It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 16:22:51 +0800, Scromlette
wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

A mate makes his own whiskey, He uses a reflux still which I doubt
you'd need and he says that trying to hold the correct temperature
without using some sort of automatic controller is a bit difficult but
doable.

(His current still is electric fired and all automated controls)
--
Cheers,

John B.

A web search finds this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denatured_alcohol
which helps my understanding of what that is.
I've always called it denatured alcohol.

A couple thoughts.

First, that heater creates heat that has to go some
where. Could be nice in the winter, when you are
heating already to keep your self and shop warm.
Not sure if the cost of the electric is less than
the cost of the fluid.

Second, the flux and debris will accumulate in the
pressure cooker. Nice to line that with aluminum
foil, or a pie pan from Dollar Tree, so you can
lift the foil / pan out and discard. Rather than
junk the entire cooker.

Alcohol vapors are flammable. Know that, and work
with whatever safety is needed.

With that boiling / condensing temp, room air and
a fan might be well enough to condense the vapors.
Condensor off a dehumidifier might be enough, or
use the evaporator out of an old frost free refrig.

I used to find auto dry gas for 50 cents for 12 ounces,
now and again. That could work for your process. I have
a bunch of bottles of drygas, that I don't use. The
gov't makes the auto fuel guys put in 10% ethanol, so
it's like having a bottle of drygas in every gallon
of fuel. Using auto drygas might be cheaper and less
labor intensive than recycling the denatured, and
have to scrape out your cooker.

I'm curious to hear how this all works out. Please
be kind enough to write again.

Vote for my guy, and shoot my favorite type of gun,
also, please.



..
Christopher A. Young
Learn about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

On 9/9/2013 4:22 AM, Scromlette wrote:
It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

Since the bloke isn't working from corn mash, it doesn't
seem necessary to reflux. Simple one stage distil should
do the job.

And, since he's starting with alcohol with some solids,
it's less critical to maintain perfect temp. You'd (to
the OP) need some kind of thermostat on the heating
element, so it didn't get over 190F or some similar temp.
Otherwise, it might tend to cook the resins in the
pot.

..
Christopher A. Young
Learn about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

On 9/9/2013 8:02 AM, John B. wrote:


A mate makes his own whiskey, He uses a reflux still which I doubt
you'd need and he says that trying to hold the correct temperature
without using some sort of automatic controller is a bit difficult but
doable.

(His current still is electric fired and all automated controls)
--
Cheers,

John B.

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

--
Ed Huntress

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on the value of your time, and the volume you are processing. If
your time is free, you can knock yourself out and save cash outlay - but
if your time is worth something (which it should be, even in a "cottage
business") then you'll have to work out if it costs you more than $3-4
worth of your time (and the cost of electricity to supply the heat) to
reprocess a litre of sprits.

Additional hard to quantify costs may involve the opinion of your local
fire department, insurance company, etc. regarding your processing of
flammable liquids - probably best undertaken somewhere that won't be
affected if the whole business managed to catch on fire, even though
nothing you described _should_ result in that happening. An ounce of
excess caution is worth a kilo of profound regret, etc...

--
Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by
Please don't feed the trolls. Killfile and ignore them so they will go away.

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 16:22:51 +0800, Scromlette
wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?
I don't know if it will be worth your effort but you can distill your
alcohol without boiling it. This is probably the best way for your
safety. If you heat the dirty alcohol to even 100 degrees F it will
evaporate fairly quickly and it will have less water in it if you are
not using a reflux still. The dirty stuff you have will have absorbed
water from the air. The best you can hope for when the stuff is
distilled will be 95% alcohol and 5% water. This is the azeotrope of
ethyl alcohol and water. For experimenting you can use an aquarium
heater that you submerge in the dirty alcohol. This will give you a
thermostatically controlled heat source that will be unlikely to
overheat and start a fire. Wrap some insulation around the heated
dirty alcohol container and run your copper tubing through a cold
water bath. If doing this in the USA it may be illegal.
Eric

"Scromlette" wrote in message
. au...
It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling it
for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure cooker
vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat exchanger.
I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would be
sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

You might see if filtering it through activated charcol works well enough. I
have not tried it or heard of it being done (except as "charcoal mellowing"
of whiskey), but it might be less trouble, expense and risk than setting up
a still. Activated charcoal in bulk is much less expensive than when you buy
it in the form of a water filter.

You also might want to ask other forums about what other low-volume PCB
makers are doing.

