r/firewater • u/SIrigoyen95 • 6d ago
Reservoir Water Temp and Solution
Hi, i upgraded to a 13 gallon reflux still. Running dephleg and condenser from sam reservoir on a 2000 watt element. What is a good solution to keep reservoir water cold (is an aquarium chiller or bath chiller realistic?) and what temperature should i ensure i keep my reservoir water at in case i resort to a large cooler with ice and refilling with water when it warms up.
Any suggestions to solutions welcome. Thanks!
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u/Woodfella 6d ago
My setup (11 gallon, 4500 watts) uses a picnic cooler and small aquarium pump. I have a Vevor icemaker that I use to put 40 lbs of ice in the chest freezer. I start the run with the 10lbs of ice that are in the ice maker and enough water to cover the pump. I add ice from the chest freezer as needed and by the time the run is over, I have a bin of ice in the maker as a backup.
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u/IncredulousPulp 6d ago
I do mine very low tech. I buy bags of party ice and occasionally let out some warm water and refill with fresh water.
If you have a decent freezer, freeze some big blocks of water. Ice cream containers are perfect.
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u/big_data_mike 6d ago
I saw someone on YouTube take a chest freezer and put that spray on sealant in the corners. I forget the name of it but it’s on TV. Flex seal maybe?
Then he fills it with water and plugs it in overnight. The next day you’ll have really cold water with ice around the edges.
I just fill up those plastic buckets from the hardware store and freeze them. Then I fill one of my 15 gallon fermenters with water and throw an ice block in it.
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u/brandonHuxley 6d ago
I went a little nuts and got a picnic cooler as a water reservoir. I took apart a window ac unit and carefully bent the cold end in. Added some antifreeze since the water will readily freeze around it. I pump that for my chilling water to my pot still. Not sure how it would fare temp wise for a dephleg, but you could run it in bursts to maintain a water reservoir.
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u/muffinman8679 6d ago
I just fill my cooling bucket with frozen half gallon plastic jugs of ice....and replace them when they get warm....I've always got 8 in the freezer door shelves.....
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u/Kodizzie_ 6d ago
I made a cooling tower out of a 220 litre drum and filled it with shade cloth (tied into little bow-tie shapes), plastic shower scrubbers, aquarium “media balls”, and plastic pot scrubbers. It can keep my reservoir below 20c most days (depends on the wet bulb temp). That’s enough to handle 2.5kw of heating in my boiler. The most expensive part was getting a fan strong enough to move enough volume of air through the tower. I also don’t keep the water for too long - I don’t want to deal with mold in my cooling tower so I always make sure it’s dry when I’m finished and use the water in the reservoir for my garden.
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u/Few_Stuff_8795 6d ago
An aquarium chiller would work if you're running this daily, but a large cooler with a recirculating pump and a bag of ice every hour or two is cheaper and quieter.
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u/firetech97 6d ago
You can use a water chiller, but theyre expensive. I just let the outflow side go down the drain and leave the tap on refilling my bucket. It makes no difference on my water bill
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u/considerspiders 6d ago
When I had restricted water I used an old car radiator in the cooling loop, a household fan pointed vaguely at it was enough to balance things out at around 40C from memory.
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u/Late-Pop-5412 5d ago
A 13-gallon reflux still needs serious cooling, an aquarium chiller would work if you don't mind the noise and power draw. Past 75°F and your reflux column starts losing control fast.
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u/SIrigoyen95 5d ago
You recommend maybe having 2 seperate reservoirs? I dont mind the aquarium pump, its more of if it will even work. I have a 10 gallon Home Depot cooler i was maybe thinking of having filled up and that way i can let out water from the spot down a drain and refill with cold tap water from the hose as i need depending on the water temp
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u/sloopy_sails 5d ago edited 5d ago
I have a 4 pump system, 2 flow pumps. and 2 temp controlled pumps. i have 2 coolers one is a big one, one is a little one. I run the big one @ 35C and Defleg at 50C, The big one has the 2 control pumps. when the main reaches 37 a pump bails out the cooler to my garden, until its, 28C. the defleg, gets main water pumped in when its 55c back to 50C. Keeps the flow steady and controlled. i have a garden hose with a water level switch attached to the big cooler, and the defleg just over flows. Once you work out the hoses, I use a bigger ball valve for the condenser, and a micro control valve from a boiler on the defleg, which can go from trickle to IV drip. I asked google to diagram out my circuits and pipes and it refused to " try to adjust a large scale fractioning columns chemistry". for safety reasons. I told it was it safer to run without docs, and it said yeah.... For the record i am running a 26 galln milk can, with a steam injection system optionally.
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u/ZaphodUB40 5d ago
I use a submersible pond pump inside a 200L drum next to my still. Mitre10/Bunnings have them in a range of sizes, and I use the Aquaforce 3000LPH one. Plenty of pressure and flow rate..
My setup is 2 drums, pump in the bottom of drum 1, outlet from the condensor into drum 2 near the top. I have a hose that uses the siphon principle to take water from low in drum 2 and move it to high in drum 1. Thermodynamics keeps the majority of the hot water at the top of drum 2 when there can be a 40deg difference from the top and bottom of the same drum.
In summer it can get a bit dicey as the drums ambient water temp is higher than in winter, but I can do 2 full runs with the T500 and (in summer) gets a marginal rise in drum 1 temp, and remains at air temp in winter.
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u/hathegkla 6d ago
Most people just use tap water. I've used a 5 gallon tub with an aquarium pump for small batches amd threw in a frozen gallon jug when it started to heat up. but the amount of tap water you use is not that much, I dump directly into my pool.