Higgins 4" 3 sieve plate column build

[higgins]

I received my parts this week and have been playing with them a bit. Total cost of these parts: $293 including shipping.

Parts

One sight glass assembled with blank copper plate in it. The plate sits on the sight glass base, and the PTFE wrapped gasket holds it in place.

Sieve plate / downcomer design

Now to get busy drilling the plates and making the downcomers.

[Ben]

Looks great! I don't think you want your downcommers to come down so far, when you really load up the plates they will be submerged. It will make it sensitive during initial plate loading. They only need to drop down far enough to clear.

Initial loading:

[Setsumi]

Well done to get started.

[Sporacle]

Good to see your on your way Higgins, good luck.
Possibly look at putting a flair on the top of the downcomer as well, heard it helps.
Looks like its going to be a great still

[higgins]

Update: Yesterday I drilled the sieve plates and made the downcomers. Then I assembled it and tooks some pics.

My plates were made from .04" x 4" D 99.99% pure copper disks I found on Amazon. A 5-pack for $32 shipped

01-CopperDisk.jpg (3.6 KiB) Viewed 7311 times

Drilled plate - 5/64" holes - 9% open area;
3/4" dia downcomer, 1" dia cap tack soldered; PTFE wrapped gasket

02-Plate.jpg (12.02 KiB) Viewed 7311 times

Plate assembled. I reduced the downcomer length to 5 1/2"

03-PlateAssembled.jpg (11.55 KiB) Viewed 7311 times

Now to assemble the sight glasses with the plates:
First I removed the top collar and glass cylinder from the assembly. It is attached to the one below for stability while being reassembled

Now with plate assembly and gasket

Assembled

Continued in next post

[higgins]

View from the top

Assembled 3 plate column

I decided to run it last night just with water. I didn't want to do the vinegar run yet because I still need to build a shotgun condenser. I assembled it with a 4" to 2" SS reducer, 2" SS tee/elbow, attached my leibig, and dropped in my CCVM RC coil. Popped my 3500W element into the boiler, put about 5 gallons water in it, and fired it up. As the steam came up it started to load the plates. My RC was at 100% reflux and after about 10 minutes all 3 plates were fully loaded, but not anywhere near flooding. at 100% power my RC knocked everything down with a fairly small flow of water. I'm pretty sure it will handle 5500W.

This was the easiest thing to build ... I'll bet I don't have 10 hours into it, and that includes PTFE wrapping 6 4" gaskets.

So a few questions for the plate operators:
It seemed to behave exactly as expected with water only - is this a good indicator of how it will perform with low wines?
My plate depth is 1/2", with 3/4" downcomers. What effect will increasing the plate depth have?

Once I get my 2" shotgun condenser built I'll do my vinegar and sac runs, but that will be another week or so.

I'm also working on a steam rig, but that is another story.

[Saltbush Bill]

Nice job on the plates.

[Setsumi]

Myself would not increase plate depth, at 9% open area and 1/2" depth I think you are at optimal to balance your plates with power.

Check out this by theflying dutchman. I know it is old but it clarifies plates well.
viewtopic.php?t=37618

[higgins]

Thanks SBB, and thanks Setsumi for the reference to dutchman's post. I saw that a few months ago when I first began contemplating a flute build, but didn't understand it nearly well enough. Going back to re-read I now 'get it' much better than before.

This was incredibly easy to make (< 10 hours time), will be very easy to add more if desired, and a pretty low cost (Approx $70 USD per plate section). I'll probably stick with 3 plates unless there is a compelling reason to add more.

I'm getting started on my 2" shotgun condenser build today.

I could not have done this without all the knowledge and help from the folks on this forum. Thanks to all who participated in my Understanding Plated Columns before I build thread.

[Hoosier Shine9]

Higgins,

Looks good.
welcome to the "dark side"..... lol


hs9

[higgins]

I finished my shotty (2" x 20", 4 1/2" tubes) this past week, so today I did my vinegar and sacrificial alcohol runs on my new plater and shotty. The alcohol was 2 gallons of high feints (>80%) diluted down to 35%, about 4.5 gallons.

I started it out at 100% power (3500W) and once the plates started to fill I backed it down to 60% power (2100W). My reflux coil was all the way down, 100% reflux.

I ran it about 10 minutes and it was very stable with the 3 plates about half full (majority was large bubbles - liquid was 1/4-1/2 inch).
So generally with the sac run I'd just blast thru it like a stripping run, but I thought I'd take the time to learn how the still wants to behave.

