Brendan's Plated Column Build

Post by **Jimbo** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 1:50 pm

Excellent response Brendan, thanks for the detail. Yes there's lots of talk of plated columns and how the whatsits connect to the conigits, but painfully little about the qualities of the hooch they produce. I love technology, but Im most curious about the product it makes, how neutral can you get and the quality of whiskey produced. You answered both. Im a brandy and whiskey maker primarily, with the occasional need for a batch of neutral. Ive considered a plated column for a while, but only if it allows me to make a great whiskey in 1 run (time save), and a better neutral than my pot makes (not hard to do). Sounds like yes to both based on what you report. Thanks!

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 2:20 pm

Jimbo wrote:Excellent response Brendan, thanks for the detail. Yes there's lots of talk of plated columns and how the whatsits connect to the conigits, but painfully little about the qualities of the hooch they produce. I love technology, but Im most curious about the product it makes, how neutral can you get and the quality of whiskey produced. You answered both. Im a brandy and whiskey maker primarily, with the occasional need for a batch of neutral. Ive considered a plated column for a while, but only if it allows me to make a great whiskey in 1 run (time save), and a better neutral than my pot makes (not hard to do). Sounds like yes to both based on what you report. Thanks!

Jimbo I'm quite surprised by this, as I have spent a bit of time away from this forum...and on some of the international forums, it's all that's talked about!

Basically all reports and the best way to summarise flutes/plated columns are that they really seem to 'compress' the heads and tails, and you get a high ABV output from a single run which carries a lot of flavour through. (ie. whiskey and rum at 90%ABV with flavour, which you would not get if you pot stilled to 90% as it would probably take 3 or 4 runs.) The benefit of this is much shorter aging times. I'm really just experimenting now, but distilling 'rougher' and seeing how they age...

Guys have always said that they are concatenated (stacked/joined/connected) pot stills, and that the sacrifice is that they are not very good at neutral. But 6 plates and a packed section, and it was 'too neutral' for me (diluted to 40%, it's so clean and easy to drink). I know we usually recommend different still types to people depending on what they wish to make, but a plated column really can do it all. The caveat being that a rig like this is not for the novice...for one, it takes a lot of work to make one or a lot of money to buy one, and you really have to understand distillation well to make it worth your while.

For someone like yourself Jimbo, I would say it's a necessity!

Post by **Jimbo** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 2:47 pm

Thanks. As far as 90%, no interest in going there for whiskey. Id prolly stack 2 plates and hope to keep it 80% or less. 75 better. I like esters and flavor in whiskey. If I can do that, and get a larger cut than my usual 60-65% because the heads/tails are compressed more, and do it all in 1 run. Well, then Id be sold. And then if I can load in a pile of feints and stack 4 or 6 plates and pull off a respectable neutral. Well, thats all gravy then.

Post by **googe** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 3:14 pm

Beautiful Brendan, good to see you finally posted it here!

. Glad it's working out for you

. Maybe send jimbo a bottle

, non plate people.just don't understand how much flavor comes through at 90% with one of these

.

Post by **Jimbo** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 3:20 pm

googe wrote:Beautiful Brendan, good to see you finally posted it here! . Glad it's working out for you . Maybe send jimbo a bottle , non plate people.just don't understand how much flavor comes through at 90% with one of these .

haha

Let me know if I should PM you my addy Brendan. LOL. Sounds great googe. But Brendans own statement "...it was 'too neutral' for me" scares me a bit. ?

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 5:57 pm

Jimbo wrote:Thanks. As far as 90%, no interest in going there for whiskey. Id prolly stack 2 plates and hope to keep it 80% or less. 75 better. I like esters and flavor in whiskey. If I can do that, and get a larger cut than my usual 60-65% because the heads/tails are compressed more, and do it all in 1 run. Well, then Id be sold. And then if I can load in a pile of feints and stack 4 or 6 plates and pull off a respectable neutral. Well, thats all gravy then.

That's the thing with these rigs, 75%ABV as you know it isn't the same with a plated column. Just like 85-90% out of a flute is nothing like 85-90% out of a pot still...it must have something to do with the single run versus the many runs that a potstill would take to achieve the same...

Jimbo wrote:But Brendans own statement "...it was 'too neutral' for me" scares me a bit. ?

