Brendan's Plated Column Build

[Brendan]

I have had my build thread up on another forum for about 9 months now, and thought it about time to contribute and present it here for you fine folk. Hopefully some may get some ideas or encouragement for their own build, and for the rest, maybe just enjoy lots of pictures and videos

My original build thread was a challenge I had set myself to complete a very thorough design in only 6 weeks. Unfortunately it pushed out to about double that, but I am so happy with the final result that I couldn't care less!

So keep in mind the following posts were presented over a 3 month period...it's a long journey, so pull up a chair and enjoy

[Brendan]

So i've decided to jump in head first, join everyone else and build myself a bubbler.

I have been making do with my 3" Pot and 3" VM and have perfected a nice vodka (in my opinion ), but as some of you may have seen I have put everything over the last 12 months into researching the production of a decent whisky, and in particular a Scotch-like single malt whisky.

I am in the middle of also setting up a bit of a brewery at home to deal with the All-Grain side of things, including my new mash tun with rotating sparge arm (wank factor ), but I will leave that for another thread when everything comes together.

Here i'll stick with the bubbler build, and seeing as I have a bit of downtime over the next 5 to 6 weeks, I have decided to set myself a challenge/timeline to motivate me to push through and get it finished. The timeline i've set is 6 weeks, which ends on Sunday 3rd March

I am planning to build the usual 4", 4 perforated plate bubbler, with each plate it's own modular section. The modularity I want for future proofing, so that I can both add or subtract plates, as well as make new plates and slot them in for experimental purposes.

This is obviously very common at the moment amongst a lot of us, and i'm not doing anything new, just collaborating people's ideas. But i'm a bloke with average tool skills, and if people can follow that over a timeline and relate it to themselves, I thought it might be interesting.

I figured i'll document it all like a diary and see how we go...i'll put up lots of pictures as they keep everyone interested.

Here goes nothing...

[Brendan]

Day 1

This morning I headed down to the metal scrapyard. At the right price, I raided what I thought I could use there. After buying from plumbing stores, and some from Reece (expensive plumbing store in Australia) on my last build, I learnt my lesson.

I picked up a nice big piece of 4" about 1800mm,
a 1600mm piece of 3" (don't even know if i'll use it, but after paying $200 for a piece on my first build, I was grabbing this at $30!),
also some long cuts of 1 1/2", 1", 3/4", 1/2".
Only thing I couldn't get was 2"...fairly important, but i'll keep lookin

I also grabbed some goodies like the $39 Bunnings Dremel copy and cutting discs, as well as a cobalt 1.5mm drill bit for the plate holes

Will probably get myself some Map gas tomorrow with the ts8000 torch, as I think it's going to come in handy in certain areas (reflux condenser tubes )

I'll be into the shed this week, cutting these sections up and having a go at my first ezy flange

[Brendan]

Week 1 Summary

So as promised, here's a heap of pics to keep the build diary up to date

I cut up some 3" pipe and flattened it out, to cut out the plates. Tried a few methods, and ended up being most successful with the imitation demel tool.

Cut and sanded a heap of pieces ready...

And here's what $300+ at Midway Metals (stainless supplier in Australia) looks like

[Brendan]

As for the flaring tool, I cut a slot the width of the 4" pipe wall in some flat bar. By levering the flare out slowly around the pipe, it does about 75% of the work without picking up a hammer

I went a bit far on the first try and put a few little tears in the lip, so found I just hd to take it small angles around the pipe, until i'd been around it about 3 times...then finish it off and suare it out with a hammer and anvil.

After my f*@# up earlier on in the week...(I went all the way through making an easy easy flange with 1/2" tube, and didn't realise until i put the thing on and it looked ridiculous )

I went and got 30m of 1/4" (Because Reece were not getting $11.75/metre ), and got to work on the easy flanges.

I put a few flanges together tonight, so its all underway now, I can see her starting to take shape

[Brendan]

Seeing as i’ve been making my modular bubble plate column using easy flanges, I thought i’d put a few pics up of the double ended easy flange to show anyone that might be considering the same thing.

I was originally going to use 4x4x3 tees for convenience, but after adding the cost of them up and then getting my hands on 4” pipe very cheaply, I took this cheaper route, and am happy so far with the result.

I was not happy with the first couple, but soon got the hang of it and am consistently making them nice and square now

Flared pipe end

1/4" hard soldered ring over flared end

Hammer flat, get square, and soft solder ring to complete flange

Make sure you slide the second 1/4" ring on before flaring the end! I learnt this the hard way about 5 times

Slide the ring down into place, hammer flat, and soft solder to complete the double easy flanged section

[Brendan]

All nice and square and cleaned up to finish

[Brendan]

Week 2 Summary

I didn’t get a lot done this week, due to having a life So I am really keen to get into the shed over the following week.

