Graham Condenser

[Deerhunter]

Built my product cooling condenser. Made a Graham using a piece of 2" x 12" with a 3/8" coil inside. My question is do I need a valve on the water outlet side. I've seen some setups with two valves. Example: Hillbilly stills has a valve for the take down condenser and a by-pass valve. I understand the valve on the take down condenser but what is the purpose of the second valve?

Shouldn't the product condenser flow wide open all the time without a valve?

[shadylane]

IMHO Only one valve is needed and it should be on the cooling water inlet of the condenser.
Also, a needle valve gives better control than a gate or ball valve.
If running a reflux still, the product and reflux condensers need separate control valves.

[Hound Dog]

Deerhunter, having the valve is handy for some but not an absolute on a product condenser. If you are running off of tap water instead of recirculating for example, you would want to minimize your water usage and avoid waste. If your water is too cold, you may experience huffing from vapor collapse and you could cut down your flow to help control that. For the most part though, I think you will find that using a recirculating system, you will just run it wide open like you suggest.

A reflux condenser does require a bit of control usually though, but that was not your question.

[Deerhunter]

Did my Graham condenser over as per Rad's recommendation. Moved my water in and out stubs as high and low as I could get them. As he mentioned this would help minimize air pockets. Makes perfect sense to me. Thanks Rad!