Steam Generator

CothermanDistilling

agreed, just thinking of having the heat source (the first PC-HX) closer to the injection point for faster response... but zero issues with you copying a working design!!!

Smaug

@CothermanDistilling said: agreed, just thinking of having the heat source (the first PC-HX) closer to the injection point for faster response... but zero issues with you copying a working design!!!

Ah sure. The lower elevations for the HXs are really just to make them a bit easier to pull maintenance.

Btw, the beer feed lines would ideally be insulated. As would the boiler and steam feed lines.

jbierling

@Smaug But we are estimating 78 gallon per hour feed rate.

Looks pretty nice. What is the bottleneck determining the 78 gph? Column size, HX size, heat input, or everything together?

I do wonder about the 4", but never having seen a small continuous grain-in still, hopefully it would be fine.

crozdog

just thinking, instead of having the HX on the cold water inlet to the steam gen being fed by the outlet of the low wines hx, why not just run the warmed output water from the low wines HX straight to the steam gen water inlet control mechanism?

Smaug

@crozdog said: just thinking, instead of having the HX on the cold water inlet to the steam gen being fed by the outlet of the low wines hx, why not just run the warmed output water from the low wines HX straight to the steam gen water inlet control mechanism?

The output of the low wines HX water output would far exceed the needed feed water flow rate.

The way it's piped now would allow for sending that water to a HLT for future cooking while simultaneously preheating the steam boilers feed water.

Smaug

@jbierling said: I do wonder about the 4", but never having seen a small continuous grain-in still, hopefully it would be fine.

Power is the only thing I feel comfortable spit balling.

Column size and HX. The HXs are more or less generically sized with modularity in mind and affordability. We'll know more soon.

I feel comfortable that the column will behave nicely, just not sure at what speed? Seems most of the feedback is looking to do a tote in a single shift. That should be easily achievable. Again, we'll know more soon.

grim

Awesome stuff, really really awesome.

jbierling

@Smaug said: Seems most of the feedback is looking to do a tote in a single shift.

You're never going to make everyone happy, but FWIW, I'd like to do two totes ;)

I do 1100L in about 5-6 hours in my 1000L BM, so your current electric offerings already cover a tote a day. I'd like a continuous system to do twice that with the same or less [wasted] energy. Stumpy's system is way too big for me though.

Smaug

@jbierling said: You're never going to make everyone happy, but FWIW, I'd like to do two totes

I do 1100L in about 5-6 hours in my 1000L BM, so your current electric offerings already cover a tote a day. I'd like a continuous system to do twice that with the same or less [wasted] energy. Stumpy's system is way too big for me though.

The difference being that a tote a shift is still batch on a kettle. On the continuous, the labor dynamic changes.

But yes Joel, I'm hoping the system will meet your mentioned production requirements too.

If not then a jump to 6" tees and perhaps 3" or 4" HXs. I just want to keep costs as cheap as possible and design enough modularity to simply make a basic parts change to facilitate the multiple interpretations for production speed.

Smaug

KK just moving some stuff around.

Previously the column really wasn't oriented in the most user friendly position.

Made the HX rack and also wall mounted the feed water HX.

Fiji_Spirits

Aren’t the condensers for the low wines going to have drainage problems? How does the liquid drain without causing back pressure? Don’t those need to be vertical?

Smaug

Can't see it but they are pitched. They are also oriented down stream to exploit gravity. Also, yes the low wines HX will need a bit of back pressure to push over the 180 bend. But that will optimize heat exchange with respect to preheating the beer prior to injection. It is low wines so there will be less surface tension than straight up water.

Once filled they'll drain fine. There will likely be some entrainment but it matters not.

crozdog

I like the HX rack. Why not mount the water preheat and the steam generator in it as well?

Smaug

@crozdog said: I like the HX rack. Why not mount the water preheat and the steam generator in it as well?

Sure sure. Can do.

"With SD,,,the originators of all things modular,,,we (and you) can do...."

Kk,,,putting that on a tee shirt or ball cap (If It'll fit).

jbierling

I was thinking that would look nice fitting in the footprint of a pallet. Would look good for shows that you go to. Plug-and-play continuous still fitting anywhere you can put a pallet. I would think you would blow some minds.