Don't worry, my "too neutral" comment was in regards to when i was running vodka...I stripped it and was running low wines through 6 plates with a 500mm packed section, and rather than getting 90%+ABV with slight wheat character, i got 95%+ABV pure ethanol

But only because I was maxing out to see what I could achieve...next time i'll be running 6 plates without packed section to see what the result is like (on an all grain vodka, trying to carry over some character).

My whiskey is slightly lighter than my taste, but that was with 4 plates and I ran it really slow. Next run will be 3 plates and push it a bit harder

The joy is that you can do everything at brilliant quality all with the one rig, but you just have to learn what to use and how to run it

Hey, just about all decent craft distilleries have a plated column to play with (although theirs have valves to engage/disengage the number of plates). I know some do a strip in the pot, bypassing the column, and then do a spirit run with 1 plate, which requires a few years aging. And then there's others that strip, and run harder through 3 or 4 plates, and have aged for a year or less...

Post by **Halfbaked** » Wed Dec 11, 2013 6:31 pm

A buddy of mine has one. Its a glass column one. It makes some fine drop. He does strip first on a pot and spirit on the flute. It cleans up the spirit real nice and makes a fine drop. Id like to have one. If your drop taste as good as what it comes out of, it be some might fine drop.

Post by **Danespirit** » Thu Dec 12, 2013 2:25 am

Hound Dog wrote: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....

Refering to Tolkien gives this a touch of fantasy..you like reading Hound dog?

Talking about fantasy....You made yourself a FANTASTIC rig there Brendan..

I really enjoyed this building thread..

Hound Dog · Post by **Hound Dog** » Thu Dec 12, 2013 4:47 pm

Yea, I read a lot. I usually spend my evenings with a good book (or kindle download these days) instead of in front of the TV. I save TV for something mindless to fill in time while the wife and I sample All Bran on Friday and Saturday nights.

Boudy · Post by **Boudy** » Thu Dec 26, 2013 8:05 pm

Hi Brendan: First off, "Beautiful work sir." Your thread has been very informative. I want to run mostly Rum and thought I was going to build a pot still until I read your input on plated columns. Would you explain your take of perforated plates vs bubble cap plates? I mean are they functionally the same yielding similar results? Finally, would you mind sharing some design details to help a guy build his own surge ball? I've seen one for sale someplace online but can't find much info on them.

Thanks,

Boudy

Post by **emptyglass** » Mon Dec 30, 2013 4:26 am

Hi Brendan, good to see ol' red eye again. Glad you posted it here. You have opened some eyes again at what a plated column can do.
They are as close as you get to a 2 trick pony. Vodka made quick and whiskey with flavour, what more does a man need?
Oh, maybe some rum and brandy, but that's coverd too

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Mon Dec 30, 2013 7:55 am

Boudy wrote:Hi Brendan: First off, "Beautiful work sir." Your thread has been very informative. I want to run mostly Rum and thought I was going to build a pot still until I read your input on plated columns. Would you explain your take of perforated plates vs bubble cap plates? I mean are they functionally the same yielding similar results? Finally, would you mind sharing some design details to help a guy build his own surge ball? I've seen one for sale someplace online but can't find much info on them.

Thanks,

Boudy

Hey Boudy,

Sorry I missed this earlier, thanks for stopping by.

I haven't run bubble plates myself. They are functionally the same, the rest comes down to personal preference...some have said one carries through more flavour (has been said for both) and many report not a single difference (apart from the fact that it sucks to drill 300 holes on 6 plates!).

I can indeed help with the surge ball...you don't need to worry about the ball at all...if you have the parrot 'hard-wired' in to the product condenser like I did, all you need is to solder a small piece of copper pipe pointing up at a 45 deg angle from the pipe between the product condense and parrot. This way, no distillate will escape, but the output is vented to the atmosphere and will eliminate surging in the parrot.

As I'm doing this on my phone, I'll try the best graphic I can to explain what I mean...if your tube from PC to parrot is 1/2" and is vertical, then you need a piece of 1/2" facing up at a 45 deg angle and open at one end...

|
|/
|

Worst picture ever I know, but the vertical line is the output pipe after the PC, and it shows the angle I mean of the small vent piece...much easier than constructing a ball with holes. Same principle, with the ball, the distillate dropped through the middle and the holes vented that to the atmosphere. The ball shape is to avoid distillate running out of the holes as they are placed on the upper half of the ball...

