Pope Scientific manufactures Wiped Film Stills in both 316L stainless steel and borosilicate glass. When selecting a still system for purchase, materials of construction matter just as much as size and other features. Both have their benefits, but how do you know which one is right for you?
Borosilicate glass has been utilized and trusted in laboratories the world over. At Pope, our glass components are annealed to over 1100F and can be relied upon for all your daily processing needs. Every chemist likes to be able to observe what is going on and glass allows looking into the process and making parameter changes as needed. Every chemist also knows that glass can break when mistakes are made.
Pope Scientific 316L stainless steel Wiped-Film Stills don’t break and not only have more robust construction but also allow faster distillation processing. Stainless steel has a greater heat transfer rate than glass, resulting in more than double the processing throughput than its glass Wiped Film Still cousin. We do recommend gaining experience on a greater visibility glass still before switching over to stainless steel where observation is limited to material entering and leaving the still body. We offer stainless steel conversion kits with adapters to the peripheral components as well as turnkey 100% stainless steel systems with sight glasses for full process view.