On 9/9/2013 9:10 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics,

When I was a kid I remember my father gently shaking his new bottle of
"Kentucky Springs" Bourbon. He said it was to mix the fusel oil. Is
that true? Is fusel oil in better bourbon? (Kentucky Springs is pretty
crappy bourbon)

On Mon, 9 Sep 2013 10:14:18 -0700, "anorton"
wrote:


"Scromlette" wrote in message
.au...
It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling it
for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure cooker
vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat exchanger.
I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would be
sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

You might see if filtering it through activated charcol works well enough. I
have not tried it or heard of it being done (except as "charcoal mellowing"
of whiskey), but it might be less trouble, expense and risk than setting up
a still. Activated charcoal in bulk is much less expensive than when you buy
it in the form of a water filter.

You also might want to ask other forums about what other low-volume PCB
makers are doing.
I think that's an excellent idea. I wish I had thought of it. And
activated carbon (charcoal) is available in bulk for pretty cheap at
aquarium stores. And while it lets ethanol right through it does
capture a remarkable number of other substances that dissolve into
alcohol.
Eric

"Heat exchanger" is the key to distilling liquids. Basically, from
a person knowing the concept only, there are 3 long tubes bonded together
in a side-by-side fashion for hi thermal conductivity between them. At one
end the alchol enters one tube and exits another; from the remaining
garbage exits. All are nearly the same temperature.
At the other the input tube is wrapped in a few circles and connected
to the output tube. The wrapped tube is contained in a heated chamber and
given means to seperate the gas (alcohol) and liquid (garbage) and direct
the liquid into the proper tube.
Everything is wrapped with heaps of insulation so no heat is lost.
First step to making such a gadget would probably be searching recent
patent records for distilling methods. hello google...

Hul

Scromlette wrote:
It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 17:33:05 -0400, Tom Gardner Mars@Tacks wrote:

On 9/9/2013 9:10 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics,

When I was a kid I remember my father gently shaking his new bottle of
"Kentucky Springs" Bourbon. He said it was to mix the fusel oil. Is
that true? Is fusel oil in better bourbon? (Kentucky Springs is pretty
crappy bourbon)

Fusel "oil" is actually an alcohol. It's the stuff that makes you spit
out a drink and it gives you headaches. It's bad juju.

Bootleggers and low-rent distillers run their stuff once through a pot
still. That leaves the fusel oil and some unpleasant esters in the
distilled alcohol. There are three ways to get rid of it. One is to
run it two or even three times through a pot still. The second is to
use a reflux still for the first pass, which can be as good as three
passes through a pot still.

The third is what makers of quality whiskey do: age it for 20 years in
a charred oak barrel. Whether the charcoal actually absorbs it is
controversial, but it gets rid of it somehow.

--
Ed Huntress (whose uncle made money bnilding pot stills for
bootleggers during Prohibition)

If you decide to pursue this, here is a site with a lot of good info and
designs: http://moonshine-still.com/

-----
Regards,
Carl Ijames
"Ecnerwal" wrote in message
...

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on the value of your time, and the volume you are processing. If
your time is free, you can knock yourself out and save cash outlay - but
if your time is worth something (which it should be, even in a "cottage
business") then you'll have to work out if it costs you more than $3-4
worth of your time (and the cost of electricity to supply the heat) to
reprocess a litre of sprits.

Additional hard to quantify costs may involve the opinion of your local
fire department, insurance company, etc. regarding your processing of
flammable liquids - probably best undertaken somewhere that won't be
affected if the whole business managed to catch on fire, even though
nothing you described _should_ result in that happening. An ounce of
excess caution is worth a kilo of profound regret, etc...

--
Cats, coffee, chocolate...vices to live by
Please don't feed the trolls. Killfile and ignore them so they will go away.

On 9/9/2013 6:11 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 17:33:05 -0400, Tom Gardner Mars@Tacks wrote:

On 9/9/2013 9:10 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics,

When I was a kid I remember my father gently shaking his new bottle of
"Kentucky Springs" Bourbon. He said it was to mix the fusel oil. Is
that true? Is fusel oil in better bourbon? (Kentucky Springs is pretty
crappy bourbon)

Fusel "oil" is actually an alcohol. It's the stuff that makes you spit
out a drink and it gives you headaches. It's bad juju.

Bootleggers and low-rent distillers run their stuff once through a pot
still. That leaves the fusel oil and some unpleasant esters in the
distilled alcohol. There are three ways to get rid of it. One is to
run it two or even three times through a pot still. The second is to
use a reflux still for the first pass, which can be as good as three
passes through a pot still.

