Methanol Recovery

[Jacka Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Jacka]

Who on here if anyone does Meth recovery?

Would love to have look and run through some experiances with someone who has a small scale recovery process running.

[mallcruiser Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close mallcruiser]

Re: Methanol Recovery

do a search.....

then if you still haven't learnt enuff do a search on infopop...

then in three weeks after reading all that you can teach us....

Paul

[fantom Member Find all posts View Profile Close fantom]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Hi David,
I am doing meth recovery, my setup is a frytol drum and lid,
a 1000w element is fitted in the drum approx 2" from the bottom.
a 1 mitre length of 2" copper tube is fitted to the lid of drum via 2" copper endcap and some 3/4" brass allthread and nuts. The copper tube (column) is packed with stainless steel pot scrubbers, then i have fitted a spare reflux head to the top of the column. the reflux head is the same as the one pictured here Mayfairs Homebrew and Tobacconist
I put around 20 litres of glis into the still and away we go.
the heating element was obtained from a home brew shop and the cost is about $45, the reflux head was the original one bought for distilling drinking alcohol and became redundent when i built a fractionating still head for the good stuff .
So with this setup I can recover good quality methanol that is 100% pure according to mem trusty hydrometer. I do not do a 5% prewash so no worries of water in the recovered product.
feel free to ask if ya need further details.
Cheers Fantom

[gwalker Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwalker]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Fantom,
What quantity of Methonal are you getting from 20 litres of Glis?
How long do you run the process?
G

[hdj80 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close hdj80]

Re: Methanol Recovery

I am just not sure yet if the effort and time is really worth the few litres you get back... I have just started using KOH instead of NaOH and this will mean that I'll be able to do the distilling another day????....

[gwalker Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwalker]

Re: Methanol Recovery

I am just not sure yet if the effort and time is really worth the few litres you get back...

If you get back 5 litres of Methonal from 25 litres of glycerene, the meth is only worth about $6.50 for a lot of effort, or is my maths wrong?
G

[fantom Member Find all posts View Profile Close fantom]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Fantom,
What quantity of Methonal are you getting from 20 litres of Glis?
How long do you run the process?
G

Hi G
from 20 litres of glis I recover just over 5 litres, and it takes around 3 hours to get that. so a 1000w element run on taraff 33 (hot water) @ say 4 hours is I believe well below $1 for power.

Cheers Fantom

[Jacka Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Jacka]

Re: Methanol Recovery

I am looking at it from another point of view.

What are we going to have trouble sourcing? What is the cost of meth going to get to in the future?

Also should we be doing something that we don't want the rest of the world to do, should we polute the enviroment with meth?

I just find it a littlw distasteful to be wasteful when there appears to be an out. I would have to say I have not personally tried it I am just working through the best way to do it before I get started.

[fantom Member Find all posts View Profile Close fantom]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Also should we be doing something that we don't want the rest of the world to do, should we polute the enviroment with meth?

hi David don't think ya need to worry about poluting the enviroment with methanol nature takes care of it.
"Methanol is produced naturally in the anaerobic metabolism of many varieties of bacteria. As a result, there is a small fraction of methanol vapor in the atmosphere. Over the course of several days, atmospheric methanol is oxidized by oxygen with the help of sunlight to carbon dioxide and water." wooops there it is again that poisonous gas co2 that is causing the earth to melt down......global warming? maybe but i doubt it.
it will rain again 1 day always does at the end of a drought.

Cheers Fantom

[gwalker Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwalker]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Hi G
from 20 litres of glis I recover just over 5 litres, and it takes around 3 hours to get that. so a 1000w element run on taraff 33 (hot water) @ say 4 hours is I believe well below $1 for power.

Cheers Fantom

$5.00 is $5.00 and I guess removing the methonal from the glis makes the glis safer to handle and better for the environment.
G

[tim marshman Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tim marshman]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Whoops forum just ate my overthe topp essay on subject.
Cant quite bring myself to repeat it so here is the quick point form version.
I should add that Im not yet doing it, still in the scavanging and planing stage for my OFR semi contionous design but once you have a presure vessel and vac pump its easy

Use vaccume, faster and more energy efficent.
same set up can be used for oil drying
80L out of test stainless automotive gas tanks can be found at modest price and make an Ideal vessel.
Ive got some diaphragm pumps for sale if anyones interested. one thomas one richards dual head units. they need diaphragm kits but otherwise tidy

If using a 'Real" vaccume pump like the one Im keeping for my unit you should be able to run things at room temp. but you would need to ice your condenser or lose a lot through your pump or better still run separate condenser and cold trap.

In practice I think that a diaphragm pump and mild heating will give good results condenser must stay cold but at modest vaccume, exotic cooling should not be required.

[Sandman Donating Member Find all posts View Profile Close Sandman]

Re: Methanol Recovery

Whoops forum just ate my overthe topp essay on subject.
Cant quite bring myself to repeat it so here is the quick point form version.
I should add that Im not yet doing it, still in the scavanging and planing stage for my OFR semi contionous design but once you have a presure vessel and vac pump its easy

Use vaccume, faster and more energy efficent.
same set up can be used for oil drying
80L out of test stainless automotive gas tanks can be found at modest price and make an Ideal vessel.
Ive got some diaphragm pumps for sale if anyones interested. one thomas one richards dual head units. they need diaphragm kits but otherwise tidy

If using a 'Real" vaccume pump like the one Im keeping for my unit you should be able to run things at room temp. but you would need to ice your condenser or lose a lot through your pump or better still run separate condenser and cold trap.

In practice I think that a diaphragm pump and mild heating will give good results condenser must stay cold but at modest vaccume, exotic cooling should not be required.

Im interested!!
What size are the vacuum pumps , how many CFM per minute do they do and to what level of vacuum ? (assuming a new kit is fitted).
and what do you want for them?
PM me with the details.
Cheers
Sandman