How to Distill Water

At one time, distilled water was available primarily for use in steam irons and scientific laboratories. Its benefit as a supply for every day use was not discussed because very few people considered that possibility. Now, when a huge percentage of the population drink only bottled water, whether distilled water is a health benefit or a health risk is hotly debated. That debate will continue, but the way water is distilled is a very old and well understood process. Learn about that process by reading on.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Heat resistant glass flask
• Stopper
• Glass or copper condenser
• Collecting beaker

1. Understand that distillation is based upon the fact that liquids boil and go from a liquid phase to a gaseous phase. As long as whatever is "contaminating" the liquid, bacteria, metals, and other "junk," go into a gaseous phase at a higher temperature, then the gaseous phase of the liquid (steam in the case of water) is pure. The gaseous phase is converted back into liquid by cooling, and a source of pure liquid has been produced.
2. Take a heat resistant glass flask, such as a Pyrex container and into its top, place a stopper that is connected to a glass or copper condenser. A condenser is basically just a cold surface where the hot molecules of water in the form of steam cool off and once again become liquid.
3. Attach another collecting beaker to the end of the condenser.
4. Boil the water in the glass flask. The steam will run through the condenser and the water will collect in the glass beaker. The water collected in the collecting beaker is now "once distilled water."
5. Repeat the process to remove more contaminants.

Tips & Warnings

• A glass condenser is a large glass tube with a smaller glass tube in its middle. The hot gas (steam) passes through the small tube. Cold water or a water anti-freeze mixture is circulated through the large tube, thus cooling the smaller tube so that the hot gas loses its temperature and returns to a liquid phase. A copper condenser is simply a long length of coiled copper that is cooled by some sort of a cooling jacket, accomplishing the same feat. The gas cools and becomes a liquid before the end of the tubing.
• Simply distilling water using this process will not remove all contaminants from the water. Contaminants such as toluene and other organic compounds must sometimes be filtered out of distilled water using a carbon filter.

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