The third is what makers of quality whiskey do: age it for 20 years in
a charred oak barrel. Whether the charcoal actually absorbs it is
controversial, but it gets rid of it somehow.


Now I remember, it was "Echo Springs", not "Kentucky Springs". Did it
probably have fusel oil in it? Did dad really mix it in? Does it float
or sink? I don't shake "Maker's Mark" or Jack, I sure won't touch Echo
Springs. (I probably drink a whole bottle of booze every year.)

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 19:11:29 -0400, Tom Gardner Mars@Tacks wrote:

On 9/9/2013 6:11 PM, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 17:33:05 -0400, Tom Gardner Mars@Tacks wrote:

On 9/9/2013 9:10 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics,

When I was a kid I remember my father gently shaking his new bottle of
"Kentucky Springs" Bourbon. He said it was to mix the fusel oil. Is
that true? Is fusel oil in better bourbon? (Kentucky Springs is pretty
crappy bourbon)

Fusel "oil" is actually an alcohol. It's the stuff that makes you spit
out a drink and it gives you headaches. It's bad juju.

Bootleggers and low-rent distillers run their stuff once through a pot
still. That leaves the fusel oil and some unpleasant esters in the
distilled alcohol. There are three ways to get rid of it. One is to
run it two or even three times through a pot still. The second is to
use a reflux still for the first pass, which can be as good as three
passes through a pot still.

The third is what makers of quality whiskey do: age it for 20 years in
a charred oak barrel. Whether the charcoal actually absorbs it is
controversial, but it gets rid of it somehow.


Now I remember, it was "Echo Springs", not "Kentucky Springs". Did it
probably have fusel oil in it?

If it was cheap, it probably had some.

Did dad really mix it in? Does it float
or sink?

I don't know for sure, but I think it floats. I was taught to just
keep the condenser warm, and aimed into a tin can, until the
temperature got up to the boiling temp. of ethanol. Then dump what was
in the can before hooking up cooling to the condenser and collecting
the alcohol.

My still was a piece of lab equipment that was liberated from
Princeton University by a chem-engineering friend. It had a socket on
top of the reflux column into which you stuck a precision thermometer.
It was pretty classy for making hooch, but it did the job.

I don't shake "Maker's Mark" or Jack, I sure won't touch Echo
Springs. (I probably drink a whole bottle of booze every year.)

I haven't owned a bottle for 20 years. I drink maybe two gin martinis
and one glass of scotch per year.

--
Ed Huntress

"Ed Huntress" wrote in message
...

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 17:33:05 -0400, Tom Gardner Mars@Tacks wrote:

On 9/9/2013 9:10 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics,

When I was a kid I remember my father gently shaking his new bottle of
"Kentucky Springs" Bourbon. He said it was to mix the fusel oil. Is
that true? Is fusel oil in better bourbon? (Kentucky Springs is pretty
crappy bourbon)

Fusel "oil" is actually an alcohol. It's the stuff that makes you spit
out a drink and it gives you headaches. It's bad juju.

Bootleggers and low-rent distillers run their stuff once through a pot
still. That leaves the fusel oil and some unpleasant esters in the
distilled alcohol. There are three ways to get rid of it. One is to
run it two or even three times through a pot still. The second is to
use a reflux still for the first pass, which can be as good as three
passes through a pot still.

The third is what makers of quality whiskey do: age it for 20 years in
a charred oak barrel. Whether the charcoal actually absorbs it is
controversial, but it gets rid of it somehow.

--
Ed Huntress (whose uncle made money bnilding pot stills for
bootleggers during Prohibition)


IIRC, I read something about making a filter with activated (charcoal or
carbon?) in a few feet of tubing, run the alcohol through a few feet of
tubing filled with activated charcoal and it was supposed to remove the
nasties.

RogerN

On Mon, 9 Sep 2013 18:28:34 -0500, "RogerN" wrote:

"Ed Huntress" wrote in message
.. .

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 17:33:05 -0400, Tom Gardner Mars@Tacks wrote:

On 9/9/2013 9:10 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics,

When I was a kid I remember my father gently shaking his new bottle of
"Kentucky Springs" Bourbon. He said it was to mix the fusel oil. Is
that true? Is fusel oil in better bourbon? (Kentucky Springs is pretty
crappy bourbon)

Fusel "oil" is actually an alcohol. It's the stuff that makes you spit
out a drink and it gives you headaches. It's bad juju.

