WHY THE NAME :
CHARLES 803
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Here is Robert Warren running his still at a public energy fair in Boulder, Colorado.
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Just behind his hand is a white and black 50 gallon barrel, filled with 40 gallons of beer
donated by a local brewery.
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The garden hose brings cooling water into the automatic temperature valve. The high proof
alochol runs out into the glass bottle at the lower left.
The 6% alcohol beer yielded
2.4 gallons of
160 proof in just over an hour of boiling time!
<SOURCE>
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SOME THEORY...
Please build as per plans, do not try
to redesign this
most acurate distillation instrument.
Here is why
Back in the late 70's Robert Warren, his friends Less Wescamp
and Pete Charles played around with the many Mother earth's designs and to make a long story short, they managed to shrinnk the normal 6 to 9 feet of column needed to achieve 180+Proof output in one pass into a neat device called the Charles 803.
(A way for robert Warren to thank Pete for making the drawings and being very involved
in the design. )
Mainly by spanning the coils all the way through the reflux and condensation sections.
1) By gradually letting the room temperature, ( or below...or there abouts)
enter at the TOP of the condenser coil, to cool the vapors into alcohol, thereby picking up its heat energy in the proces...
2) The cooling water passes into the reflux column long coil at the precise
temperature to cause the vapors to pass to the condenser's chimney, containing 160 to 180 Proof alcohol.
3) As the cooling water keeps going DOWN the reflux column, it gradually picks up heat from the very hot vapors REFLUXING their merry way up the column and gently cool the vapors by bringing graduall controlled cooling.
If the cooling coil in the reflux column was not present...
This same column would need to be as much as 3 to 4 times the actual lenght it
is right now.
This technique did not come about in a few hours of drinking beer and discussing the theory amongst friends...
It wa achieved with MANY YEARS of trial and error engineering by fellows who felt the way it should be right in their guts, and managed to make it
work...Against all engineering experts of those days who claimed yhat it simply
could
not work.
Thirty some years later, it is still on of the best designs ever dreamed up and
proven to work.
A) Pleass save yourself grief and build the C803 EXACTLY as pre specs and
drwaings,
make it work smoothly and enjoy...
B)
Do buy the V47 Valve specified:
The equilibrium needed to properly carry out distillation will get all
whacky if
you control the temperature of the cooling water...
The V47 ( and all self contained bellows operated
proportionnal controllers )
will operate in less than 1/100'th of a degree and maintain the exact amount of
flow to
maintain perfect equilibrium.
A solenoid valve will either open or close, and 1/10th° 0.1°, and the time
lag
between opening and the cooling water affecting the actual vapor temperature,
( that will run into 10 seconds per degree, with a minimum of 5 to 6
degrees before the valve reacts...)
will cvause the vapor temperature to hunt by as much as 5 or 6° and you willl
never
stabilize the smooth flow of energy required.
I have designed (Adapted, for these exist as catalog parts...$ 850.00
+)
A valve operating in PWM with pulses varying from full on, to full off, in 0.05
Seconds pulse increments, this acts
exactly like a bellow operated proportionnal
valve of the V47 type.
And I can build and sell it for less than $150.00...
The
problem is in the fact that it operates electrically, and I don't believe in
Electricity around distillation at home or
near home.
It is simply too dangerous and after spending $750.00 In legal fees,
I now know
that I can be held liable for dumb screw ups one would encounter using my valve.
So, I will make the concept
available in due time, once I get a propper
liability waiver written up and legally registered.
C) Learn to produce at a steady pace, around 160 to 180 Proof targets,
you will soon find it very difficult to achieve over 185 Proof as the closest
you get from the natural maximum azeotope IDEAL level of 195 Proof ( or there abouts...)the more energy and fussing about you will get yourself stuck into.
My recommendation is to produce 160 Proof, convert your machines to work with all alcohol ( no gas mix) most engines will perform very well at 160 Proof and you get to use the latent energy of water vapor for free.)
**My lawnmower, a Honda 1989( aprox...Got it used ) model HRB215HXA
Has been runing EXCLUSIVELY on 160 Proof Ethanol for the last 3 summers, and other than readjusting the mixture to slightluy richer, and moving the timing ahead by 6°, it runs well.
( On cold mornings, I make it sniff some ether to give it a boost and let it
wharm up for 10 minutes before loading it up.) Gilles
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CONSTRUCTION of a Charles
803
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BUILDING MATERIALS
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STAINLESS STEEL
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MILD STEEL
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