Experimental Study of Distillation Equipment for Making Essential Oils from Citronella Plants using the Fractionation Column Method

In Indonesia, in general, it has a very abundant natural resource potential, one of which is lemongrass. Lemongrass is still not widely cultivated in Indonesia, this plant is processed and processed into essential oils, it will get a high selling value. Currently, the development of essential oils is a considerable concern of the Indonesian government. Of the various raw materials for making essential oils, one of the raw material plants for essential oils in Indonesia that is good to be developed is citronella. The purpose of this study was to examine experimentally the manufacture of citronella oil (Citronella oil) from the leaves and stems of citronella. Citronella oil is generally used for health, ranging from bacteria and fungi, headaches, to hypertension and is also used as aromatherapy. The advantage of the fractionation column method is the process of separating the components from the Constituent substances of a mixture of solution compounds based on the difference in boiling points by using multilevel distillation, so as to produce good quality essential oils with low water content. From three Tests of essential oil distillation apparatus with fractionation column of citronella, the results of the first test is as much as 940 ml with a mass of 920 gr and a density of 978.2 kg/m3, the second test results obtained as much as 80 ml with a mass of 70 gr and a density of 875 kg/m3, the third test results obtained as much as 70 ml with a mass of 50 gr and a density of 714.2 kg/m3. The average density from the first to the third Test was 855.8 kg / m3. The combustion temperature in the reactor tank is very influential on the duration of combustion and the number of results that come out and the quality of the results obtained.