Hopefully you could follow all that

emptyglass wrote:Hi Brendan, good to see ol' red eye again. Glad you posted it here. You have opened some eyes again at what a plated column can do.
They are as close as you get to a 2 trick pony. Vodka made quick and whiskey with flavour, what more does a man need?
Oh, maybe some rum and brandy, but that's coverd too

Thanks EG. As far as I am concerned, they are the pinnacle in home distilling. Due to it being modular, my pot still hasn't been used for a year as I just remove the plates...and my VM certainly hasn't come out for a 12hr run!

Boudy · Post by **Boudy** » Mon Dec 30, 2013 8:31 am

Thanks Brendan. I understand exactly what you mean.

Boudy

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Thu Jan 23, 2014 3:42 pm

Here's a few videos which i've been meaning to get up here...

This first one is just of the vinegar cleaning run, getting it all shiny inside and showing one of the plates loading with vinegar

These videos are from the maiden run, which was a sacrificial TPW wash run through the 6 plates plus packed section. Was pretty happy with the 96%ABV output

At the end of this video, you can see the reflux dripping back down from the packed section to the top plate.

This video gives a good view of the parrot and output at 96%ABV at about 2 litres per hour...much better than the drips I used to get from my old VM!

And this last one shows the whole system setup and running some nice vodka from an All Bran/Weet-Bix wash. This run held 96%ABV @ 2L/hr for 4.5 hours

Hope you enjoy watching as much as I enjoy running it!

Horsecreek shine · Post by **Horsecreek shine** » Thu Jan 23, 2014 8:33 pm

Nice job I likes the shiney shit !!!!

BDF · Post by **BDF** » Fri Jan 24, 2014 11:30 am

Love seeing your stack of boxes/chains to get to the right collection height XD

One question I have is what effect does it have if you run with 6 plates and no packed section?
More flavor and lower APV? Higher collection rate? Better/worse/same Heads/Tails compression?

davsmth41 · Post by **davsmth41** » Sat Feb 01, 2014 4:47 pm

Brendan, I'd really like to see each section with its internal parts. Just wondering how I would set that up where I could just add a section. Awesome setup. Nice job

Post by **aquavita** » Sat Feb 01, 2014 7:24 pm

You have set the bar pretty high Brendan!

Bruster · Post by **Bruster** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 4:12 pm

Just my 2 cents lol. I like the sectional build. Just a few hints. If your worried about de soldering a part when you solder a new one, if you have room , wrap a damp rag between new and old soldered part. The rag will act as a heat sink and protect previously soldered parts. I also got real close with my sight glass. I wrapped a thin sheet of wet dry sand paper on the 4" pipe and then rubbed my sight glass pipe on it. Honed it to a perfect fit. I'm going to do one like yours next

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 5:45 pm

BDF wrote:Love seeing your stack of boxes/chains to get to the right collection height XD

One question I have is what effect does it have if you run with 6 plates and no packed section?
More flavor and lower APV? Higher collection rate? Better/worse/same Heads/Tails compression?

Yep more flavour and lower ABV, collection rate unaffected, heads compression fairly similar still...

davsmth41 wrote:Brendan, I'd really like to see each section with its internal parts. Just wondering how I would set that up where I could just add a section. Awesome setup. Nice job

Sorry I missed this, I will get some photos up early next week

Bruster wrote:Just my 2 cents lol. I like the sectional build. Just a few hints. If your worried about de soldering a part when you solder a new one, if you have room , wrap a damp rag between new and old soldered part. The rag will act as a heat sink and protect previously soldered parts. I also got real close with my sight glass. I wrapped a thin sheet of wet dry sand paper on the 4" pipe and then rubbed my sight glass pipe on it. Honed it to a perfect fit. I'm going to do one like yours next

The wet rag is a good tip too Bruster, I have also had good success in the past by using large steel clamps to act as a heatsink around the areas I don't want to get too much heat.

bigal2286 · Post by **bigal2286** » Fri Feb 21, 2014 8:59 pm

Very impressive build and write up. It's got me seeing red and I think some 4" pipe is in my future.

