RE: ethyl alcohol

[<envisible at earthlink_net>]

its too bad i can't just send you some 95% etOH - i'm surrounded by the stuff
in the lab. although i'm afraid i don't really know why you need to soak your
seeds in ethanol i'd venture to say 45% ethanol vodka would probably do the
trick if you increase the time, probably twofold. if you're set on using a
higher concentration of ethanol you can distill your vodka without setting up
a large still as the link suggested - you only need a little bit to soak a
seed in right? :) it's quite easily done - everyone does it in freshman
chemistry - but it might take some inventiveness without some convenient
glassware. actually, if you had access to dry ice you could just put a bit of
your vodka on ice and the water would freeze out of solution first, leaving a
condensed "mother liquor". anyway, to make an easy still you could probably
start with a teapot to put the vodka in. you could just run a length of tube
from the steam hole of the teapot to a cup to collect the vapor but to greatly
improve efficiency you need some kind of refluxing tower. this would simply be
a vertical (or mostly so) chamber (preferably of glass - but i suppose a
length of tubing would do). the vapor condenses on the cool walls of the
tower. ethanol is then more likely to re -evaporate and travel farther up the
tube while water will return to the pot. to give much more surface area to
this process loosely pack some of the tube with coarse copper or stainless
steel cleaning sponge (i think there's a brand called "chore boy" that was
used in school).  from the top of the refux chamber simply run a cooled length
of tubing downward towards a collection cup.  the only easy way i can think of
to evaluate the success of your endeavor is to light some of the product. it
should burn much more completely than the starting material. how well your
apparatus works will probably depend on striking the right balance between the
length of your reflux tower and the amount of heat you put under the teapot.

here's a link i found

http://cator.hsc.edu/~kmd/caveman/projects/alcohol/index.html

FWIW

elie