WORM SIZING

[Kegger4now]

Hey everyone...need opinions...I have a keg boiler with 2" lift that reduces down to 1/2" worm coil....but I cant find an idea of how long my 1/2" coil should be for condensing? Ideas?? Thank you in advance!

[Kegger4now]

Anyone???

[myles]

You have to match the worm length to your heat input. There is a calculator on the main site that will do it for you. Also consider the water in the bucket, if you are going to circulate you can use a smaller bucket. For example the extreme scenario is a graham condenser, a worm in a small bucket with a fast water flow.

But you must start with your power input.

[rad14701]

If you will be using a static worm bucket, without replacing or circulating the water, make sure the "bucket" (flake stand) holds more water than your largest potential boiler charge...

[Kegger4now]

I was loking at this calculator lastnight but have some questioms...what to put in for heat input? I am using a gas burner? What is this number factored from?

[rad14701]

I was loking at this calculator lastnight but have some questioms...what to put in for heat input? I am using a gas burner? What is this number factored from?

As a rough estimate, if you can determine BTU's and divide them by 3.4 you will be close on Watts... There is a topic kicking around that explains how to calculate BTU's by heating water but you'll spend a lot of time and gas experimenting...

[Kegger4now]

awsome..and what about vapor temp? Is this the temp inside keg?

[myles]

A good rule of thumb is 20 foot length of worm, although if you are using a big burner you might need more. And yes the temperature is for the vapour temperature just before the condenser, as you could possibly be shedding a bit of heat by air cooling along the way. To start with just leave the temperatures at the default settings - it will give you a benchmark to work from.

You can probably look up a BTU figure for your burner in the manufacturers specifications.

BTU multiplied by 0.000293 = kW
kW multiplied by 3414 = BTU

[Dnderhead]

it a hard question,if the cooling water is stagnant you are going to need a lot more that if its running water

[Runt]

Can a worm be to long or to cold?
Cold worm vs warm worm?
How does it affect the spirits?
Thanks

[Ben]

Could be too long to be practical, takes up too much space, costs too much, too much distillate pooling inside, requires too large of reservoir.

Generally its better if your distillate is coming of cool, ensures you aren't going to start producing vapor, this is especially true if your operating a new still, or don't have a ton of experience.

Will have little affect on spirit, whatever is in the worm from the column is going to come out either way. If you were much too long I suppose you could get some smearing.


You can open a new topic for a question when the thread is this old

[Runt]

Why would I want to open a new thread when this was the topic I wanted to talk about?
I had already read this one and responders should have already read this thread. If I had opened a new thread it would end up repeating what was said here. I don't understand opening a new thread.