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HedgeBird's Still Build


HedgeBird

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Absinthe Pete, I tried to open that Coleparmer link but my computer locked up! So while I was waiting to reboot I rang the guy who sold it to me. He looked up the specs in a book while I waited, it said 120 C. No doubt.

Maybe this o-ring product is a different formulation from the Coleparmer product.

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According to Cole Palmer chemical resistance chart neoprene is satisfactory to 120 F NOT C.

http://www.coleparme...ical-Resistance

Dude, Cole Parmer is spelled with only one L.

According to the Cole Parmer link above, neoprene has excellent resistance to ethanol. Footnote 1 says, "Satisfactory to 72°F (22°C)". Footnote 2 says "Satisfactory to 120°F (48°C)". These footnotes refer to nothing on the page that I can see.

A quick google search yielded the following pages that affirm neoprene's rating to 250 degrees F:

http://www.quickcutgasket.com/materials.html

http://elderrubber.com/material.htm

I have personal experience in this area (as does anyone who has ever run a still made by Mile High) and can verify that neoprene is quite suitable for use in a still.

The two polymers that you mentioned are also quite good, but there's certainly no need to get all snippy about neoprene, dude.

Nick

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Absinthe Pete, I am sorry to say that I think you misread the Cole-Parmer tech data.

this is a cut and paste

"Explanation of Footnotes

1. Satisfactory to 72°F (22°C)

2. Satisfactory to 120°F (48°C)"

I assume this is similar to what you read.

This is a general statement for all the items, if you look under Neoprene there are no footnotes.

I actually cut this note from the compatibility of COPPER and ETHYL ALCOHOL. I am sure you would agree that a copper still can run at above 120 F

Edit, To Nick, Thanks for the backup, you posted a few seconds before me.

No offence taken Absinthe Pete, it has generated some good research and discussion.

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Nick - Thanks for sharing details of your Carl. They realy are beutifull things! So with the de-foamer in place you basically have three 3" pipes leading from the boiler to the column and the rest is closed in with a plate? How much clearance do you have between the de-foamer and the first plate? If I try to add something similar I might need to adjust my plate height.

Yes, the only openings between the boiler and the column are the three pipes. The one going down is about four times as long as the two going up, which seem to be the smallest practical length they could be.

In our case, there is actually a large botanicals helmet above the boiler, and the column is located beside the still, so the drawing I made is simplified. However, in my experience, the de-foamer is either doing its job, or is in the process of foaming over. Under normal operating conditions, there may or may not be foam below the defoamer, but there should never be any above. If foam starts to creep above the defoamer, the only thing that will stop that is a reduction in heat input.

So any space between the defoamer and the first plate only serves to give the still operator a chance to notice a boil over and reduce heat input. Obviously, the more space, the more time the operator has to notice the boil over.

Nick

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You might want to research this decision a little further, Jedd.

I love Armaflex for cold applications and use it all of the time. But I've never seen it used at boiling temperatures before. A quick check of the product sheet in your post above revealed that the high temperature spe for Armaflex is 105 degrees C. Since the temperature of steam increases with pressure, I believe you'll be reach 105 C at a pressure of around 5 psig...

Fibreglass or another insulation with a significantly higher maximum temperature spec might be more appropriate for a steam application.

Nick

I should mention that this still is electric powered, not steam, so I wouldn't expect the surface temperature of the boiler to get above 100 C. With that said, the Nomaco Kflex that Hedge mentioned looks like it may be a better option as it has a much higher temperature rating.

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Thanks so much to everyone here sharing their hard-earned knowledge.

I'm making a 16 inch diameter column out of .125 copper, and have been particularly interested to hear thoughts on how to join the rolled shell.

My original plan was to TIG with helium and pure copper filler, but the majority of advice that I've sought has discouraged me from even trying it, due to warping. Then I was fantasizing about using silver solder for this (since I've got stainless steel bolt flanges on each end that would help to deal with the hoop stress)...until reading PeteB's advice about corrosion. So now I'm inclined to braze using copper phosphate filler, but am thinking that the amount of heat applied will probably cause almost as much warping as TIG will cause anyways.

Regardless of the method, I plan to use the plate assembly as an internal frame to keep things in place while joining...is there a chance that this will help to at least distribute the deformation and keep the column from getting really bad?

Any thoughts are appreciated.

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I would recommend TIG if at all possible, but if you like the steam punk look, try riveting and lead free soft solder. hand hammered copper rivets would look quite nice, clean the solder from all visible areas and it will look good, and will be sealed nicely. you can also use rivets to fix the plates in the column as well.

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In my experience TIG will give very little warping. Before I posted this I checked my welds, I could feel them with my hand but they are hardly visible. That is on an 18 inch tapering cylinder. (cone)

I also joined a thicker sheet by brazing with phosphor bronze but got quite a lot of warping.

I don't think I posted about corrosion with dis-similar metals, maybe you read my mind.

A suggestion about the flanges that may not be perfectly flat after you weld them on: Bolt them together without a gasket then weld on. If you do get any warps they will be in both rings and as long as you always bolt up with the same alignment, the casket gap should be very even.

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I'm not trying to dispel everything you say PeteB, but I like to help people out by giving correct advice, as I weld for a living.