I raised the RC and ran it at a slow-med drip for 10 min.
Raised RC again to a broken to steady stream @ 1 LPH for 10 min.
Raised again, steady stream @ 1.4 LPH for 10 min.
Raised again, heavier stream at 1.8 LPH for 10 min.
Raised again, heavier stream at 2.4 LPH for 10 min.

Each time I changed the coil It seemed to stabilize very quickly.
At this point the level on the plates (really the max the bubbles reach) has decreased a bit.

So now that I understood a bit about how much to raise the coil, I changed to modifying power level
Raised power to 65% (2275W), 3 LPH
Raised to 80% (2800W), 4.8 LPH
raised to 100% (3500W), 6.3 LPH.
ABV was stable at 80+% for the 1 1/2 gallons I collected.

By the way, this was alcohol saved just for sac runs. Can I save it and use it for a future sac run if I need it?

I learned a lot about how the new still performs.

A short clip running at 60% power (2100W)


I'm getting started on a pair of bourbon mashes this week - it will be my first product with the new plater.

[Bushman]

Higgins nice CAD drawings, what soft ware are you using?

[higgins]

Hey Bushman,
Not really a CAD program, but more of a charting/organization type of software - Microsoft Visio. I used it at work for software development (flow charts), and I got a personal copy for cheap during an MS promotional program.

Since retirement to my 4 acre mountain farmlet 8 yrs ago, I've planted a lot of new trees, berries, run underground electric/water to the barn, couple of new outbuildings, etc. I put my plat map into Visio and use that to document changes to the farm during my custody.

[higgins]

I've been asked for my parts sources in a PM so decided to put it here.

4" Copper disks from Amazon, paid $32.41. I'm a prime member, no shipping cost.
1" copper caps from Amazon, 5 pack. ($13+ when ordered, but now $18+). Could be sourced locally.

The downcomers required about 18" of 3/4" copper pipe sourced locally.

Knowing that I'd break several bits while drilling the hundreds of holes, I bought a 13 pack of 5/64" cobalt drill bits for $14. I broke 5 of them.
Also a set of step bits for $17 to drill the 7/8" holes in the plate for the downcomers.

The column parts are from Oakstills.com in China. You order by sending an email stating what you want and Peter will respond with total cost (including shipping). My order (more than what is listed below) total was $164.20 for the parts. Shipping was $129 for 13kg, but it did get here in 8 days. I just learned they also have an ebay store.

The quality of the sight glasses and bowl reducers seems to be very good. Their tri clamps are definitely lower quality than some you get from Amazon (Dernord for example), but at $2.80 vs $14 for a 4" tri clamp I can buy a few extra in case one breaks. Overall I'm satisfied with the quality.

The items I used in the column were:
3 - 4" inline sight glass ($27 ea)
2 - 2" to 4" bowl reducers ($12.50 ea)
4 - 4" tri clamps ($2.80 ea)
4 - 4" PTFE gaskets ($0.80 ea)

[higgins]

I ran my new flute with product yesterday for the first time and thought I'd report on it.

Here is how it was configured - you can see the cold finger of the RC coil in the top 2" inline sight glass:
(the still is not crooked - the picture is)

First, since I built this there is no instruction manual, and I've never run one, or even seen one run before.
Second, most flutes I've seen use a dephlegmator (CM?) to control reflux. I'm using a 2" CCVM head.
This is what I planned on doing:
1. Heat to boiling, RC coil all the way down for full reflux, wait for plates to load up.
2. Once it is stable, run for 15 minutes to balance it.
3. Raise CCVM coil a bit (reduce reflux ratio) to take off foreshots at a few drips per second.
4. Once the stream slows down raise RC again to take off heads at a bit faster rate
5. Once the stream slows down raise RC again to take off hearts at a faster rate.
6. Shut down when tails are detected.

So this is how it went:
9 gallons bourbon low wines @ 31.5% ABV.
2" CCVM head for reflux, 3500W element.
After heat up I ran at 80% power (2800W) and started balancing/stabilization.
Then I started very slow, collecting the first jar at 2-3 drips per second (45 minutes). This jar smelled almost like pure acetone, and it was 94% ABV.
Raised the RC to collect heads at a broken stream.
2nd and 3rd jars were much quicker, around 9 min per jar. They were at 94% and 93%.

I thought that was way too high an ABV to carry much flavor and that maybe I was running it with too much power and too much reflux.

So I shut down, dumped jars 2 and 3 back in the boiler (no need to add back that acetone) and restarted at 70% power.
After re-balancing, I raised the coil and started taking off heads with a lower reflux ratio. The reflux stream falling off the cold finger seemed to be about 3-5x larger than the output stream.
Jars 2-10 were 15 oz, 90% ABV
Jars 11-21 were 11-12 oz, 90%
22 was 12 oz at 87%
23 was 13 oz at 84% (and very nasty)
24 was 15 oz at 73% - at this point I quit collecting.

