Southernhighlander

The total length is 40', so according to my calcs. the total heat exchange surface area is 1,509.535 square inches.

SlickFloss, Please see the 1000 gallon still below. This customer bought that jacketed vessel used, for a couple of thousand and he brought me the vessel and later purchased and had shipped to me the copper alloy that I requested. We built the condenser, line arm, manway and bolt flange for the column, from materials we had here. We charged a $45.00 per hour shop rate then (it is $65.00 per hour now) and with labor and everything I believe that he paid us right around $6,000.00 That scotch column has a 32" diameter union if I remember correctly. The condenser is 12" in diameter and 7 or 8 foot tall. We had to make several modifications to the vessel including cutting out the 2" drain and installing a 4" drain with a sanitary butterfly valve. We also cut the holes for the column and manway and we built the condenser stand. We could have polished the whole thing out, but the customer did not want to spend the money for that. She is not pretty but she will do a great Job, I have not quoted a deal like that in a couple of months. So if you are comparing a quote that I gave you for ready built equipment, you are not comparing apples to apples. Also, for you to be able to have tradesman, who know nothing about still building to build you a still, you must know how to design the still and you must have some experience in all of the trades that will be utilized, so that you can show the tradesmen what should be done. If you make a mistake in the design, or if you do not have the ability to show the tradesmen exactly what needs to be done, then you my friend, will end up spending far more money than it would have cost you for one of my stills. So lets see what you know about still design. What is the best alloy of copper for building distilling equipment? One alloy is better than all of the others by far? What mathematical formula or method do you use to size a German helmet or scotch head for a still and this includes the diamater of the onion, bolt flange connection and hight and taper of the witches hat of the scotch head? If you have a 500 gallon stripping still with 500,000 BTUs of steam heat per hr in the jacket and you are going to use a tube side tube and shell condenser with 3/4" diameter tubes, what diameter and length should the condenser be and how many tubes should be in it? Also what do you need above the tubes at the top of the condenser to make it work correctly and what formula do you use to find this? What welding rod should be used to weld stainless to copper? What welding rod should you use to weld copper to copper? Your average journeyman boiler maker will not have a clue about this, because though he will have probably done tons of aluminum and stainless steel welding, it is extremely unlikely that he will have welded copper. Copper is much harder to weld than aluminum. It takes a lot of practice. I am not talking brazing here, I am talking welding. Is it acceptable for the 304 stainless components of a still or mash tun to be Mig welded using 308L? What about 316L? The above are just a few things that you need to know to build a simple pot still. I could ask you 50 other questions that you probably would not know the answer to. Even if you use google you will find that the answer to most of the above questions cannot be found with google. If you know the answers to all of the questions above then you are an unusual fellow and even though you can build your still the way that you say, most people cannot and therefore your advice in this matter is bad advice. If you want a still that will do higher proofs, then you are talking about a much greater level of complexity and there is a huge amount of info that you need to know. I am not saying that someone cannot build their own still, even a large still. Several people have done so with very good results. i am saying that if you are going to do that, you had better know what you are doing, or it may cost you far more than what you think.

JustAndy, I know someone that is interested. Please email me paul@distillery-equipment.com

We have the coils below for $350.00 each. The tubing diameter is 1". You can maintain the mash temp in your tote with 1 or 2 of these.

Below is one of our heat exchangers for cooling mash. This one is made in the USA at our shop here in mo. The inner tubing is 2" and the outer tubing is 2.5". paul@distillery-equipment.com 417-778-6100

SlickFloss said "You can very easily construct a facility out of used dairy for a fraction of the price of conventional suppliers with the right team of contractors (steam fitters, welders, plumbers, and electricians) if you're flexible with your capacity and can afford to wait to piece things together during construction......" While this is a correct statement when it comes to most distillery equipment manufacturers , it is incorrect when it comes to my business. I used to build a lot of stills from re-purposed equipment such as cooker kettles and dairy tanks. I called this equipment my backwoods series equipment. We found that we could produce our standard series line of equipment for less than what it cost to produce backwoods series equipment, so we produce very little backwoods series equipment these days. I have complete systems that cost my customers much less than having steam fitters welders plumbers and electricians re-purpose dairy equipment. For example one of my 250 gallon electrically fired still pots costs less than $3,900.00 By the time you purchase the used vessel and pay your tradesmen from $65.00 to $150.00 per hour to make the changes, you will have at least $5,000.00 into that pot and yours will look pretty ugly while mine is beautiful and will probably function a lot better. Also if anyone out there does want to turn used dairy equipment into distillery equipment, we can still do it for less, because my hourly fees for sanitary, welding, fabricating and boiler making, are way below the national average, because my business is in a very rural economically depressed area, so my labor charges for the Fabricators, welders, electricians and boilermakers that work for me are less than what you can get any where else in the US. Also my people do superior work. My 2 best boiler makers have over 50 years of combined experience doing sanitary fab work and welding. Also there is of course the fact that my people build stills everyday. We have equipment in over 18% of the craft distilleriesin the US and that percentage is increasing every day. paul@distillery-equipment.com http://distillery-equipment.com http://moonshine-still.co http://triclamp.co

SlickFloss, We have built several stills from Groen and other, electric over steam, jacketed cooker kettles. We have several of the cooker kettles and columns for them in stock. We rib the lids and weld them on solid and add manways etc.

Do you have a vfd on it?

Hi John, I would be glad to help you with your customer. the name of my business is affordable distillery equipment. If you look under equipment on this forum you will find a thread with lots of reviews of us. We have equipment in around 18% of the craft distilleries in the US.

Is it a very loud screeching noise like screech, screech, screech? if so it sounds like the air seals are out of adjustment. If you can send me a pic or 2 of the motor and every thing that is outside of the still pot especially of the air seals, I can set up a call with one of my techs and they can help you adjust it out. My email is paul@distillery-equipment.com

Thank you Wilder.