Bootleggers and low-rent distillers run their stuff once through a pot
still. That leaves the fusel oil and some unpleasant esters in the
distilled alcohol. There are three ways to get rid of it. One is to
run it two or even three times through a pot still. The second is to
use a reflux still for the first pass, which can be as good as three
passes through a pot still.

The third is what makers of quality whiskey do: age it for 20 years in
a charred oak barrel. Whether the charcoal actually absorbs it is
controversial, but it gets rid of it somehow.

--
Ed Huntress (whose uncle made money bnilding pot stills for
bootleggers during Prohibition)


IIRC, I read something about making a filter with activated (charcoal or
carbon?) in a few feet of tubing, run the alcohol through a few feet of
tubing filled with activated charcoal and it was supposed to remove the
nasties.

RogerN

It may. The straight info available for making hooch is much more
widely available today than when I dabbled with it, around 40 years
ago. The info I had was probably half nonsense.

--
Ed Huntress

"Scromlette" wrote in message
. au...
It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns
or politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with
dissolved rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking
about distilling it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per
litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator
heat exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat
exchanger would be sufficient cooling.

I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).
Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine
perhaps?)

Will it be worth the effort?

This is a cross-section of a commercial vapor degreaser.
http://www.microcareprecisioncleaner...the_system.jpg

All the ones I used back in the 1970's were simple rectangular
stainless tanks with a heater in the bottom and a coil of cooling
water pipe near the top, with a gutter under it to catch the
condensate. You could make one from two different-diameter tin cans
with the smaller one inlet part way into the bottom of the larger to
form the gutter
jsw

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

On Monday, September 9, 2013 4:22:51 AM UTC-4, Scromlette wrote:
.. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved

rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling

it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.



You might see if a solvent recycler is in your area. They distill solvents and sell the clean solvent. Generally buying solvents from them is cheaper than other sources and you should get some credit for the dirty solvent you give them.

Dan

Joe Gwinn fired this volley in
:

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.

It will react. It will form formaldehyde in contact with copper.

Oh... minor missed item here... that happens at 300C. G

Lloyd

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

--
Ed Huntress

Ignorant guess: so that the flammable vapors won't escape, and possibly
catch fire.

As to fusel oils, not a big deal. Circuit boards won't complain of hang
overs and head aches. Might even help clean the boards.

..
Christopher A. Young
Learn about Jesus
www.lds.org
..

On 9/9/2013 9:33 PM, Joe Gwinn wrote:
I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 07:00:01 -0400, Stormin Mormon
wrote:

Ignorant guess: so that the flammable vapors won't escape, and possibly
catch fire.

As to fusel oils, not a big deal. Circuit boards won't complain of hang
overs and head aches. Might even help clean the boards.

Well, the OP's question is about distilling methanol. I've never heard
of fusel oil being a problem with that, although I have no idea.

We also were talking about stills for making drinking-quality ethanol.
Fusel oil is a product of fermentation of some sources of sugar and it
can be an issue with that distillation.

--
Ed Huntress


.
Christopher A. Young
Learn about Jesus
www.lds.org
.

On 9/9/2013 9:33 PM, Joe Gwinn wrote:
I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

There is some methanol in the fermented mash, and this too must be
discarded to yield potable hooch. The old rule was to discard the
first (fusel oils) and last (methanol) fractions, and keep only the
middle fraction.

I don't offhand know how much methanol there is in the third fraction,
but it isn't going to be a lot.

When methanol is used as a fuel, what is the problem seen with copper
and brass parts? Whatever the problem, it will be worse in a still,
because of the higher temperature (82 C, not 300 C).

I did a little googling. The effect on aluminum, magnesium, and zinc
is pretty rapid, on brass far slower, and pure copper slower still.
This assumes that the methanol contains some water, which is easily
absorbed from the atmosphere. The methanol vapor in a still will not
contain much water, so the corrosion effects may be greatly reduced.

Joe Gwinn

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 08:21:49 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

Well, I think you'll find that most of the pot stills made during
Prohibition actually were soft-soldered with lead-tin solder.

As I mentioned, my uncle made those things for sale to the moonshiners
in the Jersey Pine Barrens during Prohibition. When I was a teenager
he taught me how to sweat-solder pre-tinned parts (that's how I
soldered almost the entire hot-water heating system in my house), and
he described the process of making a still. I've since seen it
described the same way elsewhere.

