Goofy things I do

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cranky
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Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »


WARNING! What you are about to read and see is probably not a good idea for many reasons and should probably not be attempted by people who don't have a good working knowledge of glass. So I would recommend that if you are thinking of trying something like this, don't.
Now that you have been properly warned I would like to show you my latest build.

How much beer can a bottomless mug hold?
Answer: An infinite amount of beer. :lol:

I have a tendency to do goofy things. I like goofy things. Goofy things are different, unexpected and above all fun, all of which happen to also be the reasons to be in this hobby to begin with. My newest build is one of those goofy things done for the hell of it and should not be attempted without a certain amount of knowledge of the materials being used because if done wrong they could result in serious problems or injury so folks, don't try this at home.

That said I would like to present to you my newest build which I like to call

Muggles Too
s2.JPG


There are several reasons this build came about, the first one being a few months ago I completed a painfully slow 15Hr run with my 1.5" boka and while I like the outcome very much I was not happy with the amount of time it took. My budget is almost nonexistent, consisting of an occasional Home Depot gift card and my monthly $5 Amazon card from Bing rewards, so alternatives for an upgrade were not very appealing.

Basically it came down to choices, #1 purchase store bought, which I can't bring myself to do anymore, #2 somehow find time to run the Boka more, but that doesn't look like it is going to happen anytime soon or #3 make a bigger column. Option #3 seemed like the best solution because I wanted a bigger column anyway, but how do you do it on a tight budget? I wanted a 3 or 4 inch column but the copper and fittings are expensive. I could seek out scrap yards and see if somehow I could come up with something that will do the job or buy some copper sheet and roll my own. I have always liked the idea of a glass column and thought about maybe buying some borosilicate tubing and manage to rig something up, I love seeing what some of the members are doing with borosilicate, but that's expensive too, although not as expensive as copper, or there was one more alternative... I could do something goofy.

So me being me I chose the goofy option. The basic idea for this came from a still made by Mash Rookie called Muggles, which can be seen here (http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... 50&t=23962 ) I have always been fascinated with glass not just for stills but the medium of glass in general and MR's work has always inspired me. His Muggles has always fascinated me ever since I discovered HD I had planned on someday building one based on that one, albeit since my particular style of building can best be described as Early American Junk Pile it won't be quite as refined or pretty as MR's but it will be functional and in my opinion just plain cool, after all It's built for me so I am the only one who needs to be pleased by it. So with MR's Muggles in mind I set about to make my own version of a low budget muggles.

To begin with I have done some glass work in the past, not nearly to the extent of MR but I have a working knowledge of glass and how it behaves that is enough to handle this build. I happened to already have a hole saw for glass so that was an expense I didn't need to make, which is good because those things are pretty pricey which is not good when you are trying to keep your budget down. If I had to buy the glass hole saw new I might as well buy the boro tube, it would have worked out cheaper in the long run, but I did have it. I also have some 12" X 12" copper sheets that I bought about 20 years ago and never used and some leftover copper from my previous builds, and some copper pans that were part of a box of things I bought for other things and aren't really worth anything but scrap and a 24" piece of stainless steel pipe I found in a dumpster. I did have to buy some things like fittings and valves and dollar store mugs and all-thread rod and lots and lots of solder. Solder was actually the biggest expense of this project totaling well over $50. The all thread rod was second at $38 for 6 rods. All in all I figure I have just under $200 in this build which to me seems like a lot but considering a length of new 3" copper pipe is much more than that and I would still have had to make most of the other parts and it wouldn't have been nearly as cool.

Other things that went into this build were
10 dollar store mugs
2 ball valves for the condensers
2ea 90 degree fittings for my 1.5" pipe.
9ea 12" copper dinner plates = $5
10 rolls of PTFE tape for everlasting gaskets
2ea 2" tri-clamps
And lots of other miscellaneous bits and pieces.

To begin this project I made a rough materials list of what I had, then a rough sketch of what I wanted. The mugs are about 3.3" diam inside and 7" tall. I bought 6ea 72" X 3/8th all thread rod, which is the longest that Home Depot had and actually works for me because the ceiling height in my garage is just under 9' and when you add in the height of my cart and the keg you are getting pretty close to that limit. This limits me to a maximum of around 8 mugs if for some reason I decide to go as tall as possible.