Plate levels (25-50% full) and activity was consistent thru the first 20 jars, started decreasing a bit.
My take off rate was about 3.2 LPH.

I did sample a few of the jars (diluted to 35%) as I was collecting and as I suspected, it wasn't carrying over much flavor, which was a bit disappointing. But I was really impressed at the volume of apparent hearts collected - seemed to be about 75% of the total.

conclusions:
--------------------------------

I'm thinking I ran with too much power and too much reflux as there is not much bourbon character in the 90% white dog. I saved the leftover stillage and will add all my jars back to reconstitute the low wines and run it again. I may do it several times just to learn my flute. The finished mash tasted pretty good, so I know there is flavor in there.

I think I'll run again with some changes.
During plate loading and stabilization, find the lowest power that keeps the plates loaded and stable.
Raise RC higher for takeoff at a lower reflux ratio - say 1:1, or the refluxed stream is about the same as the takeoff stream.

I would really welcome any advice you flute operators have for me.

[Saltbush Bill]

Less plates will give you more flavour.,
Your abv's at the beginning seem very high for 3 plates, an average with 4 perf plates would be 92%. In my and most others experience.

[Bolverk]

Sorry not to detract from the thread..

How perf plates compare to bubble plates in terms of efficiency?

[Sporacle]

I'm pretty new to running a perf plate and I run 4 plates generally.
I agree with Salty, that your 3 plate abv sits pretty much with the abv that I get from 4 plates.
Take off rate is very subjective, I've found that between 2 and 2.5 lph is the happy spot for me.
Power wise I'm between 2.75 and 3kw.
I would possibly drop my power a bit and lessen the reflux, try for around 2 to 2.5 per hour and under 90abv for the run and see how that compares.

One really good piece of advice that I was given, is change one parameter at a time and let the still settle. That way you don't chase your tail to much
Good luck

[Saltbush Bill]

How perf plates compare to bubble plates in terms of efficiency?

99% of my experience is with perforated plates, everything I've seen, read and heard says that perf plates run faster, they also need more power to stay loaded than a bubble cap plate.

[Bolverk]

99% of my experience is with perforated plates, everything I've seen, read and heard says that perf plates run faster, they also need more power to stay loaded than a bubble cap plate.

That makes sense since there is nothing keeping the liquid up other than vapor pressure.

Is there a benefit to them over bubblers?

[Twisted Brick]

Is there a benefit to them over bubblers?

.
Perf plates versus bubble caps

[Bolverk]

Is there a benefit to them over bubblers?

.
Perf plates versus bubble caps

Thank you, I was looking but couldn't find that thread.

[shadylane]

So I shut down, dumped jars 2 and 3 back in the boiler (no need to add back that acetone) and restarted at 70% power.

Something I learned the hard way, while experimenting.
Be careful dumping high proof alcohol back into the boiler.
When 90% liquid alcohol gets poured into a hot boiler it tends to flash into vapor.

Nice rig you made and learning to drive.

[shadylane]

My plate depth is 1/2", with 3/4" downcomers. What effect will increasing the plate depth have?

If you increase the plate depth without a corresponding increase in the cup.
Vapor can blow up downcomer and stop reflux from going down.
The plates will be temperamental and want to flood.
On start up you may even have to flush the column to get it to load the cups.
In other words let it flood, then turn off the power for a moment so the falling reflux fills the plates below enough to overflow into the downcomers and fill the cup.

Based on your pics, it looks like everything is working good.
Either you did your homework or got lucky.

[higgins]

I'm pretty new to running a perf plate and I run 4 plates generally.
I agree with Salty, that your 3 plate abv sits pretty much with the abv that I get from 4 plates.
Take off rate is very subjective, I've found that between 2 and 2.5 lph is the happy spot for me.
Power wise I'm between 2.75 and 3kw.
I would possibly drop my power a bit and lessen the reflux, try for around 2 to 2.5 per hour and under 90abv for the run and see how that compares.

One really good piece of advice that I was given, is change one parameter at a time and let the still settle. That way you don't chase your tail to much
Good luck

Thanks for that, Sporacle. I was initially going to build a 4 plater, but dropped back to 3 because of recommendations I got when designing it. I'm pretty amazed that the ABV was so high, but I measured with 2 different P&T hydrometers and they agreed with each other. The reflux ratio is very high, so it is going to take some time playing with it to figure out the best way to operate it.

In a thread titled 'Flute Operating Parameters for Bourbon', SBB said:

Reflux barely on is how they run.........I doubt you will achieve anything worth while by upping the power.

