Mini Gas Chromatograph

[700G]

I don't know much about gas chromatography, but it looks like a unit like this one may suit our needs: http://www.vernier.com/products/sensors/gc2-mini/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow . If so, it seems like $2K is within the range of some hobby distillers. I know there are few members here that know a little about GC, hopefully they can chime in.

[Prospekt]

I'm working towards my MSc. in Biochemistry but unfortunately don't have any experience in GC/MS. I've been thinking about using this type of equipment for a while.

But check this out:
There's a device that's recently been funded on Kickstarter (Their goal was $200,000, they got 2.7 million!) called a Scio. It's a near-IR spectrophotometer. It's only $250 and works with your phone. I feel like this would be a great way to determine cuts/age time/ etc and get some real hard data on your product.

http://www.consumerphysics.com/myscio/store.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[RevSpaminator]

Wow. This could be a game changer for this hobby. I don't suppose you've found any data on how accurate and/or sensitive it is? If it can produce lab accurate results then we can start gathering hard data on all sorts of things. When we say a material is bad when used for stilling, we can point to real data. Imagine doing your own water analysis or being able to determine what was missing from your ferment.. This is just cool.

[Prospekt]

Yeah, it's pretty exciting isn't it! And I'm sure the prices of these units will only come down as they start scaling up and getting more interest from hobbyists and anyone who likes science "toys" such as this one.

It's slated to be released this spring, and everything I'm seeing on it is press releases. They say it can be used to check the purity of pills, the freshness of plant material, the caloric content of any food, and what any material is made of. The thing I find exciting is that the library of materials is crowd-sourced, so that the more people use it and upload their scans, the bigger the catalog of things it will be able to identify. I kind of want to buy one just typing this out right now, but I don't have an iPhone...

[Odin]

This is an interesting device! I may buy one, just to see differences between fores, hears and tails.

Regards, Odin.

[Prospekt]

If you do buy one, Please do a write-up for us Odin! I'm sure there are more than a couple of guys on here that want to hear how it works out.

Cheers.

[Odin]

Haven't decided yet. Looked at the video of the Vernier. Liked it, but ... if you have to set your own parameters for the analysis as well as decide what's what ... that might be a challange. I expected these machines to provide the answers, but maybe my thinking is off?

Odin.

[Prospekt]

The software will just show you a graph with peaks, but from then on it's up to you to decide what it all means. And that's assuming that the machine itself isn't too difficult to use. There are lots of resources out there to learn how to interpret MS data, but I'm sure it could get pretty heavy.

[BigSwede]

Oh wow... I have lusted after a personal GC for years, but the best I could even consider was some heavily used 1970's vintage POS. You HAD to do this, didn't you.

If I was running a micro distillery, I'd absolutely have one of these or similar, plus as many other analytical instruments as I could afford. They are incredibly powerful tools.

We took them for granted in college. We had GC, mass spec, NMR, others. Between them, you could identify almost every substance known. It does take training and homework, there's no software that spits out exactly what is in the sample.

We had one lab that was a "crime scene" with an unidentified white powder. We used these tools to identify our samples. I remember guys shouting out "holy s--t, mine is pure cocaine!" Another, "I've got heroin!" As my analysis continued, I was thinking "Wow, what could it be? Morphine? Ricin? Psilocybin?" It was Sudafed! Very bummed.

The only other issue with a small GC like thos, internal components tend to have a limited life, require replacement and maintenance, etc. they are not simple devices.

Maybe the future will bring us reasonable and reliable analytical tools.

[manu de hanoi]

good old spectrometer wouldnt do the trick ?

[bellybuster]

The expense of buying one of these isn't the biggest part, it's the pure samples required to calibrate. When I was running IR spectrophotometry for aviators liquid oxygen analysis the samples were unbelievably expensive, a full set running more than the machine itself. I am assuming GC will require known pure samples?

[heartcut]

With a sensitive scale and high grade chemicals you can make your own standards. GC speciation won't be affected by the accuracy of your mix, so you can tell what's in it, but the concentration meausurement will be a little less accurate than your calibration standards.