Glass Lab Stills

punkin

As said distillation of alcohol without a permit is illegal here, no matter the boiler size. It is only legal to own a still under 5l that's to be used for essential oils or water etc.

RobertS

So, basically the same as America's law about 1 gallon stills for non-alcohol use?

mtnspirits

Could any of you guys share pics of your glass rigs?

Are most folks macerating or using a rigged up adapter basket, etc to hold the herbs?

richard

Mine is as below, 1st and 2nd picture. Absolutely critical as shown in last picture (not mine) with the receiver, is to have the vent connected direct to main downcomer (see top most glass connection). Failure to do this as I found out in my first supplied unit was that the unit puked when pressure built up. This is why you have a vented surge arrestor in the parrot in normal SD supply.

richard

Forgot to add, to keep botanicals above, just take some copper (or similar) mesh / screen and partial plug the bottom to prevent botanicals from falling down.

The negative with my heater is that it cycles OFF & ON depending on the % heat setting. This is as opposed to a to a heat controller (like a stove) where you can simply adjust the amount of heat applied. In this manner you could get continuous supplied heat.

punkin

My little toy with some rose petals.

ElectricEd

A bit late in the thread but...

The Alcohol Industry - Excise Technical Guidelines (current to 30 June 2006)

Section 2 Excise Overview

Excise duty is a commodity-based tax currently imposed on the following domestically produced goods:

• alcoholic beverages (not including wine)
• tobacco products)
• petroleum products, and)
• coal (duty free rate as at 10/2/2005)

GD50

@richard What do you use the tap on the outlet for ? Mine is similar but open on the outlet so you can't have problems. I did at first use a graham condenser ( like in punkins picture ) with the spiral inner tube but unless you use it vertical it builds up too much boiler pressure so I went to a Liebig type which works fine and no pressure problems. I had trouble getting it vertical and run the condenser at 45 degrees.

grim

@richard said: The negative with my heater is that it cycles OFF & ON depending on the % heat setting. This is as opposed to a to a heat controller (like a stove) where you can simply adjust the amount of heat applied. In this manner you could get continuous supplied heat.

Why not just scrap the existing on/off controller with an SSR-based one? Or, plug the mantle into an SSR controller, and leave it set to 100% (the latter may fry the mantle controller if there is any sort of circuitry in it).

GD50

@grim

That looks like a rheostat or infinite control as on a stove but would not be 100% sure. If it is it would be ok but if anything electronic in there you could possibly fry as you said.

richard

The end piece " receiver" is in case I wish to run the unit for essential oils. Yes you can take it off. It's there so I use it.

I will at some time change the control.

I was looking originally at the "Graham condensor" but it arrived with the Liebig instead. What I did find is that water flow needs to be a bit on the high side in order to get distillate properly cooled.

Unsensibel

@grim said: I've had good experience with Chinese sellers on eBay - But the shipping times are long - 2 to 3 weeks isn't out of the ordinary, but given the low price, and low shipping cost, it's hard to argue. The packaging for shipping is impressive, you will swear for at least an hour trying to remove a tiny glass part from it's armor. I got quite a bit of glass for eBay seller "DESCHEM".

Amen! Ordered from your guy and am impressed!

Got a glass kit with a hot plate / stir bar combo. shipping estimate was 2-3 weeks but arrived in less than one. I second that the packaging is something else! Looks like they tape everything to the walls first and then build the box.

Great recommendation

Unsensibel

grim

Stir bar vortex?

Unsensibel

Dingdingding!

Tested the set-up yesterday, now if to extracting essential oils