Barely on may be difficult to achieve with a CCVM head - even with the coil all the way up there will be some reflux, possibly too much. Next run I'll see if I can quantify how much (little) reflux I can achieve. It certainly won't be the 0-100% that you can get with a dephlegmator - I'll be lucky if I can get it as low a 10% reflux.

I'm considering making a change to my CCVM head. The 3/8" CSST coil by itself lets a bit of vapor pass to the PC even when all the way down, so I wove some SS scrubbies into it. This helps a lot with reducing vapor bypass, but makes it harder to raise and lower from the tight fit. Since I'm asking it to behave like a valve, it needs to be easily adjustable, yet completely cut off the vapor flow when all the way down. I might try enclosing my RC coil in a copper tube sized to just slide into the top of the SS Tee. When it is down it will completely cover the outlet side of the tee, and I should be able to raise/lower it with more 'adjustability'. I'll drill a 1/4" hole in the side of the tee (near the top), solder an SS nut over the hole, and use a 1/4" SS bolt as a set screw to hold it firmly in place.

Something I learned the hard way, while experimenting.
Be careful dumping high proof alcohol back into the boiler.
When 90% liquid alcohol gets poured into a hot boiler it tends to flash into vapor.

Nice rig you made and learning to drive.

Good point. However, I dumped it back in at the top of the column rather than open the boiler and pour it directly in.
Thanks for the nice comments.

...
Based on your pics, it looks like everything is working good.
Either you did your homework or got lucky.

I did a lot of homework, but I think there may have been a bit of luck involved as well.
I think (hope) it will just take some time and a few runs to get it dialed in.

[NormandieStill]

Thanks for that, Sporacle. I was initially going to build a 4 plater, but dropped back to 3 because of recommendations I got when designing it. I'm pretty amazed that the ABV was so high, but I measured with 2 different P&T hydrometers and they agreed with each other. The reflux ratio is very high, so it is going to take some time playing with it to figure out the best way to operate it.

In a thread titled 'Flute Operating Parameters for Bourbon', SBB said:

Reflux barely on is how they run.........I doubt you will achieve anything worth while by upping the power.

Barely on may be difficult to achieve with a CCVM head - even with the coil all the way up there will be some reflux, possibly too much. Next run I'll see if I can quantify how much (little) reflux I can achieve. It certainly won't be the 0-100% that you can get with a dephlegmator - I'll be lucky if I can get it as low a 10% reflux.

It's generally accepted that the lowest reflux ratio you can achieve with a CCVM head is 50%. I guess if you had a larger diameter port you could theoretically go further down but with a standard Tee you're not going lower than 50%.

If you build your coil into an endcap and put a needle valve on the water supply you could turn it into a CM head which would let you get all the way down to 0%.

Sorry.

[Wildcats]

Thanks for sharing this. I like the work you've put into this build. Hope it makes you a great drop. I too have goon ccvm. Mine is 2" all the way thru. Will be doing my first run on it this weekend.

Have fun and stay safe.

[higgins]

...
It's generally accepted that the lowest reflux ratio you can achieve with a CCVM head is 50%. I guess if you had a larger diameter port you could theoretically go further down but with a standard Tee you're not going lower than 50%.

If you build your coil into an endcap and put a needle valve on the water supply you could turn it into a CM head which would let you get all the way down to 0%.
...

Currently I'm running the water output of my shotty to the input of the RC coil, but I can change that pretty easily so I can control water input to both RC and PC independently.

So you're saying to put a TC end cap on my RC coil so that cap engages when the coil is all the way down, right? Like this?

I like it. That should be an easy modification that will still allow it to function properly when used to make neutral with my CCVM.

With my flute I could start using it as a CCVM, draw off fores and heads, then lower it back down and turn the water down to manage reflux ratio as a CM. And since there is no valve, the vapor path is still open.

Anyone see any negatives with this proposed change?

[acfixer69]

Do not put a cap on the coil. Both ccvm and cm need to be open to atmosphere.

[NormandieStill]

Do not put a cap on the coil. Both ccvm and cm need to be open to atmosphere.

As long as there no valve on the take-off port (à la VM for example), the system remains open to atmosphere. In the same way that a pressure build-up in a CCVM boiler will force vapour past the coil and out the top and take-off, a pressure build-up with a cap will still force vapour into the take-off port. Capping the coil is no different from using a reflux coil in a CM still instead of a dephleg. Draw it out (or look at the drawings above), there is still a unobstructed path to atmosphere.

If it helps, imagine the coil sitting lower than the take-off port when all the way down. This is now a CM with a 90° bend after the RC.