StillSmart

Hey guys,

Last time I was on here was around 3 and a bit years ago with my SS Super Reflux, and boy have things changed in this industry!, the T500 was just coming out before I lost touch with distilling.

Now I'm back, I have been out of practice for far to long and want to back into the swing of things. I have cleaned, and bought new equipment and want to use my reflux still to get be back on track before I take the plunge with a T500, (I would love a I still though!).

Hopefully I can share with you my experience with my distillation and take onboard any guidance people offer.

Thanks

BOR

Great to see you back.The super reflux will give similar results to the T500 with the right packing,if you use the essencia packing it will produce 93 abv or with spp in the little column 95abv so imho its a keeper,plus you also have the option of running in pot still mode.the only thing i would recomend is the use of a power controller just for the compression of heads in reflux mode, power down to achieve total reflux and let them stack then collect fores / heads slowly then power back up for the hearts
Cheers.

check here for the essencia packing
http://www.homebrewmegastore.co.uk/shop ... parts.html

Hi and welcome back into the fold...It's a great forum..

I've got hold of a T500 a month or so....it does the job well. Let us know how you get on.

Thanks for the warm welcome,

I have purchased a power controller and monitor, and will give this a go in the next few days. I have been looking at getting SPP, but don't know where to get it from in the UK?

One question I have is about water control whilst using the power controller, do I control my temp via the controller and just have a fixed water flow, or use the power controller for my initial heating up and then dropping down to achieve 100% reflux and slowly increasing power to collect heads, then on to hearts, using the water flow to tightly control the temperature?

Thanks for your help

BOR

Bottleofrum wrote:Thanks for the warm welcome,

I have purchased a power controller and monitor, and will give this a go in the next few days. I have been looking at getting SPP, but don't know where to get it from in the UK?

One question I have is about water control whilst using the power controller, do I control my temp via the controller and just have a fixed water flow, or use the power controller for my initial heating up and then dropping down to achieve 100% reflux and slowly increasing power to collect heads, then on to hearts, using the water flow to tightly control the temperature?

Thanks for your help

BOR

Hi BOR,
You can order the SPP's from here. http://www.istill.eu/#!spiral-prismatic ... liter/c7ok
I ordered mine 2 weeks ago, just another 6 weeks to wait for delivery.

Hi and welcme back.

i have a Super Reflux and love it.
I like that it can be easily used as either a pot or reflux.
I make Rum and Malt Whisky, I normally use it as a 5 gal pot still.
I'd stick with the super reflux myself.
Norm

Yup I still use mine

Have you seen the copper pot still top that ss are now selling for the t500 ? x2 part set .. after my previous post elsewhere it looks like it could well fit on the ss super reflux

Iain

Hey,

I believe that the ss copper head will not connect onto the super reflux due to the attaching clips being different. Would have been great though ..

Imho the spp isn't worth the bother for the super reflux you only get a small increase in abv and the bloody stuff gets everywhere,it has to be emptied every time unless you can store the still upright.also you need to fit a small amount of scrubber in the condenser cross over pipe to prevent it getting in there.since i purchased mine ive gone back to using copper scrubbers just to save the hassle.after saying all this it was an exiciting experiment and i still have it if i decide to try it again.
As regards the power controll i run on full power to warm up then drop the power to about a 1000 watt with enough water to achieve total reflux leave it like this for 20-30 min then reduce the water so your getting a drip per second,once youve collected the fores and heads up the power to about 1400 watt and increase the water to maintain the temp at 78 keep it like this untill your collection slows right down and you can leave the tails in the boiler

Cheers

I'm a little puzzled, I have a 25litre wash at around 12% which finished at 0.988 ( ss turbo. 6kg sugar). I have packed my column with copper saddles at bottom and ceramic saddles from the copper to the crossover pipe, using a essencia digital thermometer and using only water flow as my control ( power controller not turned up) I am getting an alarming fast distillation speed, it's a constant flow. In 40 mins I have 1litre @ 87% abv with temperature at a constant 78 degrees . To get rid of the heads first I tried to compress them using water flow, for about 20 mins I collected around 300ml at a temp of 74 degrees. This is very fast to what I'm used to, any ideas?

Thanks

BOR

That flow is fine. Especially on a stripping run. Constant head temp for the bulk of the run is always a good sign. When temp starts climbing you know your getting to the end of the run.

Why do you use packing on a stripping run?? Pointless

I was not conducting a stripping run. I have never conducted one as I have thought my spirit run was good enough.
I have since identified what went on here, because of the packing (to lose) I used and the constant power (1400w) on my heating element, I had to use a very high flow rate of coolant water to get my temp down to around 79.

I have since made my power controller and also got some pan scrubbers as my packaging. I'm hoping with control to the heating element I can slow this baby down , compress the heads and achiver a higher abv with the new packaging. Oh and add a few more hours to my distillation too.

BOR