My original design, like MR's, started off with a column consisting of 5 mugs which would give me about a 35" packed column. I eventually decided to add a 6th and 7th mug but in the beginning figured 5 was a good place to start plus 2 more for the condenser and 2 extras just in case. Totaling 10 mugs.

I thought about using the 2"SS for a shotgun condenser but really like the look of a twisted shotgun/graham condenser (Shotgraham?) like MR made but making one proved a bit more difficult than I wished to tackle right now. so I wound up making a 20" 3 tube shotgun out of a remaining piece of 1.5" tubing and 3 lengths of 1/2" O.D. (7/16 I.D.) tubing I had. Eventually I plan on returning to the glass shotgraham but it's not like you can see the condenser working so this should work for now.

This is actually a rather complicated and difficult build. One of the most difficult parts was cutting the holes in the bottom of the mugs. My hole saw is roughly 2.25", I could have bought a new one that was 3" but decided not to spend the money and see how things turn out, in the future if I think it needs to be bigger I will buy a bigger one and some more mugs and make new ones or take them to my glass grinder and make the holes whatever size works. The biggest problem was drilling those holes in the first place. I don't have a drill press at home so I took them to work with me along with my hole saw and as I found free time here and there, chucked up my saw in the drill press and slowly bored holes in the glass, keeping it wet with water to keep it lubricated and prevent it from overheating. Through trial and error I found that the best method to do this is to start drilling from the top (inside the mug) until the guide bit was well into the glass and the saw part had made a decent groove, then turn the mug over and drill into the bottom connecting the guide hole all the way through then continue drilling until there was a good groove in the bottom of the mug. Then turn the mug back over, keeping it on paper towels on top of a piece of plywood, and begin drilling from the top again, adding about 2-3 inches of water for cooling. Then it was a matter of being patient, holding the right pressure and watching to see when the bore hole began getting close to the bottom groove so I could back off the pressure a bit to prevent fracturing when the glass got thin.
MUG 1A.JPG
MUG 3.JPG

Overheating was a real issue, so after 5 minutes or so I had to go do something else for a bit and change the water out. At one point I pushed a little too hard and long and overheated the glass which caused the hole saw to bind and actually snapped the shaft on my saw rather than the glass breaking which says a lot for the glass I suppose. Fortunately there was still enough shaft left to finish the job without having to buy a new saw.

As the top and bottom bore holes get close you have to back off on the pressure and feed the saw slowly or you might fracture the glass creating stress risers that could crack later, the idea is to actually bore all the way through the glass rather than cutting or fracturing your way through. The thickness on the bottoms of the mugs varies quite a bit so drilling time varied accordingly, the last one was the thickest and took about a half hour. All in all it took about a couple hours over a few days to get all 10 mugs drilled and I figure I bored holes through about 4" of glass. Then while fabricating and fitting other pieces I managed to chink up the edge of one of the mugs in a couple places. This wouldn't be that big of a deal if I wasn't going to heat the mugs but because I am it shouldn't and won't be used. This is why I made extra mugs just in case something else happened to another one. This leaves me 9 usable bottomless mugs. If I choose I can go as high as 8 mugs packed for a CM or if I add in a LM cup section I can probably still run 8 packed mugs with one unpacked above the takeoff. I really don't think it needs to be quite that high but it is nice to have options.
MUG 2.JPG
MUG 4.JPG
Last edited by cranky on Sat Apr 25, 2015 8:08 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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cranky
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

With the glass drilling complete it was time to begin making the parts to hold the whole thing together. I debated several different ways to do this, MR used just straight SS rods on the outside to hold everything together and Teflon gaskets between the mugs. He had some trouble with sealing and the mugs slipping out of alignment. I didn't want that to happen so my thinking was to make copper plates that sit between mugs with a ring around the outside to prevent slipping and some pieces of copper pipe soldered to the rings for guides for the all thread with everlasting gaskets to seal between the mugs and the copper. The base piece would be a similar plate but the bottom would utilize a short piece of the SS pipe with an easy flange to make a keg connection and the top would include a dephleg. In all honesty I would prefer a 2" copper section for a keg connector instead of the SS but SS is what I have right now so that's what I used.

