Stilldragon Dash 1 Experience

Lloyd

@fadge, it looks like you have the first of the new downcomers. Please read this.

A bubble tee with an assembled SGK is dishwasher safe. Its not much more violent or hot in there than on the still. You don't need to worry about the o-rings unless you take it apart, that's when you'd want spares. So don't take it apart :)
By their nature the pure silicone o-rings are fragile because they are so thin for their size. A 3" o-ring is normally much thicker in cross-sectional diameter but they are custom made to fit the shallow groove of a Tri-Clamp ferrule.

@jonno, that is a good assembly plan and pretty much what I do. But after the column section I usually attach one part at a time unless I have help. If I have help I build the whole still on the table and get someone else to work the boiler connection clamp while I hold it in place. A Dash1 is not all that heavy until the condensers fill with water.

jonno

Just having a fiddle with me new toys...

I used to have a 2" potstill, having this thing setup like this, do you think it would increase my take offspeed at all? I used to pull around 6L/hr with 2400 watt element.

2x4" - 4x2" with 90 elbows and shotgun....

Would it improve?

Lloyd

I bet you could get 6L/hour with a 4" Dash but truly fine quality spirit is at half that take off speed. And the ABV will be mostly constant throughout the entire run as opposed to pot stilling where the ABV is constantly dropping. In short, you get less liters per hour but what you get is higher ABV and quality. After the first run or two you'll be hooked.

jonno

Oh sorry I meant for stripping. I know when running the dash ill be pulling at about 2.5l/hr. I'm hoping runs are done in about 3 hrs including heat up. I'd be happy cos I can sneak more runs in

Smaug

Fyi, Mid-Best distillery is collecting 6 liters an hour @ 90% from a 40% boiler charge.

Lloyd

Having more elements or a higher power element with a controller will get you up to distilling temperature quicker. An element power controller is a good idea, too, if you don't already have one.
The add-ons never seem to stop but when you get to the sweet spot and you are happy you should stop buying for a while. You'll get a routine that just seems to work for you. From fermenting to bottling.
About a month from now you'll look back and see how far you've come so quickly.
And it just gets better and better.

***A Dash can run wash or strip. That's a whole nother topic but I prefer to run strip because it seems more productive to me cut wise.

punkin

Looks good Fadge. Glad it all arrived safe and sound. The manual advises to mount to your boiler piece by piece. Unless you have plenty of helping hands it's very akward and heavy to mount a full Dash. :-B

Clamp was sent express yesterday morning, Johnno. As for the dishwasher question i don't see why not. The O rings are held in place by the SGK's and the temp certainly won't hurt them.

Law_Of_Ohms

@fadge

Dont put the copper in the dish washer. the dish washing powder may effect it.

I clean all my copper with mild soapy water then put them all into a big pot of water add a bit of citric acid and bring up the temp on the stove.

takes about 10mins and the copper is pig pink :)

jonno

Hey lads,

should i do a cleaning run on this thing before running a wash through or should just giving it a run in the dishwasher be fine?

cheers

Law_Of_Ohms

I just use the dishwasher, no need for a cleaning run when everything is already clean!

Moonshine

@Law_Of_Ohms said: I clean all my copper with mild soapy water then put them all into a big pot of water add a bit of citric acid and bring up the temp on the stove.

Boil?

Stinger

I run all my SS and silicone dash parts through the dishwasher with the following settings on :Pots & Pans, High Temp Wash, Sani Rinse. I used vinegar for the caps/plates ONCE, but citric acid is preferable to the stink of vinegar. Hot backwash also works.

Usge

One thing I did...was to use a .45/50 cal dry patches from a pistol cleaning kit through the product condenser tubes. Or you could make your own "mouse" as they call it to pull through. I got some black soot looking gunk out of every tube. The tube next to where the I/Os were welded in..was full of gunk. I think I pulled 4 or 5 patches through it before it started to clear up. The reflux/dephelgmator was fine (dishwasher got to everything).

Usge

The other place to check is inside the little vent holes/skirt on the surge breaker. Use pipe cleaners on it. You'll get gunk out of it. It's not as critical an issue as the product condenser but it's worth taking a look. The only other thing I personally did was to use some needle files and sand paper to clean up the ports/holes on the bubble cap stems. Not necessary really, but since I had it apart......:).

Stinger

I angled the condenser to get the dishwasher "turbo jets" aiming straight into the tubes. I "borrowed" SWMBO's long stemmed 1/2" diam bristle knitting machine cleaning brush to clean out my condenser tubes after the dishwasher cycle - nothing came out of the tubes.

Hopefully my use of the brush will go unnoticed - or I myself may end up in the brown gunk!

Chalmer

I hear from a friend of mine if you use a dish washer put vinagar in the rinse aid dispenser and it will help clean it out.

jonno

yeah i noticed that black soot in the shotguns tubes. Was gonna see if my bottle brush fit in there lol.

Does the mirror polish only apply to external surfaces?

jonno

So doing me first run

Heated up with 4800 watts First plate started fogging up so knocked down to 2400 watts Deflag fully open but isn't able to knock down 2400 watts which I've found quite strange. I don't even think ill be touching my needle valve at all this run. It's a bit like a pot still run. Not touching anything.

Being first run I'm learning. Will hook up my power controller next run and check out what I gotta knock power to to get full reflux

jonno

Oh I should mention, running 3 plates because last tc couldn't make it in time. Collecting at 90 percent ATM. Using an 8 percent wash.

punkin

Should easily knock down 2400 watts. Check either your plumbing setup or your water supply. Hint. Needle valve is flow directional.

jonno

Yeah I just upped my water supply and it was knocking it down. I wonder why by opening up my tap it started knocking it down better? I haven't setup the thermos yet but water was only mildly warm exiting the deflag

Smaug

It does take a bit of water to run the thing in 100% reflux with only an 8% boiler charge. Can stuff a little scrubber material into the shotgun tubes to squeeze a bit more efficiency if you are trying to conserve more water.

jonno

Just from watching coops videos I thought around 2l minute would be good going through each. Sorry I should say got them indivually fed via a y piece. To get full reflux I had to push at a guess 10l min thru it. I found that strange.

Guess I will have to invest in a pump system

Stinger

I could not shut down water flow through my needle valves when I tried before starting my first run.

I separated the waste/hot Y to locate the problem line and found that one of the needle valves had been mislabeled. - Worked perfectly when corrected.

jonno

when theyre facing the wrong way what happens? Just doesn't flow as properly as it should or just doesn't work?

Stinger

I couldn't shut off the flow. In fact, the flow was hardly reduced when both valves were shut off tightly.

When I looked at the needle valves, I could see that the flow direction arrows on the label were pointing in opposite directions. It was easy to identify the one which was wrongly labelled/connected when I separated the 2 lines ahead of the hot/waste Y fitting.

I wondered whether the valve had been damaged, but it appears to be working perfectly. I'm now looking for an inexpensive adjustable water pressure governor, since the adjustment is too sensitive - all my adjustments are within the first 360* from closed.

jonno

Question, pulled the still apart after the run yesterday and noticed this on top of the deflag. Funny colors, any wonder what that'd be from?

jonno

it doesn't just wipe away

punkin

Can't really tell anything from the photo mate. if it's on top of the dephlag it has to be something in your wash.

jonno

yeah it is abit hard aint it lol.

Its like a purpely tinge....