Isolation Build

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Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Sat Apr 25, 2020 7:52 pm

Hang on, I’ll go gab a UJ and coke and be back with you drunks.........
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Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Sat Apr 25, 2020 8:41 pm

Getting so close to finishing and having a few issues got under my skin. Wasn’t gunna walk away and stew on it overnight. Rinsed all components, put the rig back together and got started on fixing the problems. The leaking seal wasn’t an issue when I reassembled the rig, I took a bit more time and made sure they were accurately placed. That worked as they should on the sac run. Bogged up the broken glass with a blob of silicone on the outside of the crack. Thought it would go off during the heat up (which it did) Took some of the weight off the dangling hoses by trying them up with a bit of bungee cord.
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That even worked a treat.
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This modification allowed the RC adjuster to work as intended. Gee I got lucky. Doesn’t always work out that way.

Time for the sac run. Put about 16 litres of 30% into the boiler. Shitty old heads, tails and some foreshots. Fired the girl up and within about 30 minutes she was on the boil. RC Al, you were on the money when you said early in the build that my condenser may not be far enough down below the tee to be fully effective. I started getting a slow drip out from the PC. So that was well spotted. I can cut a bit off the open tube if I need to but there wasn’t much product coming out so I will see if I need to after a few runs. I was also running at 2400W at the time so this may have contributed to this. During the vinegar run, I played a bit with water settings. Decided to start with 1 litre per minute on the RC supply and 2 litres per minute on the PC. After being in full reflux for about 5 minutes, I decided to start taking some product off. Opened the RC one notch and watched what happened. I started getting a good stream of ethanol coming out the spout. Thought it was coming out too quickly but I wanted to see abv and product temps at that rate.
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Wow. I was stoked with that. Talk about lucky. For the next jar, I turned the power down to about 1800W. Ended up with a skinny, slow stream. The PC did an amazing job. Knocked the vapour down and kept the temp consistent throughout the run.
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Checked the next couple of jars and the abv remained consistent.
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No complaints about that. It was starting to get close to dark so I opened her up and got her cranking. Pulled 400mil in 6 minutes (accurately timed and measured) did this for a couple of jars and noticed that the temp had risen to 20 degrees and the abv had dropped to 93%. Checked the waste water temp from the RC. It was warm but no where near the temp that my Pure Distilling reflux would get to. Looks like the coil did a great job. Very pleased with the result after an ordinary start.

Cheers

Les
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Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:05 pm

Sorry should have read 250ml in 6 minutes. Just had a brain fade.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby dans.brew » Sat Apr 25, 2020 10:23 pm

Congrats mate! :clap:
All that hard work and stewing over things was worth it.
Don't stress too much about a few niggles along the way... we all have em. I had a few issues with a leaking pc when i cranked up my bubbler for the first time.
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Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Sun Apr 26, 2020 7:17 am

Cheers Dan.

Back to stillin now. Got about 70l of TFFV to strip through the new pot. Can’t wait to crank it up and put it through its paces. Will report on results when it’s done.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby db1979 » Sun Apr 26, 2020 7:53 am

Fantastic work mate :clap:

No pressure, but I'm really looking forward to your bubbler :D
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Currently having a makeover: 2" x 4 plate solid state bubbler (1" bubble caps, no sight glasses...maybe not for much longer!) on a bain-marie boiler.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Dunnonuthin » Sun Apr 26, 2020 8:14 am

Nice neat work though out that build Lesgold. Good work and thanks for sharing. Got to pull my finger out and start publishing my own build story. I owe it to the forum.
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Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Sun Apr 26, 2020 8:26 am

Can’t wait. Always good to see someone else’s build. It’s enjoyable reading about techniques used, problems encountered and overcome and of course, some copper that’s been manipulated and shaped into something special.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby db1979 » Sun Apr 26, 2020 9:09 am

Dunnonuthin wrote:Got to pull my finger out and start publishing my own build story. I owe it to the forum.

Yep, judging by your avatar you definitely need to post some pics of your build :handgestures-thumbupleft:
db1979
 
Posts: 1760
Joined: Sat Dec 29, 2012 3:47 pm
Location: South of the big smoke in banana bender land.
equipment: Eve - 4" x 4 plate solid state bubbler (sieve plates), 330 mm packed section on a keg boiler with 2 x 2000 W elements.
Currently having a makeover: 2" x 4 plate solid state bubbler (1" bubble caps, no sight glasses...maybe not for much longer!) on a bain-marie boiler.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Mon Apr 27, 2020 6:43 pm

First stripping runs this afternoon. About 75l of TFFV stripped with the new pot. Setup was close to the arm chair so that I could actively watch each stage of the run in comfort.
C2D3ACA2-2712-4536-87EF-AA6ABFD95676.jpeg

Ran both elements for heat up. 4800w warmed things up quickly. Got to the boil in about 37 minutes. Very happy with that. Used the power controller to take off foreshots at a slow rate. Ran between 850 -1100w to get a slow collection. Only ran the bottom element for this run. Hit it with the full 2400w and got a nice stream coming off.
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Turned the water up to about 2.5 l per hour to keep the temp at about 27 degrees. Ended up with 4.8l of low wines @ 55% (corrected) in the first hour. All up the run took 2 hours 40 minutes for 8.4l.
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With the second run, I used both elements and threw 3.7kw at it to see what would happen. The temp rose to about 33 degrees so I turned the water up a bit to hold it to under 30. Wasn’t stressed about that at all as I’m used to higher temperatures than this on my other pot. Abv dropped a little bit but was able to pull 7.4l of low wines in the first hour. The second run was over 25 minutes quicker than the first. Will play with power settings to find out what the system can handle. (Possibly all 4.8kw) Will do this over a few runs to find out where it operates nicely. Stoked with the way it performed. Saved over 3 or 4 hours on what the Pure distilling rig would have taken. Couldn’t fault it in any way. Might go and catch a fish tomorrow and leave the spirit run with the CCVM for a day or so.

