My pot/thump, improving flavor/upgrading hardware?

[distiller_dresden]

Hey guys! Here's what I have to work with, been cooking with her since January, six months now, and pretty much not a weekend has gone by without a cook. Been a busy stiller!

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So here's what all I'm wondering about/looking to do...

Looking to make a distillation safe insert (JB Weld or something?) to round those 'edges' in my cap and smooth everything toward the exit pipe. OR find someone who's good with copper to make me an alembic top for my pot. Then I have a 5 gallon pot and a 1 gallon thump, I think I could also benefit from upgrading the size of my thump; I know a lot of you run thumps the same size as your pot, I would like to run perhaps a 3 gallon thump so I could charge it with a nice amount instead of the 32oz charges I'm using now, but also so I wouldn't run into the issues a 5 gallon pot/5 gallon thump would have like a much longer cook because how long the heat up would take.

I'd like to know about thumps, what kind of results as far as return on hearts cut you guys get with 5/5 setups, (or equivalent, such as equal size pot/thump) and then a difference anyone may have measured/noticed in reducing the size of the thump vs the pot such as 100%/100%, 100%/80%, 100%/60%, 100%/40%, and I'm running 100%/20% I have pretty much established very well I get from a normal cook of 5 gallons a hearts cut of about 50-60% of the cook, usually yielding me 60oz of 120proof whatever I'm making. Brandy is different, as I use more of the heads due to the flavors.

The cap is a result of I've noticed I'm not getting as strong of flavors as I would expect from rum distillations. I am making great AG based, getting flavors really well. But I've read a few rum comparison threads and one was blackstrap vs high quality and his blackstrap was so strong a distillate as to be nearly unbearable it seemed. I'm just getting molasses/rum wash flavors regardless, even for super high gravity washes, I'm not getting unbearable blackstrap flavor density or such. Part of me is wondering if this is due to my thumper, and in acting as a second/1.5x distillation or the spirit run, there's not enough in there to flavor the spirit at a starting charge of 32oz?

I've also noticed whatever I charge my thump with typically is hitting the fores and heads, and then is less detectable/weak across my hearts -- which makes sense when you think about it. But if I had a large thump, and larger charge, then the flavor would last longer into my cook.

SO -- what do you all think, is my 'flavor' issue the cap and the thumper, is it all thumper? Could I benefit from a new/modified cap anyway?