Baby Dragon - Ace of Hearts

FullySilenced

I like the one with the funnel as well.. is there a way to support the funnel and tube with a glass gusset between the body and the tube and funnel... would make it much tougher i think.. In fact gussets between the main body the beak and the funnel tube side would be good...

An what about making one of these to fit the std size dragonfire hydrometer...

Lloyd

I asked for the funnel to be fused to the main tube. Its not visible in the picture.
The minimum order for these is a little high so we must choose only one and if its for the Baby Dragon it does not need to be high flow so the main tube can be decreased in diameter. I doubt that will affect price very much, if at all, but it will take less product to get a reading.

They shipped today from a great distance away so we should have them in 2 days. Anxious.

Lloyd

They arrived already and the inspector is looking them over.
The design flaws will need to be corrected since they can only measure up to about 80% ABV.

MikeAggie

Found this thought you might want to read: glass parrot # 2 @ HD

punkin

Aaahh memories. Gman was the best and there's no doubt about it.

The distilling world is a poorer place without him.

Lloyd

Gorgeous work by Gman. And the tube holder (what's the proper name?) is inspirational.

Manofconstantsorrow

@punkin did something happen to him? He last visited AD on the 21st of September.

punkin

He very rarely posts anymore is all. We never see that creativity and energy that he used to post with anymore.

TheMoneyIsAllInFancyBongsNowadaysPunkin

Manofconstantsorrow

I'll smoke to that! <:-P In the Nuke world thats the first thing everyone says there planning on doing when the retire.

Lloyd

Manofconstantsorrow

Hard to tell from the pic looks like the plates are loaded? Or should I say I smell the Bijou Lloyd's cookin. But it does look fabulous, what's the height?

Lloyd

Sweet run.
T500 boiler, factory says it is 2000 watts, no controller and the Baby put out ~92% until it stopped producing.

Dumped junkahol (feints mostly) in the T500 and cut to about 40%, plugged it in and let er rip.
Fast boil up, steady production and instead of the ABV decreasing the production slowed instead (that's a good sign that tails are being suppressed). The big baby dephlem was kept cold on the bottom and hot on the top - not very scientific but no thermometers were used and it worked great. Very little mains water was needed. Just felt the dephlem and when the bottom half was cold and the top half was hot it worked out just about perfect to maintain the high ABV throughout the run.

Drained, dismantled and rinsed out took all of maybe 5 minutes, including the column parts to do a nice clean up. Leaving wet tails on the copper plates is a sure way to get them to turn black after 2 to 3 weeks.

This still will easily produce a gallon of 40% finished booze an hour. For folks not needing to sell booze for a living there ain't nothing wrong with that!

Someday I hope to do 3 stripping runs of ~8% UJSSM and one spirit run to really see the true gallons per hour of finished booze. My data is tainted by using feints and/or low wines.
Suppose, for example, it takes 10 hours to strip and spirit run 60 liters of wash and you get 7 gallons of 40% sipping booze. That falls under the gallon per hour but dammit it would be a good day! These numbers are imaginary until truly reamed out but they also seem a tad low because the T500 is only 2000 watts. Baby can handle more BUT the steady ABV suggests that the big baby dephlegmator was at optimum (yet I was only supplying a small trickle of cooling water to it - it still had legs to stretch out). On balance, it FELT like 2000 watts very much in the zone for the Baby Dragon. Another 500 watts to play with could have easily changed my mind.

Next up is the stockpot run. Give me a day or two.

Lloyd

@Manofconstantsorrow said: ...what's the height?

131cm (52") with the T500 boiler, 69cm (27") without the boiler.
The plates were loaded in the picture, bubbling plates don't seem to take a good still picture.

mlobarr

When are we going to see these in the States and what will the price be, thank you.

Smaug

We have 6 on the way but two of them are spoken for. We are ordering more for our last seafreight delivery before CNY.

mlobarr

Price please.

Lloyd

Getting close @mlobarr. The first few Baby Dragons will arrive in the US in a couple of weeks and about a month in Australia. The SD distributors need to work out how they will present their own configuration and their import costs to know the selling price but I think in a few days your distributor should have the idea.

