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JD I almost have enough lowe wines to do a 40% all feints run.. I am really looking forward to that. I may know when I make that run.

Nice layouts there Sam...

Made some progress today. Cut the column in two 15 inchers. TIGed the supports. All 316 SS, nuts, rod, and filler.
Second still will be for extra production or for rum, gin, vodka,... Got notches for plate support cross shafts in both columns. Still need to get couplers which will seal and locate the cross shafts. Will also easy flange the couplers.

Looking good JB, that looks like a nice tight fit on those plates...

Keep it commin man, any info I dig up on this theoreticle plate stuff will be posted to ya'll...

does look like a nice fit.
cant wait to see the conection!
spooky

You don’t need to “hang” your plate assemble, just let it sit on your lower reducer or fitting.

There is no need either to fix it in any way, the proper weight will do the job.

Nice work JB... wish I hade me some of those plates man.....

Joe,
I'm going 4 inch all the way to the boiler. No bottom reducer. The threaded rod all the way down will allow me to adjust the distance between the plates. The self contained downcommers with lower caps attached means I don't have to worry about the liquid seal at the bottom. Also, I was wondering about more vapor to liquid contact by having the cup an inch or more above the next lower plate. Maybe even two per plate. Thoughts?

KS,

You do a spirit run yet?

I don't have enough fients yet JB. It is taking longer to get fients with this column. It does a really good job of compressing the heads and tails. I have a bout 6 gallon of fients and I want to wait till I have 10 gallon of fients.

what I ran this weekend wash just sweet feed wash and it produced everything at 88%ABV running pretty fast. I did however turn my burner all the way up once I got warmed up. when I did this the bottom plate started to bubble but only slightly. I cut the burner back down after that, I just did not want to run it that hard.

Looking nice jb

Sorry RC, not much progress. Small stuff, collecting parts, hunting season, work, bla bla bla. I did successfully shrink fit a 4 inch long ferrul to the bottom of my column, but no pcs yet. TIGing up the boiler and working on the worm. Will get pics soon.

Here's the basic stuff unmodified. Will put a cone and 4 inch ferrul on the boiler. The bucket will get opened up on top and fittings near top and bottom to circulate coolant as needed. The worm will be two seperate worms. Just decided to do two stills a little bit ago.

JethroBodine wrote:

HPIM1379.JPG

Here's the basic stuff unmodified. Will put a cone and 4 inch ferrul on the boiler. The bucket will get opened up on top and fittings near top and bottom to circulate coolant as needed. The worm will be two seperate worms. Just decided to do two stills a little bit ago.

Nice Jethro, where did you get those barrels?

Got both on Ebay.

Cooling the fires of hell with all them coils JB?

Very nice.

JethroBodine wrote:Got both on Ebay.

I'll have to keep my eye open. Thanks

Made progress tonight, but forgot camera at home, again Took the 4 inch couplings( I think these are DWV couplings) and successfully flare them Trued them on the lathe and turned them to 4.680" per the sanitary fittings. Nice tight fit and shoud seal up nice Cut the couplers in half as I didn't feel I needed the full4.25 inches of the coupler for support. I hard soldered one on the column which came our perfect Total height from coupling to coupling is 15 11/16". No reason, just happened that way When I got to the ( insert explative here) dephlag, the flared coupling slipped almost 3/8" while I was brazing and I didn't notice until I was done. Now it has a bit of a left hand tilt. I figured that a sign to just pack up and go home. I'll try to fix it and take some pics this weekend. Starting to look like a column

So JB, where are those pics you were going to take???
I happily read through this thread only to come to an incomplete ending.

axle1960 wrote:So JB, where are those pics you were going to take???
I happily read through this thread only to come to an incomplete ending.

ME TOO G'DAMNIT!

nice read and you have done what i was considering doing in respect to your dephleg.. i know it is possible now to do what i planned.

also, its been a while but is it possible you can post to us or PM me with who was the seller of them shinny barrels? I have been looking for a SS 55'er for a while. I would like also like to entertain the idea of a 30 gallon barrel for my smaller stills. It would be nice to keep the options open.

I also eagerly await the modifications your doing to your drum with the dome/funnel top and flange. what do you intend to use as a heat source for your boiler?

TIA

IzzyB

Izzy_Britton wrote:
also, its been a while but is it possible you can post to us or PM me with who was the seller of them shinny barrels? I have been looking for a SS 55'er for a while. I would like also like to entertain the idea of a 30 gallon barrel for my smaller stills. It would be nice to keep the options open.

The 50 litre (15 gallon approx ) look good, and I think are a little shorter than kegs. have you tried a drum reconditioning place like

http://www.thecarycompany.com/container ... tml#recons" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow I don't know what those type of companies are like on small orders. There is a place like that close to me, I'm going to check them out at some stage.

How are the clamp bands JB? do you get a good seal?

Only concern I have is some are constructed with crevices - it might be problematic ie

Sorry guys, winter is VERY busy for me and I haven't had time to work on the stills.

Izzy, I'll get the sellers name to you tonight.

I've mocked up the top cone on a 15 gallon drum( they are about $100 from the guy I bought mine from) and the 55s are under $200.

The bevels in the side of the 55 are triangular so I don't forsee a problem. Good point on the bottom, however, I will be rinsing between runs, or at the end of the day if doing multiple runs in a day, and I've never scrubbed a boiler clean unless I burnt a mash running too fast.

Origional plan was ti fire it with propane, but I'm looking into steam injection. Haven't got far down that road, but could be fun.

I got the 55 gallon drums from 513fitworks on ebay. He usually has a few listed all the time. Nice condition and ships through the regular mail. That was the talk of the poor little town's post office when I got mine. Nearly filled the place and I had to pick it up as it wouldn't fit in the little Jeep they had

Ummmm, about the dephlag....I, um, well, tried to reheat and move the flange....andsortofdestroyedthef*ing thing It take a LOT of heat to remelt StaySilv 15. That's my excuse,... Yeah it was the heat

Skanky bits... Love it.

From some online Websters dictionary:

Part of Speech Definition
Adjective 1. Highly offensive; arousing aversion or disgust.[Wordnet]
2. Rarely used base adjective of the adverb skankily.[Eve - graph theoretic]

Soon they will add:
3. Technical term used in distilling to describe the undesirable dregs or leavings of the distilling process.[homedistiller.org]

been thinking of going to steam myself...Supper efficient..

ozone39 wrote:been thinking of going to steam myself...Supper efficient..

I would enjoy following a thread on a steam powered setup.

What happened ? Did this got thread get moved or what? Just read 8 pages and see Jan. last entree OPPs.

acfixer69 wrote:What happened ? Did this got thread get moved or what? Just read 8 pages and see Jan. last entree OPPs.

View the previous posters profiles and see when the last time they visited the site was... I think you'll find that several are no longer active members here...

Nice build ! Any more pics ?

Hey Guys, Sorry for not posing in a while. My plans to go legit are moving VERY slowly, to the point that it feels like I'm stuck halfway through a step and can't quite finish it.

My build is still about where it was, but I'm thinking about finishing the column and the dephlag just to keep my spirits( pun intended) high and to get me motivated.

Unfortunately I no longer have access to a lathe, so I can't make anymore discs. I have enough for my purposes, but none to spare.

Good points that this is an incomplete build. I think I've found some free time in my schedule.