Building A Shotgun Condenser 

Thanks a loooooot man!!!

Amen, and if you get lazy just cover in flux and worm, repeat, good to go. grew up sweating copper of every type. AND if you have a supper hard flux dirty/job get out the cheater Sauce from the electronic store! did circuit board too.

A “shotgun” condenser is just a Liebig condenser which was invented over 250 years ago

+Bearded & Bored cheers man!.....chilli!!

+ListyLab thanks :). If I can get one together I'm sure you can. Keep us posted, let us know when it's done :)

+Shaun Mccaughan ah shucks man. Cheers!

No problem, I've been a fitter and Turner most of adult life and you're metal craft is spot on.

I was going to say to also that when I made a couple of copper tube heat exchangers for my foreman's boat when i was an apprentice I soldered all the core first using a steel jig that the plates with the holes in got clamped to and all the pipes went through to a stop behind at the correct depth. Just heat up the steel and then solder the pipes in and then put inside the large pipe and solder whole lot in position. You can use spacers to change the depth of where the hole plates are on the pipes and just have the steel hole plate counter sunk cap screwed to the rest of the jig and that can be changed too. Means you can sit the plates totally square to the pipes and anywhere on their length too, more than happy to give you a drawing if any of that is unclear. Private message me somehow and i'll get it to you with a drawing of how you can clamp two pieces of tool steel plate (like gauge plate) and hole saw them out and drill as pair to clamp the copper between them. Once their hardened you can file and lightly sand them round and the same diameter each time. Just make sets up for different sizes. Like i said you're really good as is, these are just ideas for you that I used in the past.

Bahaha yeah four hands would have been rather . .. . Well. . . . Handy for that!

If you go the solder route, talk to a jeweler about silver solder. Or take an oldsilver dime and file off shavings to act ss solder.

+Kalle Klæp dude. I dig that. Thanks for the tips man :)

4 KW??? That's a monster still you're building. And why do you want the cooling water out to be hot?

The power is nice for warm up. I don't use nearly all of that when running it. Not sure what you mean about the water out being hot?

BigEdsGuns made a comment I didn't understand - "You want your output water to be very hot." I went the easy way on my setup. Chinese lab glass is very cheap right now. I found everything on eBay and Amazon. I got a Vigreux Column Distillation Condenser for $14 and a whole set of everything else for $48 - all beautiful lab glassware". I made my first run this week. I for sure won't have the throughput you will though - I'm an order of magnitude down from your 4 KW capacity.

That's for a 50l boiler too man. I'm not sure what size you are running. Huh that's cool man!

Lazy men unite! haha Yeah, I had wondered about that also, guess I will keep an eye on it.

Just ok dude we get it your the best lol

No not at all , especially if you have other parts in the vapor path that are copper .

Thanks, man. Seems to work well. I'm in the process of deciding how to make a smoking chamber for it. Right now I am thinking a cheap second-hand oven. It's super simple. There are a whole lot of tutorials around on youtube/blogs/etc. Have a look for "venturi valve cold smoker" or "cold smoke generator". Mine looks a bit different I guess. But exactly the same thing. Just different materials. Perhaps when I have it all finished I will do a grain smoking and smoker build vid :)

Yeah I had the same problem. I had to expand the pipe a little to fit the 50mm ferrules (I got from Ali Express). I did that buy forcing them in haha. Not ideal, but I couldn't bring my self to buy the right tool for the job.

@@StillIt Might wanna mention that issue as its the problem in facing also..

Thanks, dude! Did feel good to hit a "milestone".

Cheers man :)

Cheers for the feedback. Yeah I hear you. But remember at this stage I was already about 16 months deep on this & I just wanted it done. Should I have waited . . . . yes . . . was I capable of it . . . . no haha.

@@StillIt No need to defend the decision to use different fittings. I am the master of short cuts, stuff ups and last minute changes and compromises.....At least your condenser could do its job in the end and didnt leak. A friend of mine had access to a computerised sheet metal hole stamping machine which could whip out a copper disk with holes in it in no time - and with great accuracy. He built most of the still equipment at work and did the brazing and tig welding himself. There are some fantastic tools and machines that can be hired or even purchased second hand that can make certain jobs a lot more easy to carry out. In the end the most important thing in my still is the control of temperature and cooling rate in the coil/condenser. Overall though, the fermentation technique and ingredients/techniques used is the key for me as well as the wood/barrel aging process. Drinking and sharing the stuff is the easy bit..... (In Australia stills are not legal without a alcohol manufacturing permit. The excise payable to the Government is just over $80 per litre of pure ethanol. The only components that can be legally concentrated in stills without a permit are aromatics and essential oils using tiny pot stills. Distilling ethanol in pots with a volume greater than 5L is considered commercial scale and attracts large fines. Many people in Australia try and keep their stills under this volume which makes distilling a lot more difficult, time consuming and expensive.) Anyway, cheers.