Warping has nothing to do with the type of process, but the process itself. When you heat something up to a certain point, depending on the thickness, it will warp; doesn't matter if it's oxy/acetylene, tig or mig.

The only way to prevent warping in thin sheet metal, .125 is thin, is to clamp it in place when you weld; PLUS doing small stitches when you do weld it. What that means is work on one end weld a small 1/2" section, quickly, then move on to the opposite end and do the same, then move to the middle and so forth, then make sure the sections you go back to, to continue the weld is not very hot before you start again.

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I'm not trying to dispel everything you say PeteB, but I like to help people out by giving correct advice, as I weld for a living.

Warping has nothing to do with the type of process, but the process itself. When you heat something up to a certain point, depending on the thickness, it will warp; doesn't matter if it's oxy/acetylene, tig or mig.

The only way to prevent warping in thin sheet metal, .125 is thin, is to clamp it in place when you weld; PLUS doing small stitches when you do weld it. What that means is work on one end weld a small 1/2" section, quickly, then move on to the opposite end and do the same, then move to the middle and so forth, then make sure the sections you go back to, to continue the weld is not very hot before you start again.

The beauty of these forums is if someone gives incorrect or incomplete advice then hopefully someone else will make a correction or fill in the gaps.

I have been welding for over 45 years as part of my living. I currently own 5 welders. (actually 6 if you count a couple of 12 V batteries. They run a beautifully neat bead with low amp rods) I certainly do not say "I know it all", far from it.

I have seen photos of your welding and machining Absinthe Pete, very impressive. You would most likely have spent many more hours on a welder than I have.

I had planned to suggest "stitching" but got distracted while typing and forgot. My wife was panicking because there is a SPIDER on the kitchen ceiling :o (I think we speak a slightly different language. We call that "tacking". To me, "stitching" is running short beads at right angles to a straight weld to releive heat/chill stress and reduce the chance of cracks especially in thin higher tensile steel or when there are vibrations)

I still think my comment that TIG will generally causes less warping is correct. Maybe I should have explained why.

A TIG welder set at the correct amps for the thickness and type of metal will generally cause less warping because the TIG arc very quickly heats a very small area, and as you suggest, move to another area and don't come back until it has cooled.. When welding with oxy and using high melting point rods a much larger area of metal is heated and hence more distortion.

When welding up a cylinder you will not get as much obvious distortion as you would joining large flat surfaces. Would you agree other Pete?

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  • 9 months later...

I think you're wrong, I think it's scared of spiders, cause really who isn't?

Arachnophobia or arachnephobia (from the Greek: ἀράχνη, aráchnē, "spider" and φόβος, phóbos, "fear") is a specific phobia, the fear of spiders

In chemistry, hydrophobicity (from the Attic Greek hydro, meaning water, and phobos, meaning fear) is the physical property of a molecule (known as a hydrophobe) that is repelled from a mass of wate

Just my $.02

Rick

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  • 3 months later...

So, its been a year since I updated this thread; or made much progress on this project. Short story for the delay is I was able to purchase a big old warehouse here in Lancaster to house my distillery, and have spent the past year working like a dog on renovations and improvements for the distillery and for the other tenants that are sharing the building with me. In addition to the distillery the basement and first floor of the building also house a coffee roaster and a small start-up brewery. The building itself ended up being a much larger project than anticipated, but it should make for an awesome place to go to work everyday and a great place for people to visit. At this point I have finally finished most of the construction/renovation work and the distillery project is now moving right along. I have completed Local city zoning approval, received my state pre-approval and also now have my federal licence in hand. Yesterday we fired up the new 400,000 BTU natural gas steam boiler and mash tun for the first time so things are suddenly moving fast and the still is now a much higher priority..

This week we finished TIG welding up the dome/barrel. Here are a few quick pictures to give you an idea.

Welding in action:

tigweld.jpg

partially sanded/ground weld seem and machined dome.

seem.jpg

Rough finish on the weld seem and dome:

buffed.jpg

We definitely ran into some challenges along the way, but things ended up much better than expected and I think once I do my finish sand/buff it will look like it was magically bent from one solid piece of copper! Next steps for the dome are to cut and fit the man-way and sight glass, drill and fit bolt studs on the top for the column flange, and attach the stainless ring to the bottom of the dome. At this point the plan is to braze all those connections.

I have also finished brazing the dephalgmeter sections so that is ready to be fit into its pipe and have the inlets/outlets and flanges brazed together..

found a few more pics.. these are cutting the hole in the top of the dome for the column.

holecut1.jpg

holecut2.jpg

there are a few more pics on ye-old facebook page as well for anyone interested:

https://www.facebook.com/ThistleFinchDistillery

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  • 2 months later...

Friday we went ahead and assembled all the main pieces of my still.. Probably need another week or two for final fittings, attachments: piping cooling water supply building a parrot and a cooling manifold, attaching the agitator pump etc. I was a bit surprised how tall and slender looking it is compared to most stills; dimensions on paper only go so far to help visualize things! All in all I am pretty happy with how things came out at the end and feeling confident she should work well. Thanks for all the input and feed back from this forum; it was beyond helpful having you all as a resource!

1378637_10151888226285546_1311092356_n.jpg

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