I could tell you the details but it's lengthy. The short version is
that the seams were double-folded and they only sweated the contact
point between the *outside* of the outer fold and the body of the
still. It required a lot of skill and a lot of heat because of the
conductivity of the copper. The area was heated with a plumber's
gasoline torch and the sweating was done with massive soldering
coppers.

The solder never contacted liquid and no significant amount of vapor.
If a moonshiner fell asleep and let his pot run dry, the still was
ruined because the solder would melt.

It's interesting stuff. If Prohibition comes back, I've got a
sideline. d8-)



There is some methanol in the fermented mash, and this too must be
discarded to yield potable hooch. The old rule was to discard the
first (fusel oils) and last (methanol) fractions, and keep only the
middle fraction.

Hmmm. I thought that methonol had a lower boiling point than ethanol,
and that it was part of the initial discard.

My memory could be failing on this point.

Someone mentioned azeotropes earlier in the thread. That's for people
with more knowledge than I have, but be aware that some of the
volatile liquids involved, and there are a bunch of them in the
fermentation/distiallation process, form azeotropes and can't be
separated by this kind of distillation. It makes the whole thing
fairly complicated but a home distiller only needs to know a few
basics.


I don't offhand know how much methanol there is in the third fraction,
but it isn't going to be a lot.

When methanol is used as a fuel, what is the problem seen with copper
and brass parts? Whatever the problem, it will be worse in a still,
because of the higher temperature (82 C, not 300 C).

All I've ever heard is that it corrodes several different metals in an
engine, and that copper and brass were among them.

It's not a big problem in racing because you should drain the fuel
system after races are over. But it is a problem if you let it sit
there.


I did a little googling. The effect on aluminum, magnesium, and zinc
is pretty rapid, on brass far slower, and pure copper slower still.
This assumes that the methanol contains some water, which is easily
absorbed from the atmosphere. The methanol vapor in a still will not
contain much water, so the corrosion effects may be greatly reduced.

Joe Gwinn

It's just something to be aware of. What you said there sounds
reasonable. The biggest corrosion problem was with carburetors, and
they're usually aluminum/zinc diecast alloys.

--
Ed Huntress

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 09:15:53 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 08:21:49 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

Well, I think you'll find that most of the pot stills made during
Prohibition actually were soft-soldered with lead-tin solder.

As I mentioned, my uncle made those things for sale to the moonshiners
in the Jersey Pine Barrens during Prohibition. When I was a teenager
he taught me how to sweat-solder pre-tinned parts (that's how I
soldered almost the entire hot-water heating system in my house), and
he described the process of making a still. I've since seen it
described the same way elsewhere.

I could tell you the details but it's lengthy. The short version is
that the seams were double-folded and they only sweated the contact
point between the *outside* of the outer fold and the body of the
still. It required a lot of skill and a lot of heat because of the
conductivity of the copper. The area was heated with a plumber's
gasoline torch and the sweating was done with massive soldering
coppers.

The solder never contacted liquid and no significant amount of vapor.
If a moonshiner fell asleep and let his pot run dry, the still was
ruined because the solder would melt.

It's interesting stuff. If Prohibition comes back, I've got a
sideline. d8-)

I don't know about prohibition days but auto radiators are used
sometimes used in the boot-legging business as condensers. I remember
a news article about a number of people being poisoned in Georgia as a
result. The Wiki even mentions it :-)
--
Cheers,

John B.

On Wed, 11 Sep 2013 08:06:41 +0700, John B.
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 09:15:53 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 08:21:49 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

Well, I think you'll find that most of the pot stills made during
Prohibition actually were soft-soldered with lead-tin solder.

As I mentioned, my uncle made those things for sale to the moonshiners
in the Jersey Pine Barrens during Prohibition. When I was a teenager
he taught me how to sweat-solder pre-tinned parts (that's how I
soldered almost the entire hot-water heating system in my house), and
he described the process of making a still. I've since seen it
described the same way elsewhere.

I could tell you the details but it's lengthy. The short version is
that the seams were double-folded and they only sweated the contact
point between the *outside* of the outer fold and the body of the
still. It required a lot of skill and a lot of heat because of the
conductivity of the copper. The area was heated with a plumber's
gasoline torch and the sweating was done with massive soldering
coppers.

The solder never contacted liquid and no significant amount of vapor.
If a moonshiner fell asleep and let his pot run dry, the still was
ruined because the solder would melt.