With all that figured out I cut 3 round pieces of copper out of what I recall is 22ga copper sheet and 6ea 1" strips from piece of 26ga copper sheet. This left me a 6"X12" piece of 26ga that I rolled into a circle to make a tube for the dephleg. At this time I realized I could have taken my 4 pieces of copper sheet and rolled them into a 4ft tall column and saved myself a lot of trouble, but oh well, I have a plan laid out and I'm continuing with it. For the top and bottom pieces of the dephleg I wanted thicker pieces since they will be used to hold everything together, so I took a piece of silver plated copper I had and stripped the silver off it and cut it to fit my design. For the top I cut the bottom out of an old copper pan. This gave me much thicker and more rigid copper plates for the top and bottom of the dephleg. The top plate of the column also acts as the base for the dephleg.
Since this method essentially gave me ready made plates I thought about drilling holes and adding downcomers to actually make a flute. MR's original design used smaller 1-1/4" holes in the bottoms of the mugs and valves. My original design was to route out holes to match the holes in the bottom of the mugs and just filling it with lava rocks. I settled on drilling 1/4" holes through the plates which I figured would help add strength to the rings and help keep some copper in contact with vapor but upon final assembly this made packing a bit troublesome so I wound up cutting the drilled area out to make packing easier. In retrospect I should have just gone ahead and made perforated plates out of the couplings but I may at some time go back and mod it to be a plated column with downcomers but we will just have to see how things work out and maybe mod later.

The rest is pretty straight forward...OK maybe not. On top of the dephleg I made a top hat looking piece and soldered a 1.5" pipe with an easy flange coupling on it, then a 90 degree angle with another easy flange soldered to it. I drilled a hole in the 90 and added a piece of 1/4" tube to it for the thermometer, then a length of pipe and a 90 down then to the condenser. I began making the glass shotgraham but eventually abandoned that project for a simpler shotgun condenser.

Making the dephleg was quite difficult because I wanted it to have flanges to bolt everything together and be big enough to handle anything I throw at it including a potential future upgrade to 4" borosilicate and I don't have any big pipe to make it out of.

I began making the dephleg by taking the 12"X6" sheet of copper and made a round(ish) tube 6" long and around 3.5" Diam, to fit on top of the mugs. I had planned on making the through pipes out of 3/4" pipe but only had enough on hand for 4 tubes. I had also originally planned on making a shotgraham out of 2 mugs and some 1/2" soft tubing but didn't want to spend the money for 12ft of 1/2 inch so I changed that plan and decided to make a 4 barrel shotgun but when I began checking my materials on hand I found that I was one tube short for the shotgun. I could have made a 3 tube shotgun but then one day I was driving by an ace hardware and decided to stop and get enough 1/2" and 3/4" to finish the dephleg and shotgun but when I walked in the store I found they were liquidating and everything was 60% off. So me being the opportunist I am, I checked out what was still left. They were completely out of copper except for a couple sticks of 1" and some soft copper. I couldn't help myself and bought one of the sticks of 1" and then realized they still had a roll of 1/2" soft tubing. So I bought 12ft and the glass shotgraham was back on the table. Now I was left with a dilemma, do I use 1" for the dephleg or do I go with 1/2", or a combination of 1/2" & 3/4"? After a bit of consideration I decided to use the 4ea 3/4" tubes I had and make the rest 1/2" so what I wound up with was 4ea 3/4" and 5ea 1/2" tubes for the dephleg. Then I figured out the layout of the tubes and mounting holes and drilled and cut everything.
DEPH 2.JPG
DEPH 1.JPG

At some point I decided to try a sort of boka thing where I make a UFO looking catch cup with a combination through/overflow tube which just meant adding a 2 inch tall section and an extra mug. I made a top and bottom plate and the center piece to make the cup and the strips to form the skirts to hold the mugs in place. I drilled a hole in the bottom plate to fit a piece of 1.5" pipe, drilled some elongated holes to act as through holes and return and capped it with a domed copper top and soldered everything together. Later I realized I didn't include a thermometer port so I had to make a shield out of 3/8" tubing and solder that in after the fact. When I assembled everything I included this UFO piece so all the cleaning runs can be done with all the pieces so I can run things however I like when it is all done.
UFO 2.JPG
ufo 3.JPG
After doing the cleaning and test runs I have decided to leave it off and see how everything runs as a CM but keep the UFO in reserve or convert it to a single bubble cap.