I had managed to get 4 modular sections together last week, but some of them weren’t completely square, and the column looked like a crooked piece of shit when I clamped it all together.

So the time that I got this week, I cut and made up sections 5 and 6, as well as the blank piece to connect to the boiler. I finally got them pretty square and am pretty happy with the result now.

Took a lot of messing around until my arm was numb from hours of hammering though!

I went for another trip down to the scrapyard this weekend, in particular looking for 2” and 1”...and guess what I found!!?? (That big piece of 2" is about 2.4m long)

It almost looks like someone’s building a still

6 plate modular column taking shape... (and a friggen straight one finally!)

Have drawn up plans on paper for the reflux condenser...looking at 3” with 4x 1” tubes. Just a mockup with 2 little pieces sitting in there...

A lot should happen this week...I’ve got the 3” setup on a mate's milling machine, ready to drop my big 4” holesaw through it and hopefully make some neat scallop cuts to mount sight glass ports.

Depending on time, i’ll be doing what I can of the reflux and product condensers and hopefully have them finished.

Current thoughts are the 2” product condenser with 5 x ½” tubes in it...I have a fair bit of these so can make it fairly long...

Cheers

[Brendan]

So the last few days managed to get some of the sight glass ports worked out, and starting to take shape.

Went round to the grandparents place to use the workshop

Put the 4" holesaw through my only piece of 3"

And found out of sheer luck that the diameter of the belt sander was perfect, got to get lucky sometimes!

Cut down and cleaned up a bit, ready for soldering. Most of them are a great fit.

A little mockup of the column with 4 of the ports on

I think i'm going to end up going with soft soldering on these sight glass ports...as any attempt to get a piece hot enough to silver braze will well and truly melt my soft soldered easy flanges...I have thought of heat sinks and wet towels, but don't think it's worth the risk...plus a couple of them have little gaps which are much easier to fill with soft solder

Rock on plated columns

[bellybuster]

lookin real good so far. can't wait to see more.

[Brendan]

LESSON LEARNED TODAY: Don't flare sight glass flanges!

So I set out today to see about putting easy flanges on these sight glass ports.

I made my 3" rings and brazed them up...

Then cut a new slot in my flaring bar to fit the 3" pipe...flared it out and...well it looked like shit

I realised that these didn't really need to strength on the 4" column modules anyway, so why not just flstten the 1/4" tube and solder it on there...and it turned out brilliant!

Notice a difference?

And I wonder which one looks more like the SS ferrule?

[Brendan]

I think i'm going to attach these flanges to the ports with hard solder (silver braze), so that I can hit them with plenty of heat to soft solder them onto the column and not worry about melting the flange rings...seeing as hard solder doesn't flow with capillary action, so might just "tack" it on if I think it doesn't need a vapour seal...which I don't think it will as the silicone seal would cover that join anyway, but see how we go...

Looks pretty schmick to me

[humbledore]

Post faster! I keep hitting refresh. Good stuff!

[Brendan]

Sent a new keg off with a boilermaker mate today to weld on element sockets, 4" ferrule on top, as well as a 4" fill port

So keen to be 'stepping up'


This week has been slow, but I spent a fair bit of time getting all of the sight glass ports cleaned up/filed/sanded after being brazed. They all are nice and shiny and ready to be attached to the column now

Spent most of today playing with seals for the sight glasses...after ordering a heap from Mac and cutting a few in various ways and playing around with leak after leak after leak...I ended up going down to Big W and got a silicone baking sheet...

I cut up a heap of seals, which were a tad thin, so I had a leak at first...went to double gaskets and Wahlah!

The downside...the only silicone sheet was red...and now it's growing on me

*Just a note: I am fully aware of the fact that silicone breaks down in acetone, and after many hours of research I had no option left but to conduct experiments for myself. While I did verify that the silicone leaches into 100% pure acetone...I was able to leave these seals in a jar of just pure foreshots, and there was no breakdown/leaching over a period of several months...therefore I felt satisfied with the safety of their use. Safety is of paramount concern to me, and through these experiments, I guess I found that acetone is not such a large component of foreshots as we think...although they sure do smell like it.

[Brendan]

I poured as much water in as they would hold and left to check for leaks.

Finally with a double silicone sheet gasket, I had a seal! Left it for a few hours just to make sure

SPOILER ALERT: Due to the new seals, I have decided on an unexpected name for the new rig, but will let you ponder until it's done...