It's interesting stuff. If Prohibition comes back, I've got a
sideline. d8-)

I don't know about prohibition days but auto radiators are used
sometimes used in the boot-legging business as condensers. I remember
a news article about a number of people being poisoned in Georgia as a
result. The Wiki even mentions it :-)

Oh, yeah. The moonshine business has gone to hell. g In the old
days, if you sold a bootlegger poison hooch, you could wind up dead.

It was bad for his business.

But that has always been a danger with illicit booze. Some of it has
always been poison, with lead, antifreeze (used in wine to sweeten it
-- it kills), methanol, and other crap.

--
Ed Huntress

On 2013-09-10, Ed Huntress wrote:
On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 07:00:01 -0400, Stormin Mormon
wrote:

Ignorant guess: so that the flammable vapors won't escape, and possibly
catch fire.

As to fusel oils, not a big deal. Circuit boards won't complain of hang
overs and head aches. Might even help clean the boards.

Well, the OP's question is about distilling methanol. I've never heard
of fusel oil being a problem with that, although I have no idea.

IIRC -- I think the term was "metyhlated spirits" which is
UK-speak for "denatured alcohol". Given that this was what he was
using, and he was apparently using it to clean printed circuit boards of
rosin flux after the soldering, I suspect that a bit of lead is in each
batch, too.

If it were for drinking -- do you really think that distillation
would recover enough of the used product to be worth the trouble? :-)

We also were talking about stills for making drinking-quality ethanol.
Fusel oil is a product of fermentation of some sources of sugar and it
can be an issue with that distillation.

Right -- different application of the technology.

Enjoy,
DoN.

--
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On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 22:52:23 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Wed, 11 Sep 2013 08:06:41 +0700, John B.
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 09:15:53 -0400, Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 08:21:49 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

Well, I think you'll find that most of the pot stills made during
Prohibition actually were soft-soldered with lead-tin solder.

As I mentioned, my uncle made those things for sale to the moonshiners
in the Jersey Pine Barrens during Prohibition. When I was a teenager
he taught me how to sweat-solder pre-tinned parts (that's how I
soldered almost the entire hot-water heating system in my house), and
he described the process of making a still. I've since seen it
described the same way elsewhere.

I could tell you the details but it's lengthy. The short version is
that the seams were double-folded and they only sweated the contact
point between the *outside* of the outer fold and the body of the
still. It required a lot of skill and a lot of heat because of the
conductivity of the copper. The area was heated with a plumber's
gasoline torch and the sweating was done with massive soldering
coppers.

The solder never contacted liquid and no significant amount of vapor.
If a moonshiner fell asleep and let his pot run dry, the still was
ruined because the solder would melt.

It's interesting stuff. If Prohibition comes back, I've got a
sideline. d8-)

I don't know about prohibition days but auto radiators are used
sometimes used in the boot-legging business as condensers. I remember
a news article about a number of people being poisoned in Georgia as a
result. The Wiki even mentions it :-)

Oh, yeah. The moonshine business has gone to hell. g In the old
days, if you sold a bootlegger poison hooch, you could wind up dead.

It was bad for his business.

But that has always been a danger with illicit booze. Some of it has
always been poison, with lead, antifreeze (used in wine to sweeten it
-- it kills), methanol, and other crap.

I understand that adding chicken manure to the mash as a yeast
nutrient was also done. the yeast works faster and time is money, as
they say :-)

--
Cheers,

John B.

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 08:21:49 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns
or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with
dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about
distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator
heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine
perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

Well, I think you'll find that most of the pot stills made during
Prohibition actually were soft-soldered with lead-tin solder.

As I mentioned, my uncle made those things for sale to the moonshiners
in the Jersey Pine Barrens during Prohibition. When I was a teenager
he taught me how to sweat-solder pre-tinned parts (that's how I
soldered almost the entire hot-water heating system in my house), and
he described the process of making a still. I've since seen it
described the same way elsewhere.

I could tell you the details but it's lengthy. The short version is
that the seams were double-folded and they only sweated the contact
point between the *outside* of the outer fold and the body of the
still. It required a lot of skill and a lot of heat because of the
conductivity of the copper. The area was heated with a plumber's
gasoline torch and the sweating was done with massive soldering
coppers.

The solder never contacted liquid and no significant amount of vapor.
If a moonshiner fell asleep and let his pot run dry, the still was
ruined because the solder would melt.

It's interesting stuff. If Prohibition comes back, I've got a
sideline. d8-)

Yes. With better technology - TIG the seams, so no problem if the
seams overheat.


