Working on my first still (still...) and am nearing the point where some testing will be possible. I just wanted to show my first condenser assembly. Design is intended to be modular where the condenser will be held to the head either by a wide band clamp or by springs, not sure which way I want to go. Also thought about threaded couplings like I am using on the boiler, column and head and may still do that.
The assembly is 3" in diameter and 12" long. It is composed of a dual layer coil of 1/4" OD tube with a 1/2" ID cold finger in the centre. Water will be fed down the 1/4" tube and exit up through the central 1/2" tube
Coils assembly overview.
Dual coil and coldfinger detail.
Cap and connection detail.
Coil and shell together.
Full assembly.
Comments? Anything done well? Things to improve on future builds?
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Zed
When the Student is ready, the Master will appear.
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
Hopefully it will have good knock-down capability, but I guess I won't know until I see how much power I can feed the boiler with without choking the column. Water flows through at a pretty good rate. With its size I hope I can run the water a little slower than a smaller condenser might require. I have a plastic drum and am thinking about a recirculating system to help conserve water.
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Zed
When the Student is ready, the Master will appear.
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
Is the cold finger on the water inlet or the outlet side of the flow? It probably makes a difference on the efficiency of the condenser system. Just asking your plans...
ss
My intent was to make the central tube, the 'cold finger', the outlet and the top of the coils the inlet. This way I establish counterflow in the main coils with the coldest water entering at the top. This means the cold finger may be more of a cool finger or a lukewarm finger, but it only has to be cool enough to get condensate forming.
I have done reading on this and I think my reasoning is sound but I am open the the voice of experience. This is my first one, so any constructive input that makes the next one better is welcome. I have enough parts to easily build another.
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Zed
When the Student is ready, the Master will appear.
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
zed255 wrote:My intent was to make the central tube, the 'cold finger', the outlet and the top of the coils the inlet. This way I establish counterflow in the main coils with the coldest water entering at the top. This means the cold finger may be more of a cool finger or a lukewarm finger, but it only has to be cool enough to get condensate forming.
This is the BEST plan because the central core (around the cold finger) will be warm and rising. The cold finger will cause the vapors to move radially outward towards the coils which are colder. If these coils incidently contact the outer shell walls, they will also cool from the cold water. The cold coils and the jacket walls then will become the surface where most of the condensate will form. The cold finger just acts as a vapor director and it is not needed to be cold; cool or even luke warm will suffice.
Oh yes, I've built a few things over the years, just not much with copper. Working with soft tubing did have a learning curve. Next coil will look better with what I learned building this one.
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Zed
When the Student is ready, the Master will appear.
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
Beautiful work Zed. It looks like that is a 3" outer jacket, and it sits on a 2" column? Do you have any mechanism to direct reflux to the center of the column when it goes through that neck?
My reflux coils all seem to throw liquid at the walls, so I use a small chain and a bit of copper mesh at the bottom of the condenser to direct the drips down the center of my column.
Yes it is a 3" condenser on a 2" head / column. My current build is a Nixon-Stone offset design, so the condensate is going to return to the column via a dedicated reflux line. Having given some thought to the path of the condensate I machined down a reducing bushing to provide a drip edge, so assuming I get the system level the condensate should not run down the sides.
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Zed
When the Student is ready, the Master will appear.
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