Cheers

Les
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Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Wed Apr 29, 2020 11:34 am

Looks like rain coming tomorrow so it’ll be an inside day. Want to do a small spirit run on the low wines collected the other day. A bit concerned about the cracked sight glass on the fill port. Little bits of glass are breaking off so there is a chance it won’t hold a seal over a long run. Ordered a stainless cap from Andrew but with the way the post is running, it could be a week or two before it arrives. Decided to make up a temporary copper one out of some old flat copper and some 1/4” tube I had left over. Didn’t have any 4” copper to form the ring so I had to cut a piece of timber to a circle and form the ring around that. Put some 1/4” in through the cap for a temperature probe. It’ll be handy for watching wash temp as it heats up.
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Was happy with the way it finished up. It fits and seals well.
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Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Andrew » Wed Apr 29, 2020 12:05 pm

Sorry Les, the postal gods are against us at this point and your cap is still in QLD
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Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Wed Apr 29, 2020 12:16 pm

All good Andrew. That’s something that you have no control over. I know that you do everything extremely efficiently at your end. It will get here eventually.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Wed Apr 29, 2020 3:19 pm

Sorry mods. Just moved a post
Last edited by Lesgold on Wed Apr 29, 2020 3:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Birdman85 » Wed Apr 29, 2020 4:24 pm

Beautiful work!
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Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Wed Apr 29, 2020 9:17 pm

Thanks Birdman,
Hopefully it does the job during tomorrow’s spirit run. Will give a report tomorrow evening. Running the 50l boiler has totally changed my routine. Do I keep using the 30l fermenters or jump up to something bigger? The head is spinning with possibilities. The 75l of wash that I stripped would have given me a full boiler of 35% low wines for a spirit run on my Pure Distilling reflux kit. Tomorrow’s run will only be just over half a boiler full at 30%. Looks like I need to scale up. I’d be interested in hearing opinions on fermenter sizes (60l, 100l, 200l etc) with winter coming up it will also mean a change to the current fermenter heating system that I use. Looks like more research coming up.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Birdman85 » Thu Apr 30, 2020 9:52 am

I'll be running my 50L boiler too, but in the end you can't fill it up to the full 50L anyhow. I'm considering just topping my fermenters up a little to the 30L mark or so and just running that. I also looked at 50L fermenters but there'd always be a little bit of unused wash/mash (which won't be a big deal for me because I'm planning on doing grain mashes anyway).

Also take into account having 2 larger fermenters, you'd be doing 4 or so runs. Would be good for stripping runs but time consuming with your boka.
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Turbo500 (birthday gift)

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Thu Apr 30, 2020 10:09 am

I ran two stripping runs the other day with about 37 l in the boiler per run. I reckon 40l would be about the limit for the washes I’m running. All grain may be a bit less. I’m using 30l fermenters but the max I can push them to is about 27l. Need to leave a bit of headspace otherwise there would be issues. (Rum and some of the other ferments may need a bit more space. Don’t know as I haven’t been down that path yet) That means 3 fermenters of about 75l of clean wash for two stripping runs. Just fired up the CCVM about five minutes ago. Just starting to heat up now. The other issue I have is that 75l of wash only makes a small charge of low wines for the spirit run. Eventually I’ll find that balance to keep efficiency right for me. At the moment I have about 28l of low wines @ 30% in the boiler. Just want to have a play. I reckon I’ll need over 100l of wash so that I can end up with a good charge of low wines in the boiler.
Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Lesgold » Thu Apr 30, 2020 11:22 am

Just finished running off 150ml of foreshots and have now started on heads. Will pull a litre jar off and then drop down to small jars to air overnight. Boiler heat up was quick on the two elements. Got to the boil in under half an hour. Was standing watching it thinking to myself that I should turn one element off and drop the power. Then all of a sudden the column flooded. Quickly turned one element off and dropped power down on the other one. Only lost about 30ml. The brain is a bit slow sometimes. Will know what to do on the next run. Let it run in full reflux for 30 minutes. During that time there was a slow drip from the PC. In total just under 60ml came out during that time. I think I can live with that. Noticed that I had a leak at one of the joints. Tightened the tri clamp a bit and the leak disappeared. Will pull the heads off slowly before I crank it up a bit.
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The PC is working well at keeping the temperature down.
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Lesgold
 
Posts: 383
Joined: Thu Sep 19, 2019 2:42 pm
Location: NSW south coast
equipment: Pure Distilling reflux and pot. 2” modular CCVM/ 1150mm column, 50l boiler with 2x 2400w elements.

Re: Isolation Build

Postby Birdman85 » Thu Apr 30, 2020 11:54 am

Hows the boss feel about the lounge room being overran by hoses, cords and the smell of cooking liquor?
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Posts: 289
Joined: Sun Jul 08, 2018 3:54 pm
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equipment: 50L keg boiler, home made modular 2" pot still and CCVM.

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