Like I said before, we don't usually announce a new product until it is available by the distributors but everyone on the forum has been along for the ride on this one from the very beginning. It has truly been a community development effort and Baby Dragon is by far my most heartfelt offering. No other SD product means as much to me.
It is geared toward the masses of people that have limited space but who want a small scale, counter top, professional still. Baby is in a class all its own.

I'd think in about a week you'll have an idea for price. Much will depend on how your distributor presents his offering, bare bones Baby or fully decked out with hoses and valves. The Ace of Hearts is something quite special and I have done everything possible to keep it affordable - everything except using a cheaper bubble plate system.

Sad to say but I don't have a low cost parrot solution in place yet for Baby. Still working on that. But that's another story and I promise to keep everyone here updated as we make progress.

punkin

It's looking like the Ace of Hearts will retail in Australia as a 4 plate unit, without the optional parrot and the optional HBS boiler fitting for $749au. We're still trying all we can to lower the price and there may be adjustments before they are available or in the future as we get any parts at better value.

This has been Lloyds baby all along and his dream to be able to bring affordable high quality equipment to the average apartment or small needs user. We are all trying hard to keep it as affordable as possible.

cleadus1

kinda interested in one, looks like a good product!. is there any more info on production rates etc? just wondering what striping and production rated are like..

punkin

Hopefully @Lloyd will chip in mate. I think so far he's the one with the most hours behind the wheel from preliminary testing, although @FullySilenced may be catching up to him by now.

I'll have a boiler to suit (going to stock a few) and i've put a unit together for photos that i don't think i can bear to part with (familiar story) so i may play around with it as well.

Lloyd

@cleadus1 said: ... is there any more info on production rates etc? just wondering what striping and production rated are like..

Hi @cleadus1, I don't have any stripping data because booze here is so incredibly cheap compared to sugar, fruit or grains. Its usually too nasty for me to drink but is quite good when re-distilled with proper cuts.
My limited run data for spirits using a 2000 watt T500 boiler was right at 2L per hour but better spirit was at about 1.5+L/H with more reflux. That still works out pretty close to a gallon of 40% finished booze per hour, not bad for such a small rig.

Hoping to gather more data after a week or so because I have some packing material on order. I have some SPP, SS wool, and scrubbies but also some pumice rock and porous ceramic balls on order. Looking to play with a Baby Dragon hybrid to get Mama making her own vodka.

Clickeral

@Lloyd said:

Could always double distill it nice and slow without a packed section, that's what i do atm to get a nice vodka with my 4plater :)

mlobarr

Who makes or sells the T5000 boiler?

Myles

T500 is an urn based boiler from stillspirits. You can probably find one in most homebrew shops.

mlobarr

Thanks Miles.

cleadus1

@Lloyd said: Hi @cleadus1, I don't have any stripping data because booze here is so incredibly cheap compared to sugar, fruit or grains. Its usually too nasty for me to drink but is quite good when re-distilled with proper cuts. My limited run data for spirits using a 2000 watt T500 boiler was right at 2L per hour but better spirit was at about 1.5+L/H with more reflux. That still works out pretty close to a gallon of 40% finished booze per hour, not bad for such a small rig. Hoping to gather more data after a week or so because I have some packing material on order. I have some SPP, SS wool, and scrubbies but also some pumice rock and porous ceramic balls on order. Looking to play with a Baby Dragon hybrid to get Mama making her own vodka.

I look forward to hearing your results!

punkin

If you are in Aus i will be stocking them cheaper than the home brew shops from next week on.

mlobarr

Thanks Punkin but Im in The US, Arkansas.

FullySilenced

Lloyd is spot on track with the production rate of the Baby .... from the runs that have been produced on my rig... 1.5 to 2L an hour..

FS

Lloyd

@Clickeral said: Could always double distill it nice and slow without a packed section, that's what i do atm to get a nice vodka with my 4plater

That's what I do too.
Been told before that its a three step approach - strip (to get away from the yeast and possibly chop off some fores and tails), then a spirit run (to get the hearts out) and finally another spirit run on the hearts (to further rectify the spirit). Each step is with 4 to 6 plates.

Its been a long time since running a hybrid, if I remember correctly it was using SS wool but may have been SPP, and it was some of the softest, smoothest vodka I've ever made. Hoping to do it again.