# Distilled Water - Home made distilling apparatus



## rusty (May 16, 2013)

Discarded propane tank with valve removed, washed several times to remove residue.

The coil is a water cooled condenser which I salvaged from a discarded soft ice cream machine, inside there are two separate coils one for refrigerant the other of course water used to cool the refrigerant.

For the time being I'm going to try it as an air cooled condenser, if this does not work then I'll hook up the garden hose to that second coil to keep it cool. The refrigerant coil has copper fins on the outside to assist with heat exchange.

Propane tank is being heated with a tiger torch, once it comes up to temperature I will cut back on the heat so that I'm not generating more steam than the coil is able to handle otherwise I could have a nasty explosion.


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## AUH-R (May 16, 2013)

Love it! reminds me of scrapheap challenge. Thanks for sharing.


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## Barren Realms 007 (May 16, 2013)

Air circulaton is not going to do IMHO, you will need to use water.

Nice set up.


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## rusty (May 16, 2013)

Barren Realms 007 said:


> Air circulaton is not going to do IMHO, you will need to use water.
> 
> Nice set up.



Air circulation worked less than 5 minutes, after I hooked up the cold water found that the coil has an internal leak. Sat outside over winter and forgot to drain the water.

Still managed a few gallons of distilled water by spraying cold water on the outside of the coil. The other day at one of the landfill sites I was at there is an commercial cooler, hopefully its water cooled.

These coils make for a nice compact unit, the set up I made today is haphazardly set up. Later on I want to set this up permanent so that I'll always have distilled water on hand.

Using well water with mineralization has caused me plenty of grief.

It's probably cheaper to purchase distilled water, but living out in the country has its downsides, I made a few calls this morning the nearest town that had water was a Pharmacy an hours drive for me. Then my truck is down, waiting on a new starter to arrive, wife is very dissed at me for the moment and wont even let me use her truck.


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## butcher (May 16, 2013)

:lol: That will teach you not to diss her off.


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## Tinker Terry (Jun 14, 2013)

After reading this thread I have to wonder why you aren't using auto parts for your condenser. Lots of vehicles have electric fans. Seems to me it would be simple to run steam in the top and get water out the bottom. A restricter on the inlet would give it the properties of an exansion chamber as well. Take a look at how your auto air conditioning works and tou will know what I mean.


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## rusty (Jun 14, 2013)

Tinker Terry said:


> After reading this thread I have to wonder why you aren't using auto parts for your condenser. Lots of vehicles have electric fans. Seems to me it would be simple to run steam in the top and get water out the bottom. A restricter on the inlet would give it the properties of an exansion chamber as well. Take a look at how your auto air conditioning works and tou will know what I mean.



I'll be looking forawrd to further participation from you Tinker.

Basically I went with what I had kicking about the shop and yard, if you read my other thread where I'm attempting to cool down my condensor coolent. You'll notice that this crazy Canadian is pretty handy at tinkering parts together.


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## justinhcase (Feb 15, 2014)

Being of irish decent I have made one or two stills in my time.
Have to ask why you where using a propane tank for your boiler when you had the cooling coil sat on a beer keg.
Beer kegs make some of the best stills around and will not rust,I like to clamp a good size header directly to the large opening on top and a simple water jacketed condenser from there runs like a dream.
And if you have a mind to you can run a little bit of mash through for special occasions once in a blue moon, though I would not do that out side of County Meath my self.


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## jimdoc (Feb 15, 2014)

justinhcase said:


> Being of irish decent I have made one or two stills in my time.
> Have to ask why you where using a propane tank for your boiler when you had the cooling coil sat on a beer keg.
> Beer kegs make some of the best stills around and will not rust,I like to clamp a good size header directly to the large opening on top and a simple water jacketed condenser from there runs like a dream.
> And if you have a mind to you can run a little bit of mash through for special occasions once in a blue moon, though I would not do that out side of County Meath my self.




Rusty is no longer a forum member, so don't expect an answer.

Jim


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## rewalston (Feb 15, 2014)

jimdoc said:


> justinhcase said:
> 
> 
> > Being of irish decent I have made one or two stills in my time.
> ...


Well at least not that Rusty...I'm still here  (rewalston = Rusty)


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## butcher (Feb 15, 2014)

I thought so, I always liked rusty and his posts when he was part of the forum.
I personally have no problem as long as there are no problems.


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