Yup you sure can. I decided to go with braze as it was easier to find the tools and solder for me. Brass can be questionable due to the inclusion of lead.

I guess it was just because of the unknown factor. But really I think its one of those things that you just keep working at, hit a problem, keep going. I was finding it hard to find suitable flux for copper to stainless soft solder here. I ended up finding all the bits for brazing first. So I just went with it. I will try soft solder for something in the future for sure. Will be interesting to compare the two I think.

Thanks a bunch man. Yeah I think I should really have gone a little slower with the process. Taken more time to internalise the tips I was getting. But anyway, I guess I got some kind of a result. Its all up and running. Im sure it will need repair at some time though haha. But I guess when that happens I will be more prepared to handle the situation 😉

Thanks man! I decided to not bother with the baffles. I was worried enough just about getting this togeather haha. And I guessed 500mm x 5 15mm should be enough for most things regardless. IH brought up the proud 15mm too. Will look at grinding it down to help on smearing. One end is only just proud, so will use that at the top. Hmmm, hadnt thought of controlling water on the out instead of the in. Output water being hot will only be a sign of efficiency though. Like using the least amount of water right. There is no reason to actually have it be hot other than that?

If you notice a lot of air bubbles on the output (clear tubing), you can slow it down. The water will flood and should push out any trapped airspace in the shotgun. Unless some gets airbound by a large distance from the output hole to the top vapor entrace of the shotgun. Air compresses, water does not.

Hi Demi, your English is awesome don't stress it. If you are using packing in the column and active reflux then more width is a good thing! Width gives speed, height gives higher abv

Ok, I had read something about speed ... in the forum we recommend the largha column for the great distillers while mine is for small lots and this has led me to confusion. I use my distiller as both crowded reflux and in pot still mode without packaging and with little reflux. I have another question that torments me: when preparing the fruit in fermentation is it useful to heat the fruit to increase the availability of sugars? tasting the cooked fruit is sweeter .. the sugar is still the same, but I think that with heating it is more available. thank you for your patience and your fantastic videos.

@@Demymaker Thank you for your comments, and @Still It thank you for the video and your reply, it's spot on. I don't want to hijack your thread but seeing as there are relatively few comments, this shouldn't bog things down much. In my experience (extremely limited) and my opinion (unformed, 3rd-hand), the question of cooking fruit before fermenting is a good one, and has multiple answers. To start with, your end goal. Are you making brandies/schnapps/eau de vie or are you intending to make high spirits? My guess from your description of your system (both crowded reflux and in pot still mode without packaging and with little reflux) you are wanting to do both. If you were only wanting to do high spirits, the fruit esters aren't going to make that big a difference. However, when you apply heat you release the pectins into solution, and some strains of yeast will ferment pectins into methanol, which is poisonous. Methanol is a lot of what you throw away or use for cleaning, from the foreshots. So: heating the fruit can decrease the characteristic fruity esthers but also create more methanol in the foreshots/heads. But heating can also make sugars more soluble and fermentable as you stated. These are why when we make cider, wine, and most brandies we use cold pressing techniques to get the juice out. On the other hand, you can make fruit brandies by heating up the fruit, to juice it before fermentation. You just might lose some of the true fruit esthers that you want in your braindies. Sometimes you have a bunch of people helping you crush and juice apples, for instance. Then when you ferment that juice you have cider or can make brandy. Sometimes you have 0 people helping you so you have to use heat and time to turn extra apples into applesauce, then filter it, and ferment it. I've got about 200 liters of that kind fermenting right now, with the intent to use some of the stripping/pot still run to make brandy, and using the rest to do a high spirit run. Hope this helps a little.

@@chironchangnoi Thank you for your answer, I really appreciate it. From the fruit I want to get the maximum taste and smell possible (I think many want this). In general I chop the fruit with the peel, then the ferment (without added sugar) and finally we distill all the pulp, a first time with the pot still (to raise the level of alcohol, otherwise I get little product) then the new distillation with column without packaging. I'm always looking for improvements, so if you have any advice to give me I willingly accept them. Thanks a lot.

+Brian Vail yeah mate. Flick me a message!

+Brian Vail of corse. Flick me a message on FB or on the back end here 😁

Sorry mate nope haha. But there is plenty out there. Chuck "cold smoke generator" or " Venturi cold smoker" into the search bar 😀

Still It Dam your on the ball with reply,s !! thanks m8 will do been smoking my own bacon for a year or so making mead and pickling everything i can , will be getting my gun ticket soon so the smoker will be more use and the animals will have less buckshot in them lol

The first few times I tried was a bit sketch. I was not getting it hot enough. But I got there in the end. The joys of learning haha

Right on, I figured it was probably not enough heat. I'll try using some hotter gas.

That's a sweet idea actually mate!