Smaug

@jbierling said: I was thinking that would look nice fitting in the footprint of a pallet. Would look good for shows that you go to. Plug-and-play continuous still fitting anywhere you can put a pallet. I would think you would blow some minds.

I do have the jacketed re-boiler system palletized.

It's in production now. Has the larger 4" x 48" HXs, pumps, and fully automated controller.

It's on like a 4' x 8' pallet. It'll be part of our trade show system for everyone (like Affordable) to copy within a year or two ,,,,hahaha.

CothermanDistilling

if the column, the distillate pipe, and the feed pipe were arranged in a triangular fashion with modular bracketry, it would make a very rigid column with a smaller footprint... similar to a lighting truss?

Telluride

This steam generator setup still works great, I only need the 3 elements to run it

Modernity_Column

What would stop you from mounting this straight on the bottom of a 12" column? and using it as a steam generator in the sump?

Smaug

@Modernity_Column said: What would stop you from mounting this straight on the bottom of a 12" column? and using it as a steam generator in the sump?

Design wise, nothing. Just need to be able to provide the commensurate amount of BTUs / watts needed to drive the column in a timely manner.

grim

If you are talking continuous, ballpark is like 500,000 btu stripping, 200,000 btu rectifying for a 12" column.

That's like 150kw stripping, 60kw rectifying in electric terms.

If you are in the states, you'd need 480v 3-phase to even stand a chance at coming close.

Smaug

We spitballed to approximately 408 watts (1391 BTUs) per gallon/h needed. We also recognized that 500 watts per gallon/h would provide a nice margin so as to not,,,,be speeding down the highway at top speed,,,in 3rd gear if you see my meaning.

Dialing in much closer than that is difficult to factor because heat loss, collection speed, proof etc.

CothermanDistilling

@Modernity_Column said: What would stop you from mounting this straight on the bottom of a 12" column? and using it as a steam generator in the sump?

Foam... lots and lots of foam... tons of foam..... ridiculous amounts of foam...

Modernity_Column

So if you have (lets just use round numbers) 500 litres of feed wash an hour or 8.3 litres per minute at 80-85 degrees C entering the column at the top. 40 litres of spent wash collecting in the sump at the bottom of a 14 plate / 300mm / 4800mm insulated column, boiling, making flash steam continuously. 500 watts per gallon/h would be 132 watts per litre/h. Or 66,050 watts per 500 litres/h. or 1,100 watts per minute? I'm lost.

Smaug

Lost?

What does your bottoms HX look like?

80 to 85 degrees Celsius beer feed temp seems ambitious? I'll see where Adam's rig is at. Also, at that feed temp, what are you projecting your low wines abv to be? Without excellant heat recovery capability, I feel like you'll have to throw quite a bit of heat at the system to get your beer preheated to that temp. But then once injected,,,all that newly made heat pushing through the column will work to minimize abv rather than optimize.

Not really sure how much insulation will preserve, recover, and reduce BTU input? But certainly will help.

CothermanDistilling

Insulation will help, but far more important is recovering heat from all liquid leaving the system..

Smaug

Ah, so 60 to 65 is a more realistic beer feed temp (based on what Stump'y is doing) prior to injection.

BTW, Adam is producing 4 barrels of finished product per day.....And that is only an 8 hour day.

Start up procedure is literally 10 min to start producing, and shut down is literally 5 minutes.

Video on the way

grim

Jealous

Smaug

@grim said: Jealous

Need some big stuff to feed that thing. At the moment the still is out running the solids separation process.

He was running solids but that increased the likelihood of a clog (and did) due to the sizing of pipes we used on various components. I'm now sizing all HX through pipes to 1" and the beer feed piping to 2" So for now he is pulling solids out of his beer prior to running. But likely loosing alcohol in doing so because his process is a bit cobbled. He'll fix that and drop production costs even further. He has calculated that his production costs have been lower'd by 30% by having the ability to exploit economies of scale. And also by reducing heat up time as well as the man hours associated baby sitting the 600 gallon batch rig that he has.

The dude's distillery sits at the edge of a corn field that stretches as far as your eye can see.

jbierling

@Smaug said: increased the likelihood of a clog (and did) due to the sizing of pipes we used on various components. I'm now sizing all HX through pipes to 1" and the beer feed piping to 2"

Does this affect your thoughts on the mini 4" system? Seems if the beer feed needs to be 2", a 4" column might be problematic?