My new worm

[myles]

I am a habitual Liebig user but I recently had a near disaster when the supply lines to my condenser froze. I did not notice the layer of ice in the water butt INSIDE my still room. Sure we hit double minus figures outside, but I thought inside would be OK.

Anyhow it made me reconsider the worm - and I want it for a strip condenser, not just for spirit runs.

So I made one. I used 3/8" tube because it is nice and easy to work with. Often repeated advice is that 20' is ample so that is what I went with.

Actually I went with 20', 21' and 24'.

I wanted to boost the throughput potential so I went for 3 concentric worms. Loads of surface area, and I think it is the equivalent of an 11/16" tube but with more surface area.



To make it easier to build the two inner coils run in the opposite direction to the outer one.




All 3 coils recombine into a 1/2" output.



Just need to fit it to a suitable container and I can continue with my interupted rum strip run. This worm should have far more capacity than the energy levels that I am currently using.

I have taken the vapour path upto 1" - and that is going to be connected to the 2" column on my pot still. I think she should cope with full power on a strip run. If she works well I may even re-consider my previous bias towards Liebig condensers.

I have no idea what the theoretical max would be, but she should handle 3kW with ease - well I hope so.

[tater-shine]

Wow thats a lot of copper!

[tater-shine]

Now I think i read something on hear once and it stated that the steam will take the path of least resistance. So in a tripple worm condencer there is no need for two or three separate condencers. Someone will verify if i'm correct. I think it was dixie drifters idea of haveing two coils on one keg? Who knows.

[olddog]

Looks like a serious overkill.

[myles]

Could be overkill but I want to do strip runs with it. Am also thinking ahead to when I build a bigger boiler. I currently only use a 25 litre charge.

Anyhow I fitted it to a 160 litre drum.



It fits under the bench in the fake cupboard. The pot still minus the column fits into the other half.



I rigged up a 2" to 1" adaptor section to fit onto the existing pot column. Decided to keep the height for convenience, should not be able to puke past that. Well if I do I am doing something wrong

The tapered arm is suspended on chains so I can disconect it fron the column and swing it out of the way when I want to use the worm instead. Eventually there will be two separate stills, but for now I am using the same boiler for both strip and spirit runs.

[Barney Fife]

Rube Goldberg lives!

[Tater]

Very nice

[myles]

Rube Goldberg lives!

Barney that hurts Its not complicated it is lazy, I did not want to cut complicated angles - you need a few more if you just use 90's and 45's. A 2' sideways shift is quite a lot to accomodate.

Yes there would have been easier ways but would they be as satisfying to build:lol:

[myles]

I don't think the diameter changes in the column are going to work. The temperature gradient from top to bottom is minimal. If it was 20' high it might work, but at less than 4' it probably won't make any difference. A straight 2" column would be a lot easier.

[olddog]

Anyhow I fitted it to a 160 litre drum.

Thats a serious amount of water, I only use a 60lt plastic garbage bin for my 50lt boiler.

[HookLine]

Rube Goldberg lives!

Heath Robinson too!

[myles]

Things did not go quite to plan.

Some time ago I got fed up with collecting at ground level so emptied the drum and relocated it onto the workbench. I reconfigured the vapour path, filled the boiler with rum low wines for a spirit run, filled up the worm drum and locked up for the night ready to run in the morning.

Next day I was met with chaos. The workbench had colapsed - I just hadn't thought that 160 litres of water might be a touch too heavy. It had tipped over my boiler and mangled my lyne arm. The floor was covered in a mess of propylene glycol, water and low wines.

Anyhow I salvaged the worm and put it in a new drum. This time I cut the top out of a 60 litre fermenter and used that instead.

This is the worm, as when I rearanged my photos the old links stopped working.



It now lives in this drum, which is sitting on the old one for comparison.





Whilst I was at it I reconfigured the water in / out to use a single hole in the drum. The tap is on the supply line and the centre pipe is the output. It feeds from the surface so that hot water drains away and maintains the water 1" below the rim of the drum. Cold in at the bottom, hot out from the top. The drain is the vertical 1/2" tube inside the smallest coil.



I am rebuilding the still room to fit two new stills. This worm is going on a pot still that uses a 100 litre keg running on 6kw ( 2 of 3kw immersion elements) and a 20 litre stock pot as a thumper. (The small keg is for a VM/CM column)



It will be 2" from keg to thumper, 1.4" 0ut of the thumper that will step down to 1" and then 3/4" feed into the worm. The 100 litre keg is to leave plenty of headspace for foaming, as it will be mainly used for rum. Physically its not that much bigger than a standard 50 litre keg, just a bit wider round the middle. It should do the job OK. Building in a much stronger support for the worktop!!!

[Scurrillous]

A shoutout to a previous post that helped me with my still.
Thank you myles for your great post. It helped me when I realised my 3/8" diameter copper was going to be too restrictive.
I remembered seeing your pictures and I ended up building a worm with two coils.
I am just getting started and work like yours is such a help.

Here is a pic of mine. I love that plastic bucket.