Zak Griffin]

Love the work you've put into the cooling lines mate, it'll really set this one apart :handgestures-thumbupleft:

[stilllearning]

Got a quick bit of soldering in tonight;
Finished off the bottom end of the PC with a 50mm coupler, 2"x3/4" reducer then a 3/4"x1/2" reducer.

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I'm planning on running 1/2" into my parrot, with a 1/4" vent pipe, with the body of the parrot 3/4". Will this be wide enough for an alcometer without the liquid pushing it up? It just "feels" a bit too small :think:

Another side note: the swinging issue I'm having with the PC - as in the tri-clamp is not pulling tight at the top of the PC - seems to be because the flange is not thick enough. My dual end plate / flange trick seemed to work fine on the 4" fittings - they are rock hard and do not have any play in them at all, but on the smaller 2" fitting there is definitely not enough meat for the clamp to pull down on. Seems I've shot myself in the foot a little on that one. I'm going to make 1/4" easy flange, bash it flat then solder it hard up against the plate flange that I've already got to get the thickness up. Lucky there is only one of these in the whole project to fix up.

[scythe]

1" is the recommended parrot body size.

Why make a full flange, why not just cut a circle out and solder it on.
Does not even have to be on the face, could solder it to the back and it will work jist the same.