There is some methanol in the fermented mash, and this too must be
discarded to yield potable hooch. The old rule was to discard the
first (fusel oils) and last (methanol) fractions, and keep only the
middle fraction.

Hmmm. I thought that methonol had a lower boiling point than ethanol,
and that it was part of the initial discard.

My memory could be failing on this point.

Mine too. Now that you mention it, the rule was methanol first, then
ethanol, then fusel oils. so one kept the middle. This was the "secret
of distillation" discovered by Arab alchemists. The word "alcohol" is
of Arabic origin.


Someone mentioned azeotropes earlier in the thread. That's for people
with more knowledge than I have, but be aware that some of the
volatile liquids involved, and there are a bunch of them in the
fermentation/distiallation process, form azeotropes and can't be
separated by this kind of distillation. It makes the whole thing
fairly complicated but a home distiller only needs to know a few
basics.

The most important azeotrope here is that of water and ethanol, at 95%
ethanol and 5% water. This is the highest proof one can get by
ordinary distillation.


I don't offhand know how much methanol there is in the third fraction,
but it isn't going to be a lot.

When methanol is used as a fuel, what is the problem seen with copper
and brass parts? Whatever the problem, it will be worse in a still,
because of the higher temperature (82 C, not 300 C).

All I've ever heard is that it corrodes several different metals in an
engine, and that copper and brass were among them.

It's not a big problem in racing because you should drain the fuel
system after races are over. But it is a problem if you let it sit
there.

Yes. That was the implication of much of what I read.


I did a little googling. The effect on aluminum, magnesium, and zinc
is pretty rapid, on brass far slower, and pure copper slower still.
This assumes that the methanol contains some water, which is easily
absorbed from the atmosphere. The methanol vapor in a still will not
contain much water, so the corrosion effects may be greatly reduced.

It's just something to be aware of. What you said there sounds
reasonable. The biggest corrosion problem was with carburetors, and
they're usually aluminum/zinc diecast alloys.

Yes. I think that the bottom line is that a copper still will work
just fine with denatured alcohol. Nor will there be any fusel oils.

I'm guessing that denatured alcohol is or is close to the azeotrope of
methanol and ethanol; otherwise, it would be too easy to re-nature the
ethanol.

Joe Gwinn

On Wed, 11 Sep 2013 08:34:05 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Tue, 10 Sep 2013 08:21:49 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 21:33:58 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article , Ed Huntress
wrote:

On Mon, 09 Sep 2013 08:53:53 -0400, Joe Gwinn
wrote:

In article ,
Scromlette wrote:

It's got some minor metal work involved, but unfortunately no guns
or
politics.....

I use quite a bit of methylated spirits to clean electronic PCBs as
part
of a cottage business I run. The solvent becomes laden with
dissolved
rosin flux & has to be discarded so I've been thinking about
distilling
it for reuse. It's costing me 3 or 4 dollars per litre.


I was toying with the idea of electrically heating an old pressure
cooker vented through either a copper coil or an old refrigerator
heat
exchanger. I'm not sure if draping wet cloth on the heat exchanger
would
be sufficient cooling.

This can work, but be aware the some of the vapor will escape, and is
*very* flammable. I would do this outside, well away from away
buildings.

A long enough bit of copper tubing will work as a condenser, so long as
there is adequate airflow.

The alcohol may destroy the seal rubber. Some pressure cookers will
accept large viton O-rings. Maybe some makers use viton.


I think the BP of the methylated spirits is ~ 82 Celsius (180F).

That sounds about right.

It's not a good idea to get the pot too hot. I'd set it up in a double
boiler arrangement, unless you implement an automatic controller.
Regulating temperature by hand without a double boiler is likely to
cause trouble.


Has anyone any experience doing this sort of thing (moonshine
perhaps?)

Lots of folk, but they are in the woods, and tend to shoot revenuers
and other nosey people.


Will it be worth the effort?

Depends on volume of alcohol to be processed.


Joe Gwinn

If you cool the condenser, vapor doesn't have to escape. In fact, you
can seal the outlet with a cork or rubber stopper and put a simple
gooseneck (a manometer) in the same stopper, and you can maintain
*negative* pressure.

Yes, I've done it, with a fancy laboratory reflux still made of 100%
glass, distilling ethyl alcohol (you blow off the fusel oil and light
aromatics, waiting for the temperature to indicate ethanol, before
turning on the cooling water). It works as well with copper, and it
doesn't have to be reflux.

True enough. But I'm assuming a homebrew still, far from lab grade.
I'd start outside for sure.


