5 gallon Bucket Condenser

[valleydawg]

My small condenser is not cutting it and I am looking at use a five gallon bucket and using my garden hose to run water in and out. Is there a kit for the garden hose fitting for the bucket (male and female) and should the water enter the top or bottom of the bucket. Also what is the best temp to keep the water? I am sure this has been asked but I could not find it searching. Thanks Valleydawg

[jedneck]

How big is your boiler. If boiler and flake stand are the same size I believe you don't need to change out water. Long as distillate is coming out under 140ish° f don't need to change water out. Top can be steaming. If you have running water a libig is a lot handier.

[yakattack]

Hay valley,

I'm going to start by saying I am new myself so don't take my word as golden. As for a kit no I don't think there is and nor would it be worth it considering how quickly and easily you can make that with a few parts from the hardware store for under 10 bucks. Have water enter towards the bottom and exit about 3/4 from your fill line. And you only want it cold enough to make sure that all the vapor is being knocked down. Otherwise you're shock cooling which if I understand correctly is to be avoided.

If you were wanting to go this route I would personally suggest 1 of two options.

1. Get a large barrel ( garbage can, rain barrel, ext) that is sanitary. Use it to collect your outflow and use that water for your next mash. This way your not wasting water.

2. Again get a barrel of some sort, and fill it. Get a pond pump to circulate the water from the barrel to the 5 gallon bucket. This way your not wasting a ton of water (money) and you can manage the cooling this way.

That being said let me say this. I did exactly that and found the five gallon bucket method to be lacking. I was consistently having to check and re check and recheck.. You get the idea. Have you considered going with a lieburg condensor? Very very easy to make. Just made mine. I know from other members who have been at this a long long time that it is more efficient method than the traditional worm in a bucket.

There are many how to's for a lieburg here and if you get stuck you can ask as there are many people who will help you if you've taken the time to do a little work yourself first.

Just my humble opinion from one to another.

[valleydawg]

Thanks. I have a 5 gallon boiler so I may be OK.

[shadylane]

My small condenser is not cutting it and I am looking at use a five gallon bucket and using my garden hose to run water in and out. Is there a kit for the garden hose fitting for the bucket (male and female) and should the water enter the top or bottom of the bucket. Also what is the best temp to keep the water? I am sure this has been asked but I could not find it searching. Thanks Valleydawg

If I had access to a garden hose and was building a new condenser I'd make a liebig
Honestly, it doesn't matter if you add cold water to the top or bottom of the flake stand.
The cold water will be on the bottom in a couple of seconds.
The best temp to keep the water ? What ever it takes to knock down the vapor.
Bubba keeps the water in his flake stand hot enough to cook in.
At the bottom it's almost cold. He pours the water in with a bucket and lets the excess spill out the top.

[Hound Dog]

I find that if you just put the cold water on the top it will huff a bit plus you don't drain off the hot water. Just stick the hose all the way to the bottom so it fills the bottom. An extra fitting is an extra leak. Near the top put a bulkhead fitting like this one, screw in a hose adapter and a garden hose so it will drain the hot water off the top and maintain the gradient of your cooling.

[rad14701]

I'd stick with cold in the bottom and hot out the top so as not to even marginally upset the natural temperature gradient from top to bottom... Bubba may do what works for him but that doesn't make it right... He'd be dumping less water if he did though, even if only a couple buckets over the course of a run... With a right-sized flake stand the temperature gradient has an impact on the overall flavor profile... That's part of the magic of using a flake stand... There's some physics going on in there...

[robb]

I have a too small flake stand for my 5 gal pot still. Tried many times to build a larger worm and couldn't get the gradient right so went to Harbor frt and got a little $8 fountain pump, put it in a 5 gal bkt of cold water with a 1/4" tube to the bottom of my flake stand and it just recirculates very nicely. I seem to run slower than most so I have to change out a bucket once before I'm done. If I had spent my time on building a liebeg instead of trying on the worm I probably would have been better off. But this works for me well enough now. I am a novice so grain of salt.

[goinbroke2]

Dunno if the pictures will work, 25ft of 1/2" copper coiled in a 20L pail. I used water fittings from Canadian Tire for the hoses and drilled a hole just big enough to get the copper tube through and siliconed the poop out of it. I also added in-line taps so I could vary the amount of water flowing. (cold in the bottom, hot out the top)

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[muscashine]

I watched a friend of mine run his still a couple of times. He had a nicely built 20 foot copper worm but it was only 1/4" in diameter, coming off a 4 gallon pot (that he would put about 3 gallons in). The top of the 5 gallon bucket would be hot but the bottom would be cool at the end of the run. The he would siphon off the hot water, and add more cold. Of course, with only 3 gallons it didn't take very long. He'd do two stripping runs and then dump it all back in and do a final spirit run. The worm seemed a little small to me but the stream trickled out nicely.