Amateur Distiller
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I have a 500L Bain Marie run with oil, heated by 4x8kW elements.I have had the following issue in the last week; I started up slowly as usual, but although the dome of the still does warm up, it takes about 2.5hours, where it usually takes 1.5 hours. It seems as though the heat transfer up to the fill level is not sufficient. The product flow is also extremely low. The oil makes a loud boiling noise- also something that has not happened before, and I would not like to turn the heat up and degrade the oil. I use Atonal 324 oil and replaced the old oil before starting distilling this week. Nothing else has changed from when I ran the still in the beginning of the year. My still is not equipped with a thermometer in the oil jacket. Can it be that the oil jacket has fouled up so much that it is not conducting heat as it should?
Can you please advise?
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I have inspected the oil- it has darkened, but not significantly. It has shown worse degradation previous times.
The dome of the pot is heating up a lot, but I don't have a temp probe in the oil to check it's temperature. The jacket is also insulated, so I can't get a temperature on the outer side of the side of the jacket.
I have heard of people preferring cooking oil. are there merits to this?
Here are the specs of the oil:
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