The below was posted on our face book page by Steve Goodwin. "After a recent experience, I must say the folks at Affordable Distillery Equipment are very helpful when you have questions and they have very fast turnaround time when you do place an order. Two thumbs up to Susan, Paul and the whole crew."

Hi Cely, We can supply everything on your list. Email paul@distillery-equipment.com or call 417-778-6100 Paul

Tim, Below are a couple of pics of our 150 gallon mash tun.. The bottom pic shows the cooling coil in the mash tun. That's a 1.5" diameter coil that has a length of over 80' you can get crash cool times of less than 30 minutes.

Since Affordable Distillery Equipment was mentioned by the OP I thought that I would just let everyone know the difference between us and Olympic. Our stills (Affordable Distillery Equipment) are American designed and engineered. 70%percent of the components are manufactured to our specs, which are extremely stringent, at a factory in China. We have used this same factory for almost 6 years and they do impeccable work. They have to do impeccable work, because we quality control all of the componants, that they build for us, here at our facility in MO and if something is not right, we get those components for free. All of the electrical heating and control systems are built here in the US. All of the safety devices such as pressure relief and vacuum relief valves are made in the US. The equipment is assembled and thoroughly tested here at my facility before it ships. Also I personally inspect all of the Standard and Pro series equipment before it leaves here. I have over 12,000 square feet of shop and warehouse space here with 18 employees, 6 of which are very good sanitary welder fabricators. 2 of these guys have over 50 years of combined experience. If an issue arises after a customer receives our equipment, we take care of it ASAP. If I need to send someone 1500 miles to solve a problem, I will do that and we have done that, So, you do not have to be handy and know how to work mettle if you buy our equipment. Our equipment is not cheap. I would never sell a cheap piece of equipment. Our equipment is very high quality, affordable equipment and our stills produce just as good a product as a Vendome, Kothe or any of the other super expensive stills. Olympics stills made for distilleries are Chinese designed and 100% Chinese manufactured. As far as I know Olympic does not have a fab shop her in the US and they do not pre assemble, test or do any quality control here in the states. Also, I do not think that they have any techs that they can send out to take care of issues that might arise. We have a very good reputation and equipment in over 200 distilleries in the US.

That is our Standard Series 150 gallon Mash Tun. It has large hinged lids on a removable clamp down top. The agitator is a 1hp agitator with a gear box that spins the shaft at 45 rpm max (high RPM agitators do not work well with thick grain in mashed). This agitator has large paddles designed specifically for grain in mashes. With the optional VFD drive the agitator becomes veriable speed and can be reversed. This mash tun also has a 1.5" diameter removable coil for crash cooling your mash. Each crash cool only takes around 30 minutes. The unit as pictured, set up for steam is only $6,995.00 With programmable electric bain marie heat the price is $11,264.00 This unit is not on our web site yet, but we have sold several and they work very well.

The pic below is of one of our stills and mash tuns just after installation

Hi Dan, I think that your clients, like many other people, take Corson's threats to sue very seriously, so they are afraid to tell their stories, which is really a shame.

Michaelangelo, Heat up time with the baine marie heating system is 1.5 hrs to 2 hrs. Heat up time running low pressure steam is 40 minutes to 1 hr.

Below is a picture of one of our 200 gallon combination Mash Tun/Stripping Still/Spirit Stills that we just completed for a customer. This unit has an electric bain marie heating system in the jacket. This unit is great for start up distilleries, because you can cook grain in mashes and then once the mash is fermented you can distill in this unit as well. The combined mash tun option does not cost extra, so you can start with this unit to cook mash and distill and then when your orders dictate you can add a dedicated mash tun. Also, please note that the offset column sits very low. This still was built for a distillery with a very low ceiling. Unlike some our competitors, we have a designs that allow us to lower our columns to fit almost any height restriction. Also we can fully automate both the heating system, column and condenser control.

I recommend my 600 gallon stripping still for a little over $30,000.00. https://distillery-equipment.com/600_gallon_stripping_still.htm Call me or email 417-778-6100 paul@distillery-equipment.com if that stripper is too much we can probably come up with something.

These stills are great for running Gin using the maceration method and or a gin basket. It is my understanding that most of the Gin distilleries in Britain do not make their own GNS in house. Since GNS is a neutral and the flavor in Gin is dictated by the botanicals, I see no problem running GNS in a Gin still and putting craft on the bottle. However, if someone is running GNS to make vodka and putting craft on the bottle, I believe that they are misleading their customers.

Davis Valley Winery and Distillery. Call Rusty Cox at 757-593-1055. The original number was wrong so I replaced it with the correct number.

It depends on where it's coming from but you can get it for as little as $3.00 per proof gallon.

You can run the oil temp as high as 350F in our newer models without the worry of scorching even the thickest corn mashes, as long as the agitator is on. This allows for some fairly fast stripping runs. Without running an agitator you should not go over 260 F in the oil jacket or sticking might occur. Also, as long as you have agitation you can run 350F during the run up to operating temp with some mashes and washes but others will stick (not scorch) in the early part of the mash cook or distilling run, so with some mashes you must keep the temp down below 300F at the start and then once the mash has heated up some you can increase the oil temp. Our testing shows that it is the temperature differential that causes the sticking in those situations and it happens more at the beginning of a mash cook than at the beginning of a distilling run. The insides of all of our still pots, mash cookers and fermenters are mirror polished so that sticking is less likely to occur in our vessels and this also makes our vessels easier to clean. Steam however is always the best option when it comes to heating jackets. Steam has a much better heat transfer coefficient than oil. In a still jacket 250F steam will give you a faster heat up to operating temp time than 300F oil.