So with all the design ideas worked out and with everything for the dephleg cut, drilled and fitted I began assembling. It is a lot of work to get 9 tubes through 2 plates all lined up and inside the outer jacket but eventually I got it soldered up.

Then I filled it with water to do a static leak check and of course it leaked. So I figured out where it was leaking and re soldered and rechecked and re soldered and rechecked until finally there were no more leaks. I left it sitting on a tray overnight to verify no leaks. Then cleaned it up. I drilled the mount holes in the lower flange and used a long drill bit to drill holes in the upper flange. Then I did a static leak check again, then pressure test to verify that all was well.

With the dephlegmater finally finished it was time to turn my attention to the product condenser which I had hoped to make in the same manner as MR's but I decided to try to use some sections of the 2" SS pipe I had. When I tried soldering up the product condenser it went incredibly badly. Using pyewackets method the copper to stainless soldering went flawlessly but when I tried to solder the 1/2" tubes I got everything too hot and the solder around the stainless melted and I had a lot of trouble reconnecting it, eventually I managed to get it all soldered together and hold water but when I tried to twist the tubes one broke loose then another. After soldering and re soldering the tubes I realized the problem is the amount of strain being placed on the joint when I am twisting. Eventually I decided to not make flush connections and extend the tubes a couple inches past the joint for the condenser and connect them to a plate that will eventually be a flanged connection. This gave me the extra strength I needed to twist the tubes and I kind of like the way they look but eventually I sidelined this part of the project and set about doing other parts of the project and eventually decided to make up a 3 barrel 1.5" shotgun condenser which worked well but I do plan on returning to the glass shotgraham someday

The next thing to do was make the keg to column connection which went way better than the shotgraham and I managed to solder it up the first try albeit a bit off center but close enough.

So now I had all the pieces fabbed and ready to be assembled I began assembling. This was a lot harder than you would think, partly because I decided to support each spacer between the mugs with nuts just in case something happened to one of the mugs the remaining mugs won't collapse but mostly because I used all thread and not just rods with threaded ends and my guide pieces were not perfectly aligned and I had to run each rod 7 inches at a time so I could then run the nut's down then run the rod another 7 inches until they were all run down. Then I needed to tighten the rods down in a pattern to prevent them from tilting or bending the whole column.

Eventually I had everything run down and assembled and ready to go but realized this thing is HEAVY!!! So I decided it might be a good idea to support it from the ceiling when it is on the keg. This was accomplished by screwing in a couple eye bolts in the ceiling and soldering a loop on top of the u bend so I can run a strap to the eye bolts and support the massive weight of the column.

All that done and in order it was time to start cleaning.

I cleaned everything as I went but with this much stuff it was bound to have a lot of cleaning that needed done so I filled my boiler with water, mounted the column to it and fired it up. Things went pretty well, there were a few leaks but nothing that wasn't easily fixed. At this point I didn't have the valves for the cooling water on the condensers yet so I just did a steam cleaning run. I was pretty impressed as I watched each mug fog up then clear as the one above it fogged and water condensed and ran back down the column in spite of not having any water in the dephleg. I let that steam for a while and then shut it down and drained the boiler. I couldn't believe the amount of crap that came out of the boiler I'm glad I didn't run it with packing because I would have had to change it all.

Then I soldered on the valves for cooling everything and it was time to remove the column and refill the boiler with vinegar and water. I am now thinking that maybe a fill port on the boiler wouldn't be a bad idea but the whole fill, run, drain, refill thing will likely only happen when mods are done so maybe it isn't really that important but it sure would have helped this time.

So I fill the boiler, put the column back on and fire it back up. Things went real well there, I steamed everything for a half hour until there was a thick vinegar fog in my garage then started playing around with the valves. Currently I only have one small harbor freight fountain pump that doesn't have the lifting capacity to reach the condensers from the ground, so I put one of my water reservoirs on top of my table saw table to elevate it so it could work. Then I added a splitter to run both condensers off the same pump. It is obvious to me that I either need 2 pumps or a much better one but this setup actually worked. I turned the valve to the product condenser off and opened the dephleg all the way and every bit of the steam began condensing and falling back into the column. Next I opened the valve to the product condenser a bit and began closing the valve to the reflux condenser. Vinegar began condensing like it should. I played around with the valves balancing the reflux and takeoff then closed the reflux valve and allowed it to run until I collected a gallon and a half. Then shut it down drained it again, refilled it with water, reinstalled the column and began steaming again.

