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Like I said, I've been uneasy with the concept from the beginning. In fact, the "aquatic environment" looks to me like a partial flood, if there is such a thing. But it works, so what the hell, I don't care what it's called.

I agree with Skow69 here. I run a simple 3" slant plate LM filled with lava rock. But when I built it I kept in mind Odin's posts on aquatic states of SPP and I put a sight glass at the top of my packing. I can see when the flood starts to come on, hold it right at the top and then back off the heat just enough to drop it in the column a bit. This seems to be the sweet spot to run at.

Choking and flooding would be the point where the liquid reflux can no longer flow downward, back into the boiler, but, rather, is forced upwards by the building vapor pressure rising up from the boiler... The "aquatic environment" skow69 refers to is a balanced saturation level at which point the liquid reflux can still return to the boiler while the vapor rises from the boiler on up through the packed column, reboiling a portion of the reflux as it descends... It's a fine balancing act to perfect...

Thank you. I think you said, "The aquatic environment is as close as you can get to flooding, without actually flooding." Right?

This is where my brain goes sideways, because there has to be a point there, between normal reflux flow and flooding, where all vertical movement stops, but that can't be, because the boiler is continuously producing more vapor. Does it just keep packing (compressing) into the column? PV=nRT keeps flashing in my head. Either the pressure has to go up, or the temperature down, right?

skow69 wrote:Thank you. I think you said, "The aquatic environment is as close as you can get to flooding, without actually flooding." Right?

That's exactly the way I see it. Controlled flooding.

Kinda like making the packing into one big thick bubble plate in a way . I don't know the physics behind it but it seems to work for me . Packing has to be dense enough to achieve this also. Many times I read about guys not getting the results they expect using mesh or scrubbies and I believe it is because it is not packed tight enough. I use fairly small penny dime sized lava rock in a 3" column to get the density I am looking for.

Just one dog's opinion...

Second run testing. Set everything up. I put in a few elbows to help clean up my water lines. I was able to get in about 2 more scrubbies. I packed them a little tighter too. Heat up was about 1 hour. Stabilized and than pulled off heads. That sounds dirty but it's true. Than restabilized for about 15 minutes. Pulled up the reflux condenser to full open and put the heat to her. 1 quart in 15 minutes at about 82%abv. Turned down the heat . Pulled 1 quart in 30 minutes at about 88%abv. No choking of flooding. Product smells clean and tastes great. Running 15 gallons of gerber at about 8%. I would like to say thanks for everyone's help getting me to my goal.

Riteon copper! Glad to hear it.

Cheers!
skow

Beauty, and from a short column...I like it.

Goodness, is that 12-quart SS pot what you use to collect in? Can you say, "smearing?". I guess you're doing a strip, right?

But it does sound like the reflux process is working for you. Cudos.
ss

The ss pot is just for safety incase of a spill or overflow. I have a quart jar in there for collection.

Forgot to say thanks and give credit to to s-cackalacky for the safety tip. He mentions useing the bigger pot to put my collection jar in on another post.

I'm glad your getting good results.
You really should extend your column though. It's a simple mod that will really bump up that ABV and cleanness of your product.

My 2 cents on flooding would be to recognise the difference between flooding and saturated packing.

This is where a sight glass at the bottom of the column can be useful.
If the packing is too tight and vapour speed increased to the point where reflux can’t return to the boiler this will drop the ABV dramatically.

We need to remember that the vapour that leaves the boiler is still going to be at least 25% water (depending on the wash ABV, it could be much more).
It should become obvious that this excess water will need to be shed out of the column somehow or it will build up and work its way up to the product take off.
This is exactly what happens in a flooding situation in my experience.

I just want to say thanks to all that posted here. I've learned allot just reading through this thread and it has probably changed the course of my next build.
I was going to build a modular VM so that I could switch to a pot set up when I wanted, but now I think I will do a CCVM and just use a SS ferrule at the top that I can cap to go into pot mode.

Triclamp...this is how I cap off the top to go to pot still.

Jacksonbrown wrote:My 2 cents on flooding would be to recognise the difference between flooding and saturated packing.

This is where a sight glass at the bottom of the column can be useful.
If the packing is too tight and vapour speed increased to the point where reflux can’t return to the boiler this will drop the ABV dramatically.

We need to remember that the vapour that leaves the boiler is still going to be at least 25% water (depending on the wash ABV, it could be much more).
It should become obvious that this excess water will need to be shed out of the column somehow or it will build up and work its way up to the product take off.
This is exactly what happens in a flooding situation in my experience.

Great explanation, JB. That definitively answers and backs up what I'll do with the sight glass I have on hand for my CM.

tp

Copperlover how does that thermo in the "T" work for ya.
I see you also have one below the "T"
I would think the one in the "T" would not be of much use in full reflux. What are your thoughts?
I only ask because I'm in the middle of a CCVM build and I got a deal that I couldn't pass up on a thermo and I'm trying to decide where to put it.

The one in the tee does all the work. You are correct that at full reflux it doesn't read very good until you slide the condenser up. Than it reads correctly. the one below the tee reads completely wrong because the reflux is dripping on it all the time.