StillSmart

Now everyone don't laugh at once but I have searched and found a blank. Again even as a noob I can't believe I'm about to ask this but..... ughhhh. When do you start water flow through the liebig condenser

Now to save face I hazard a guess around 75 deg C when the column vapour is just coming up to temp but honestly I can't find an answer to this question. Seems futile running 500ml/min of water through the condenser whilst it's doing nothing during heat up but please please correct me if i'm wrong

Little help to you perhaps because I guess we have a different set up, but I've learned with mine get cooling on full @ 40 degrees, cos after that it all starts happening pretty rapidly.

I run mine as soon as I turn the power on, might seem a waste but my waters not metered so I don't care and it helps flush the turds along the sewer :-)

However, I've read many times on various posts that people don't turn their water on untit the middle of their column gets hot to touch, for stripping this is around 10mins before it starts producing with a 1 meter, 2" column from my experience, for reflux with a packed column, it's a different story, things can suddenly heat up fast, if like me your waters not metered then anytime you like but if you are metered then I'm not entirely sure, maybe put a probe on the boiler and switch it on when your at 60°c or something.

No-one is laughing smiler.
Although with that user name maybe we should.
Ask away,I think that you got the right response this time.
If not,come back and ask again.
We is a friendly bunch of odd folk here.

Robert.

@ Smiler: Just so your not disappointed - I had a bit of giggle. There are actually a couple of ways of addressing this. All the previous posts are valid - at least for those individuals that wrote them.

I try and save a bit of water so on a stripping run, I turn the water on at about 60 C. It takes my boiler (50 L) an hour to heat up. The rise is fairly steady.

On a spirit run, the temp will start off slowly and increase more rapidly the hotter it gets. About 50 mins. This is with no extensions and no packing.

When doing a spirit run with the intention of getting a 95-96% ABV neutral, the column is tripled in length and packed with stainless steel scrubbers. Here you will get some increase in temp but the last 30 degrees or so will climb very, very rapidly. So get your water on half way through the heat up.

It is better to waste some water than fill the area where you are working with extremely volatile vapor. I cook over gas so even more important.

Hope it helps

Thanks for all the advice guys. Maybe should have stated what type of column I'll be using! 750mm pot no scrubbers or owt (yet) and my leibig is 1000mm (vertical) with roughly a 750mm jacket. Seems my initial thoughts were somewhere near the ball. Good to know if I pack the column things would change very quick so start of earlier... Not on a meter so not a worry water consumption it's gonna go back to the garden anyways to water some plants lol. Just finishing up my build this weekend so still need to do a citric wash to clean and some sacraficials on sugar wash, a good opertunity to get a feel for the still. Investing a good amount of time and effort in a cider/Apple wash and little snippets of info like this will really help me out. Of the opinion if you can't put your all into something don't bother and I really dont want to mess up!!!