Everything went well there too and once again I played with the valves and takeoff speeds and everything seems to work pretty well. Once again I steamed for a while and collected a couple gallons of water then shut down and took a break overnight.

The next day I removed the column again, and this time I filled it with about 8 or 9 gallons of Birdwatchers, put it back together and fired it back up for the sac run. The sac run was actually pretty impressive, once again as they warmed up the mugs fogged up then began to clear as the one above it fogged and condensate began dripping down inside the first one. When this reached the Dephleg it all began puring down into the column building in a few minutes from a trickle to a waterfall. Then I once again cracked the product condenser and began closing the reflux condenser and placed my parrot under the outlet to begin collecting. I was actually pretty impressed by both the purity and takeoff rate. Taking it off at a pretty good speed with no packing I was able to maintain 170Pr on a single run. I think this means that once I get it packed I should be able to maintain the kind of purity and speed I am after. After a while I shut the RC down and just let it run in pot mode until it was down to 25% then shut down. Pretty happy with the results.

Next I removed the column and began the task of disassembling the whole thing one more time to pack it again and reassemble it the way I plan on running it. I had to open up the area where I drilled the holes on the coupling pieces to make packing easier. I wouldn't have had to do this if I used scrubbies but I like the lava so had to. Then I bolted the first 6 mugs together and filled them with the cleaned and prepped lava. then I added the top mug and am currently working on bolting the dephleg. on top. When everything is done and all hooked up I will add some more pix of the final assembly and hopefully some of it in action.
Last edited by cranky on Fri Apr 24, 2015 6:43 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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bearriver
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by bearriver »

Holy cow! I've been waiting to see what you were coming up with. :clap: It came out looking really nice. Disassembled it probably looks like kitchen scrap. You got a good eye for making use out of readily available items. I'm impressed. The mug on the parrot funnel is a nice touch.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by Danespirit »

You just amazed me Cranky...cool build. :thumbup:
I saw Mashrookies build too.. and another that i don't remember.
I really like the idea of a low budget still and must say you showed ingenuity.
A tip for drilling glass... You can get diamond coated holesaws cheap on E-bay.
If you only had to drill small holes a metaldrill would be sufficient (for a cable through a lamp or some like that).
For cooling i use petroleum...just a tiny squezze, it lubricates and cools way better than water.
You can make a little form out of clay (or steal some play dooh for the kids :lol: ) that provides enough to make a little pool.
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cranky
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

bearriver wrote:Holy cow! I've been waiting to see what you were coming up with. :clap: It came out looking really nice. Disassembled it probably looks like kitchen scrap. You got a good eye for making use out of readily available items. I'm impressed. The mug on the parrot funnel is a nice touch.
It does just look like a bunch of junk when disassembled. I only have a few more things to do and it will be all back together and ready to go to work. I like steampunk stuff and my wife says this looks like something a mod scientist would have so at some point I'm planning on adding a plasma ball at the top to finish that mad scientist look. I've even been thinking that filled with colored bubbling water it would make a pretty good Halloween prop :)
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

Danespirit wrote:You just amazed me Cranky...cool build. :thumbup:
I saw Mashrookies build too.. and another that i don't remember.
I really like the idea of a low budget still and must say you showed ingenuity.
A tip for drilling glass... You can get diamond coated holesaws cheap on E-bay.
If you only had to drill small holes a metaldrill would be sufficient (for a cable through a lamp or some like that).
For cooling i use petroleum...just a tiny squezze, it lubricates and cools way better than water.
You can make a little form out of clay (or steal some play dooh for the kids :lol: ) that provides enough to make a little pool.
Funny, sometimes I forget all about eBay but I've had that hole saw for a long time so it worked out well. I also have a bunch of small diamond bits and actually considered just drilling multiple small holes through the bottoms with one larger drain to make the bottom of the mugs into perf plates but thought that might just be a little too much work.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by White_Lightning_Rod »

:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

Beautiful piece of craftsmanship. I love it.

