Home Distiller

I'm distilling indoors and water seems to be the cheapest thing to use in the bain marie. I haven't tried it yet but I'm picturing a sauna with all the windows all steamed up. Any ideas on a safe way to recycle some of it...like a column, liebig, or condenser coil. Thanks for lettin' me bug y'all

Not quite getting your question....as the water in the lower pot is to "heat" the upper pot. You wouldn't want to be circulating that water out to cool it. And I dont' know how you'd capture the bits of steam that come off the pot. I haven't used a bain marie. But my guess would be that one small enough to fit on top of your stove...probably isn't going to be producing "that" much heat/steam into the air. It's not like an open pan/pot of water. There is little exposed to the air between the jackets/pots, so the vaporization rate of the water would be less. There are a few members here using them, or who have used them, so hopefully someone will chime in.

Also, you have to use energy to heat the water...to heat the bain marie. And you are distilling inside where there is no wind or insulation issues. My understanding is the main purpose of the double boiler type setups ..is to keep solids in your still from sticking/burning. Solids like fruit, etc..like making grappa or brandy from whole fermented fruit carcasses, etc. Or, distilling fermented grains without having to strain off and clear.

You are correct about the sauna. I started with a water filled double boiler and the problem is the leakage between the inner and outer pots. When the water boils in the bath, (and it has to boil to get a decent transfer of energy because the thermal gradient is so low), you get steam leaking out between your inner pot and the outer pot.

Even if you upgrade the seals to eliminate it, you have to include a vent as these things are not usually intended to opperate under pressure. You would be surprised, or not, at the quantity of steam that comes off the vent. You can do things to minimise it. 1 is to extend the vent into a tube that reaches below the water level in the bath. The steam will push water up this tube so be carefull.

Really if you wish to do this indoors you need to vent the steam outside or recover it with a condenser, but that just increases your energy bill. Steam is fine outside, or if you have it in a closed loop, but for indoor use it is hard to avoid the sauna effect.

It is why I use glycol instead of water in my indirectly heated boiler. I would like to use a steam boiler with a steam jacketed boiler, but I suspect that will be some time off.

There you go GBoy. Thanks myles for picking that up.

Now I have seen on a steam setup for cooking corn. Where the output of the boiler went to a T. From that T it had the pipe coming out the side to go over and heat the corn. The upper part of the T had the control valve on it with a liebig condenser above it. So that when the valve was opened so no steam was going to the corn. The liebig would knock down the steam back into the boiler. I think Minime had this setup?

Now this could be adapted to a double boiler. Instead of routing it outside. Route it so it goes through a liebig type condenser. And the condensed water falls back into the boiler section. I don't see why this wouldn't work.

Thanks Myles, I was afraid of that. Prairie that's exactly what I had in mind. It does seem a bit complicated, but fun at the same time

That was Pintoshine...and I think that setup was for cooking corn with steam. Had it's own issues to deal with (pressure build up, release valve, etc). But, I'm not sure how returning cool (condensed) water back to the boiling pot jacket is going to help or work in this situation? Wouldn't that just cool the boiling water and continually break the boil? And cause even "more" steam? Be great if your stove was right next to a window. Just open the window.

you need vertical liebig has tall has you can with warm cooling fluid/water so that the drip back is still very hot but vapors don't go trough.

multiples is the key word here so there's no pressure to push the steam trough.
multiple vertical liebigs.

Usge it would be just like a reflux still returning reflux to the boiler. That doesn't stop the boil. So I don't see why this would. The thing is it wouldn't be worth recycling the steam if you had to use tap water to cool the liebig. You would waist more water then you save. If you used a reservoir for the cooling. Then you mite. But it would be a safer way to discharge the steam. And keep your room from turning into a sauna.

I just got my coupling in the mail today, but apparently the old lady ordered a 1/2". I hope I can get a 1" and have it welded on before my mash is ready. I've decided to move my setup close to the window in the garage just in case my first run gets too steamy. I'll let you guys know how it goes