If this is methanol, check for a potential reaction between the
alcohol and copper. Ethyl alcohol is no problem, obviously, but I
don't know about methyl.

Hmm. Never heard of this, but maybe. Perhaps one of our resident
chemists will chime in.


I've seen copper-coil condensers run through a bucket of water that
will cool and condense the outlet to negative pressure. You just have
to pour in cold water from time to time, and let the excess flow over
the side of the bucket. That's what the gooseneck is for -- to tell
you when you're getting positive pressure and you need to pour cold
water around the condenser.

Why do you want negative pressure, given that ethanol won't decompose
from the heat at atmospheric pressure?

Joe Gwinn

Just to avoid explosive vapors.

OK. Making the still airtight will require care and workmanship, but
is certainly doable.


The reason I think you should check the corrosive effects on copper is
that methanol has been a problem with copper and brass parts in race
cars, where it's used as a fuel.

I know that ethanol stills have been made of copper forever. The big
issue was that the joints needed to be silver brazed, not soft
soldered, so the hooch wouldn't contain too much lead.

Well, I think you'll find that most of the pot stills made during
Prohibition actually were soft-soldered with lead-tin solder.

As I mentioned, my uncle made those things for sale to the moonshiners
in the Jersey Pine Barrens during Prohibition. When I was a teenager
he taught me how to sweat-solder pre-tinned parts (that's how I
soldered almost the entire hot-water heating system in my house), and
he described the process of making a still. I've since seen it
described the same way elsewhere.

I could tell you the details but it's lengthy. The short version is
that the seams were double-folded and they only sweated the contact
point between the *outside* of the outer fold and the body of the
still. It required a lot of skill and a lot of heat because of the
conductivity of the copper. The area was heated with a plumber's
gasoline torch and the sweating was done with massive soldering
coppers.

The solder never contacted liquid and no significant amount of vapor.
If a moonshiner fell asleep and let his pot run dry, the still was
ruined because the solder would melt.

It's interesting stuff. If Prohibition comes back, I've got a
sideline. d8-)

Yes. With better technology - TIG the seams, so no problem if the
seams overheat.


There is some methanol in the fermented mash, and this too must be
discarded to yield potable hooch. The old rule was to discard the
first (fusel oils) and last (methanol) fractions, and keep only the
middle fraction.

Hmmm. I thought that methonol had a lower boiling point than ethanol,
and that it was part of the initial discard.

My memory could be failing on this point.

Mine too. Now that you mention it, the rule was methanol first, then
ethanol, then fusel oils. so one kept the middle. This was the "secret
of distillation" discovered by Arab alchemists. The word "alcohol" is
of Arabic origin.

Coined, no doubt, by Sheik Yerbouti. Then the Muslims outlawed it when
they learned how much fun it could be. d8-)



Someone mentioned azeotropes earlier in the thread. That's for people
with more knowledge than I have, but be aware that some of the
volatile liquids involved, and there are a bunch of them in the
fermentation/distiallation process, form azeotropes and can't be
separated by this kind of distillation. It makes the whole thing
fairly complicated but a home distiller only needs to know a few
basics.

The most important azeotrope here is that of water and ethanol, at 95%
ethanol and 5% water. This is the highest proof one can get by
ordinary distillation.


I don't offhand know how much methanol there is in the third fraction,
but it isn't going to be a lot.

When methanol is used as a fuel, what is the problem seen with copper
and brass parts? Whatever the problem, it will be worse in a still,
because of the higher temperature (82 C, not 300 C).

All I've ever heard is that it corrodes several different metals in an
engine, and that copper and brass were among them.

It's not a big problem in racing because you should drain the fuel
system after races are over. But it is a problem if you let it sit
there.

Yes. That was the implication of much of what I read.


I did a little googling. The effect on aluminum, magnesium, and zinc
is pretty rapid, on brass far slower, and pure copper slower still.
This assumes that the methanol contains some water, which is easily
absorbed from the atmosphere. The methanol vapor in a still will not
contain much water, so the corrosion effects may be greatly reduced.

It's just something to be aware of. What you said there sounds
reasonable. The biggest corrosion problem was with carburetors, and
they're usually aluminum/zinc diecast alloys.

Yes. I think that the bottom line is that a copper still will work
just fine with denatured alcohol. Nor will there be any fusel oils.

I'm guessing that denatured alcohol is or is close to the azeotrope of
methanol and ethanol; otherwise, it would be too easy to re-nature the
ethanol.

Joe Gwinn