Distillation occurs when a liquid is separated from impurities within it. The most common distillation method is to evaporate the liquid and collect the cooled drops into a separate container, resulting in a pure form of the liquid. You can easily distill liquids such as oil in a traditional stove-top coffee pot. These coffee pots force liquids through a gasket filled with ground coffee and collect the coffee in a container. If you remove the coffee gasket from the coffee pot, the coffee pot will simply distill the liquid that is poured into it, via the evaporation method.
- Coffee pot
- Stove
Do not use a high flame on your stove if you plan to distill oil. Some oils might reach ignition temperature due to extreme pressure. The pressure relief valve in your coffee pot might not suffice if you use a high flame.
Unscrew the coffee pot and remove the gasket from the middle. This gasket appears as a small round container with many small holes in the bottom.
Place the oil you want to distill into the coffee pot's bottom container.
Screw the coffee pot’s top container onto the bottom of the pot, while holding both pieces upright. Do not tilt the coffee pot.
Place the pot on a stove and turn the stove on with minimal heat.
Wait for the pot to make noise and start spouting vapors in the air. This tells you that the oil has been distilled.
Things You'll Need
Warnings
References
Warnings
- Do not use a high flame on your stove if you plan to distill oil. Some oils might reach ignition temperature due to extreme pressure. The pressure relief valve in your coffee pot might not suffice if you use a high flame.
About the Author
Mikhail Polenin has been working with computers since 1997. His experience also expands to astrophysics, masonry, electricity and general appliance repair. He's written about various different subjects regarding astrophysics and electrical circuits for various online publications. Polenin attended the New World School of the Arts and the University of Florida.
Photo Credits
coffee pot image by AGphotographer from Fotolia.com