Using 2 different grades of solder is often to have 2 different solder melting temps. You can do the first soldering with the high melt then when doing the next solder you are working slightly colder and not risking issues with the first solder joints.

Awesome man! What sort of still are you building?

Electric KEG, 4" Ferrule on top..reduced to 2" column (tri-clamp) then 90deg+90deg still 2" reduced on its way down (still trying to find the copper sizes that are affordable (i live in north of canada, we dont have must choices on parts)), vertical liebig condenser down to the collection jar. This project has been taking a lot of time to build due to parts/money (got the green light from my Minister of Finance (wifey) for an order thru BrewHardware.com) and will start to assemble my column so I can truly figure out the condenser setup! Keep up the good videos, just found out about you today, I just subbed!

Tri-clamped column so I can add a reflux condenser up in the column in between that and my 180 deg bend that goes back down. Going for an all in one system, beer making + "essential oils" and "fuel"

AWESOME! Nice work man. That sounds like a pretty legit set up! Send some pics through would be keen to see it! Can find me on FB or insta if you want to send through on the D low :) Ah thanks man! Pretty cool finding people at the same stage as me!

Will do once I'm done, I'll shoot you some pics. Til then, take care my friend!

Flick me a email jesse@chasethecraft.com :)

Actually never measured it fitting to fitting. Just the actual "active" part of it.

@@StillIt why did you put the plates in so far? making it harder to braze? couldn't you do it flush with the ends of the pipe?

Can you share the templates with all of us please. cheers

Hows it Chuck. Sorry for the slow reply mate. I actually have not weighed it. So total guesstimate, I would say perhaps 4kg empty and 8kg full?

lol.... love the Kiwi gretting " How's it " loved my visit to Auckland!!! thanks pal!!!

Yo don't need one. Just get a drawing compass or use the pipes itself to make the circles with a pen.

Really depends on how many inners you want to fit in there. Flick me a email at jesse@chasethecraft.com I have some templates :)

One is almost but not quite flush. You thinking of the flow of gas?

The end closest to the vapour should be flush at the very least, common internet theory suggests that if it isn't you can get pooling which will encourage smearing.

Closest to vapour = Lyne Arm.....

Ah right! Will check that out!

I do not 😑. Well not yet . . . .

Ill keep my eyes peeled for it !!! thanks for the quick response as always !!!!!

I also would like that. Two votes!

Absolutely! Would love to know/ see video on how you made that cold smoker. I enjoy watching your videos. Keep up the great work my friend!

They definitely hook meat!

Flick me a message on FB or email stillit.chasethecraft@gmail.com. I need to get something set up to host stuff huh!

Still It I sent you a email a few days ago btw.

I replied earlier this morning mate. Get it?

Still It yes I did! Thank you so much!

Just for the condenser? Perhaps $8 in copper. $8 for ferrules. $10 gas. $10 braze. I had to buy a few tools too, but I can't really add that to the build cost. So perhaps $30-$40 NZD. So $22-$30 USD. At a guess. Once everything is up and running and all the kinks are worked out I will do a summary video with costs etc.

Cool cool, thanks man!

Earlier I was looking up pronunciation guides to try and decide if you were from New Zealand or Australia. I guessed wrong.

Sorry, lol

hahahah! I shall try not to be offended ;)

+Deaf Lion subtitles should be go. If you were hoping for translations that's a whole lotta work sorry :(

Hows it mate. The speaking fuck ups? Or the building fuck ups?

Not so worried about taking it apart as everything is modular. But fair point. Was easier for me to get the materials here for brazing. And also stronger (although more brittle).

I know when I was designing mine I took it apart and made changes many time. In fact I have some new ideas right now. I also want to make a real traditional moonshine still that makes use of a thumper keg. IF you haven't already you should watch the Popcorn "Marvin" Sutton video on youtube. "The last damn likker run I'l ever do"

The setup I have now will give me 95/% abv on the first run. Good for vodka. I remove the packing and turn off the reflux for whiskey or brandy. I filter the vodka through a 5ft column of activated carbon to further purify and smooth it out. Whisky I make charcoal like they do at the Jack Daniels distillery and use that. I use whatever hard wood I can get since I don't have access to the sugar maple they used.. I visited the Jack Daniels distillery several years ago. It's funny because Lynchberg TN is in dry county and You can't buy any liquor there. Cheers

+brittenv1000 I was finding it easier. To find the brazing flux. And I had a few people teaching me that knew brazing. Soldering would have worked too. I want to teach myself that too!

Still It I guess brazing is a hell of alot stronger? Is there a second vid of the shotgun installed?

+brittenv1000 nah I think I jumped right into using it after that. I need to make a overview video for the still now I think. Almost like a review type thing for those thinking of going CCVM.

+brittenv1000 oh also yes. But I think perhaps slightly more brittle too.