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Sun Feb 23, 2014 7:46 pm

davsmth41 wrote:Brendan, I'd really like to see each section with its internal parts. Just wondering how I would set that up where I could just add a section. Awesome setup. Nice job

Well assuming you know the internals of a plated column (ie. a bubble or perforated plate with a riser, downcomer, and cup), the downcomers do not sit on the plate below but slightly above them, which also gives a bit more wet plate surface area (about 8%).

Referring you back to these photos from the build of the finished plates:

Then I made up my flanges using the 100% silicone baking sheet (which i tested thoroughly, as previously discussed).

I cut two rings, the plate sits on top of one, and inside of the other, so that the modular sections join together smoothly with a double flange.

You can see that the top flange has a slightly larger ID to accomodate the plate.

Might look a bit rough, but the tri-clamp pulls that together tight and i've never had the slightest leak out of any of them

So hopefully that shows you how each module pieces together which the individual plates and sections

BDF · Post by **BDF** » Mon Feb 24, 2014 4:53 am

Those last 4 images answer exactly what had been bugging me about how people might do this without a lathe on hand.

sasquatch83 · Post by **sasquatch83** » Sat Mar 08, 2014 7:15 pm

What is the depth of of your downcomers into the cup and why is it that you left the plates free floating and didn't solder them to the individual sight glass sections? Did you make your sight glass or buy them to spec? What is the thickness? What an amazing post. Thank you so much for all the info!!!!

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Sun Mar 09, 2014 5:50 am

sasquatch83 wrote:What is the depth of of your downcomers into the cup and why is it that you left the plates free floating and didn't solder them to the individual sight glass sections? Did you make your sight glass or buy them to spec? What is the thickness? What an amazing post. Thank you so much for all the info!!!!

Hey Sasquatch,

The depth of the downcomers into the cup isn't a calculated variable...they are down between 1/2 to 3/4, enough to let the liquid out into the cup, which then overflows onto the plate below.

The plates are free for a few reasons. Firstly, because I wanted a completely modular system, where I can change up things without building a new column. This includes building some bubble caps soon and trying them for comparison. So now, I can just put them in. Also, the way the plates sit in the seal, allow a good vapour seal between the modular sections. The only way to solder them in without jeopardising the seal, would have been to make the plates slightly smaller and solder them inside the column diameter, which again comes back to the first point where I wanted complete modularity.

The sight glasses I bought from a fellow hobby distiller who ran the local distilling forum, and had them cut to spec by a glazier. Mine are about 7mm thick, but I think the local guys here use 10mm+ now; they're quite chunky. And they're cut from Borosciliate, of course.

Hopefully that helps and answers your questions. Thanks heaps for the positive feedback, cheers

bigal2286 · Post by **bigal2286** » Sun Mar 09, 2014 7:38 am

Does the J down comer perform differently than the end caps? It might hold more liquid but I don't see how it's different. Great work!

Hound Dog · Post by **Hound Dog** » Sun Mar 09, 2014 7:54 am

It's a cool setup Brendan. I hope to see you make bubble caps soon to see the performance difference.

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Sun Mar 09, 2014 1:06 pm

bigal2286 wrote:Does the J down comer perform differently than the end caps? It might hold more liquid but I don't see how it's different. Great work!

Nope, no different. Many of the non-modular ones i had looked at while researching had each cup soldered onto each plate, and then ended in a J-cup on the bottom one...from seeing this, it was really just an exercise in having a go at making both for my own enjoyment. As you pointed out, both style of vapour lock do the same thing

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Sun Mar 09, 2014 1:08 pm

Hound Dog wrote:It's a cool setup Brendan. I hope to see you make bubble caps soon to see the performance difference.

Thanks HD

I don't expect to see any difference out of the plates. A few have tried and compared and usually report no change...again for me, it would just be for fun so that I have and had tried both types and can play around with the modularity

Brendan · Post by **Brendan** » Thu Mar 13, 2014 10:32 pm

Just thought i'd post up this video.

It's from my latest apple run, and I thought for beginners and those who don't have plated columns/flutes and like to watch them

, it shows how quickly the plates start to load once the column is filled with vapour and it hits the reflux condenser.

The video shows the top plate in a 6 plate configuration,and you can see when it pans down to the second top plate that the window is all foggy, but as the vapours sort themselves out and the plate begins to load, you can see the glass start to clear up

Home Distiller

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