[The KYChemist]

Those silicone gaskets are going to have a lot of people seeing "red", on this forum. Pun intended.

[just sayin]

WoW Brendan, you have build a thing of beauty! Just love lusty copper porn.........Just Sayin'

[Brendan]

WoW Brendan, you have build a thing of beauty! Just love lusty copper porn.........Just Sayin'

Thanks mate...i'm only warming up

[Brendan]

Okay time for a bit of an update...this prob won't be too interesting as most have seen it all before, but keeping in the spirit of this thread i'm putting up lots of pics

Only one week to go, so coming into the home stretch. Unfortunately we're away for a few days for a family funeral, but you can't foresee these things Although it may look a long way off I have a lot planned later this week, so hopefully can bring it home at the finish line

I marked out all 6 of my perforated plates (1.59mm holes (1/16"), on 5mm grid), as well as the end plates for the reflux condenser (3" with 4x 1/2" inner tubes).

Started cutting out the holes...the ones on the left aren't done as I was trialling my cutting method to see how well it worked before going ahead. Only had a 20mm holesaw, so used that and used the dremel and file to get the rest of the way.

Pretty bloody good fit if you ask me

[Brendan]

Bit of a mock-up...

[Brendan]

Got my first perforated plate drilled...

After 3 weeks of hammering until my arms fell off...here is the bain of my existence...

It's finally plumb/straight!! I thought it was at first however I was only checking the level where the plates sit, however when looking from the side, even by eye I could notice a big curve up the side. This had to be the absolute worst part of this build...if you want to make a modular bubbler completely out of easy flanges, be prepared to become one with your hammer

The plate is not flat anymore as you can see from all the center punches, but i'll have that flattened back out after I do the other 5

And after lots of trial and error and plenty of leak testing, my sight glasses are all ready to be attached to the column

Ooh I hope she lives up to her name!

[Hound Dog]

The name of your tower housing this red eye has to be "Barad-dur"or "Lugburz" in the dark speech as this was the name of the tower that housed The Eye of Sauron watching over the black land of Mordor.........

Yea, I know, I was way too into Tolkien....

[Brendan]

Got my 2" shotgun product condenser mocked up yesterday...cut the end plates and vapour tubes and fit them together ready for soldering into the shell...pretty happy with it edit: It's 500mm long

Got most of the major parts together, now left with lots of soldering over the weekend, and to put all the fittings together

[Brendan]

Well it’s obvious now that I did not complete this build within the 6 week timeframe. After a quick start, there were quite a few hold ups towards the end, but that is only to be expected. I lost 4 out of the 6 weekends to family commitments, weddings, and a funeral. All of that aside, I could see the finish line at the 6 week mark and was a great motivation to push on.

Strangely enough, as soon as the 6 week mark hit, my whole week opened up with free time...but i’ll take it where I can get it. At the moment, I see it finished within the 8 week mark, which is still a great result for an amateur still builder as far as i’m concerned.

So to push on, this week saw the condensers put together and boy did they come up a treat. Both the reflux and product condensers were leak free on the first go!

Here’s the 3” reflux condenser, with 4x 1” vapour tubes...this one came together without any difficulty at all.

[Halfbaked]

Brendan don't we know each other. You are my brother. Right?

[Brendan]

The product condenser on the other hand was more of a pain. Due to the smaller area, there were some very thin bits between holes. When twisting the tubes a bit, these started to tear...you wouldn’t know after soldering though, it looks like they are all large areas between holes and the solder is holding strong.

Had to pile on a fair bit of solder to build it up nice and strong, but looks a beauty once all filed down.

It’s a 2” product condenser, with 5 x ½” vapour tubes.

[Brendan]

Here they are side by side

[Brendan]

Brendan don't we know each other. You are my brother. Right?

Haha

[Brendan]

I made the first attempt at attaching a sight glass to one of the modules. The solder ran everywhere and was a big mess, but after a quick 10 min clean up, it looked a lot better.

After dropping the holesaw through the column, I will probably re-flow the solder briefly to make sure there’s a good seal and will go to work filing and sanding to clean it all up.

Here’s the progress of the first attempt.

The mess before a bit of a clean up...

And after tidying it up slightly...

Getting close now

[Brendan]

So got my boiler back the other day as mentioned...welded sockets for elements, 4" ferrule on top for column connection, and a 4" fill port I've already mocked it up with a 4" sight glass on it

Will also add a drain port, and a large dial thermometer this week.

The other keg is my mash tun in progress, with the top cut out of it.