Liebig for reflux condenser?

[YankeeDistiller]

Hi fellow distillers,

I've read as much as possible here, and I see that liebigs can be very effective at removing heat from the vapor. But all the designs I see using liebigs, use them only for cooling the condensed product, and not for reflux condensers. Why is that?

With my skills, it will be much easier to make liebigs than wind coils. I plan to make a VM rig with a liebig for reflux and another for cooling the output. What's the downside?

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to my education.

Yank

[rad14701]

YankeeDistiller, the main reason you don't see as many reflux condensers on columns is due to height restrictions... If you were to mount the condenser at a 30 - 45 degree angle off perpendicular then you can overcome that issue... The angled reflux head has been used successfully in Europe for many years, but most of those are running a coiled condenser...

If you were to run a large bore liebig you would probably want to utilize packing or some other means of baffling to slow down the vapor and attain thermal transfer... The reason most liebigs work so well is because the outlet is aimed downward so the vapor keeps rising until it eventually cools and collapses into liquid form again... With an upward angle you would need to offset the tendency to rise...

[Dnderhead]

the closest thing whould be a "cold finger" several have been used. thou many look more complicated than a coil.

(do search)