Keep the pics coming. Or videos, both would be very much appreciated.

I think if you add the plates to run it as a plated colum you wont have a need to go to 4"
3.3" ID should do anything you want. JMO
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by MoonBreath »

I read as far as I could, then my eyes started bleeding ..So I just looked at the pictures ..Well done so far ..The twisted shotgun is something I have to do some day ..My first love affair here was MR's rig ..That thing has endless possibilities ..I'm thinkn nice etching and engraving on the glass and copper ..Oh, you need to proof read your thread, no just kidding. :clap:
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

White_Lightning_Rod wrote::clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

Beautiful piece of craftsmanship. I love it.

Keep the pics coming. Or videos, both would be very much appreciated.

I think if you add the plates to run it as a plated colum you wont have a need to go to 4"
3.3" ID should do anything you want. JMO
Thank you. Cant say the craftsmanship compares to Mash Rookies, or many others on here but I'm happy with it.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

MoonBreath wrote: you need to proof read your thread, no just kidding. :clap:
:oops: You know, I have read and re-read, spell checked and modified this thread so many times before actually posting it, I cant believe I missed so much. I think I got it fixed now. :) but I will read it one more time and hopefully get everything.

That twisted shotgun/graham condenser sure looks cool but man it is actually harder than it looks to make.
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Re: Goofy things I do

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Danespirit wrote:You just amazed me Cranky...cool build. :thumbup:
Couldn't be said better. I love how you thought out and had hands on every detail! All that work with copper sheet damn! I love thinking outside the box and working with what you've got in the situation you are faced with. This is an excellent accomplishment in both!! I don't even give a shit if it makes likker (I am sure it does) I just love it. Good job Cranky!!! Get some runs and document them for us please!
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by firewater69 »

I am a machinist by trade, and have always built anything I could, not so much to save money but because I just like working with my hands. So I can appreciate all the work that went into that setup, great job Cranky :thumbup: :thumbup:
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

Brutal wrote:
Danespirit wrote:You just amazed me Cranky...cool build. :thumbup:
Couldn't be said better. I love how you thought out and had hands on every detail! All that work with copper sheet damn! I love thinking outside the box and working with what you've got in the situation you are faced with. This is an excellent accomplishment in both!! I don't even give a shit if it makes likker (I am sure it does) I just love it. Good job Cranky!!! Get some runs and document them for us please!
Thank you, I'm afraid I may have made the first post in this thread a little too long and maybe a bit too detailed (or maybe rambling) without enough pictures but more pictures will follow. If all goes well maybe even as early as today but the wife has been sick the past couple days and I think she has been nice enough to share so not sure how long I will feel up to the task of working on it. As far as thinking outside the box, I've always been a bit of a non-linear thinker and identify with Red Green a bit too closely :crazy:
RG1.JPG
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Re: Goofy things I do

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firewater69 wrote:I am a machinist by trade, and have always built anything I could, not so much to save money but because I just like working with my hands. So I can appreciate all the work that went into that setup, great job Cranky :thumbup: :thumbup:
Thank you, I have always been a bit overly self reliant and this build was really a bit more work than I had originally anticipated but my job often involves a lot of waiting then a lot of chaos followed by a lot of waiting and if I don't stay occupied doing goofy things I don't know what else to do. So nearly every day I would find time to do a bit more and probably should have done daily or weekly posts as I went but was afraid the whole thing might have turned into a miserable failure but it really is fun to do something like this and watch the whole process in action.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by thisguy »

Can you turn your posts detailing the build process into a pdf cranky? Wouldn't mind adding it to my archives
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

thisguy wrote:Can you turn your posts detailing the build process into a pdf cranky? Wouldn't mind adding it to my archives
I have no idea how to put it in a PDF, sorry My computer skills are pretty basic.
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Re: Goofy things I do

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No problemo. I didnt know if you typed it up in Word first.

Anyways, awesome build. Its always really interesting to see whats going on inside.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by cranky »

O.K. Before my fever decides to get too high, I managed to get this thing all back together and set up for some pix. So here they are.

This first one is the final configuration, 6 packed mugs for a total of 42" of packed section with one more mug on top for an empty section between the packing and the dephleg.
MUGGLE 1.JPG
This next one shows the packing of an individual section. Packing consists of lava rocks cut to about the size of a dime to a nickle. I found an old pair of dykes or tile nipper worked best to cut the lava rock and somehow actually seemed to sharpen them a bit. Not saying you will have the same results so if you do this make sure you use an old pair you don't care about.
MUGGLE 2.JPG
This next one is the empty mug and dephlegmator. One problem I found was the thickness of the wall of the dephleg was a bit thin and bent too easy so I needed to add a reinforcement, which consisted of cutting a couple notches in some short pieces of 1/2" [pipe and soldering it to the vertical tubes and inlet and outlet tubes. It's not very pretty but it works.
MUGGLE 3.JPG
This last one shows the close up of the end of the shotgun condenser where I left the tubes exposed so I can see results of adjustments faster.
MUGGLE 5.JPG
If you are interested and haven't seen it I showed off the parrot in this thread http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =2&t=55358 it was another thing made from what was on hand and I thought the mug was a nice thing to keep with the muggle theme.
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Goofy things I do

Post by Kegg_jam »

I dub thee the 'Mugleminator'
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Re: Goofy things I do

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Kegg_jam wrote:I dub thee the 'Mugleminator'
:lol:
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Re: Goofy things I do

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I have one more picture to add for now.
This is how far I have gotten with the shotgraham
SHOTGRAHAM 1.JPG
some day I will return to it and see if I can actually make it work.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by ranger_ric »

Cranky,
This is one cool / BADASS build. Your creativity and application are astounding.. Cant wait to hear how it does when you fire it up !!
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Re: Goofy things I do

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ranger_ric wrote:Cranky,
This is one cool / BADASS build. Your creativity and application are astounding.. Cant wait to hear how it does when you fire it up !!
I have to give credit where credit is due, without Mash Rookies original Muggles still I doubt I would have thought of this and Skow69s posts about his glass column were also inspiring as well as the efforts of many others on this sight. I'm just cheap and if you are going to be cheap you have to find different ways to do things. :D
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Re: Goofy things I do

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You really did come up with something awesome. Your avatar gives me a good laugh when looking at this thread. You could tell people that you found the materials in a trash can, and they would believe you.

I like the pic with the mug handles turned out. Hope you don't cut them off. They add a mountain of personality to the still.
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Re: Goofy things I do

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bearriver wrote:You really did come up with something awesome. Your avatar gives me a good laugh when looking at this thread. You could tell people that you found the materials in a trash can, and they would believe you.

I like the pic with the mug handles turned out. Hope you don't cut them off. They add a mountain of personality to the still.
I do plan on leaving the handles on, after all without then it wouldn't be a muggle. :lol:
Oscar the grouch has always been my favorite Sesame street character and I love the song "I love trash" and always have. He is just someone I Identify well with and sometimes break out singing it. If this works here is the song that sums up my life. :P
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Wow, I finally got around to checking out this post...
Amazing work, cranky! I really love the idea of making something with budget items, or better, scraps left over from something else. And you finished product is enhanced rather than diminished by not using fancy materials. That is due to your eye for the aesthetic, and the crazy. That has got to be something special to see running! Thanks for the story and all the detail and pics, inspiring.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by Hound Dog »

Love it Cranky! It's a heck of a lot more work when you make do with what you got. You turned out a pretty cool rig there.
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Re: Goofy things I do

Post by googe »

Nice job cranky, looks.like a hell of a lot of work!!, good luck :thumbup:
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Re: Goofy things I do

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I love it when some thing so beautiful can be made from everyday ordinary things that have been re-used in ways the makers never intended.
Cheers...well done!
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Re: Goofy things I do

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Thanks guys, It was a lot of work but probably no more than most flute guys put into theirs and I really enjoyed it. It was very cool to watch run when I did the initial cleaning runs and I'm looking forward to running it now that it is packed. I plan on doing one more water and sac run with the feints I have saved up. Today I managed to stay vertical long enough to get 10 gallons of birdwatchers going, I would have done more but that's all the yeast I had. Hopefully I can get pics of it running when I get to that, I would post a video if I knew how without going through youtube.
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