Parts of a Distillation Apparatus

All 8 parts on the diagram

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Boiling 4

Thermometer Shows the boiling point of what is coming over.
Distilling flask Holds the mixture that is boiled.
Still head Joins the flask to the condenser.
Thermometer adapter Holds the thermometer in the top of the still head.

Cooling and collecting 4

Condenser Cools the vapor back into a liquid. Water runs through its jacket.
Receiving flask Catches the liquid that comes out of the condenser.
Distillate The liquid that was boiled off and condensed.
Vacuum adapter Leads the liquid down into the receiving flask.

How this list was compiled: Every name checked on 2026-09-30 and kept only where at least two of these use it. (1) Wikipedia, Distillation and Condenser (laboratory), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distillation : the flask holding the mixture to be boiled (still pot), the head of the still, the thermometer, the condenser cooled by water, the receiving flask, the adapter with a connection that can take a vacuum pump, the distillate. (2) Teaching and Learning Distillation in Chemistry Laboratory Courses (ERIC ED368572), full text at https://archive.org/details/ERIC_ED368572 : distilling flask, thermometer, condenser, receiving flasks, distillate. (3) Search-result passages of three organic chemistry laboratory manuals on archive.org, for the glassware names: https://archive.org/details/makingconnection0000anne (distilling flask, distillation head, thermometer adapter, water condenser, vacuum takeoff adapter), https://archive.org/details/studentscompanio0000john (still head, thermometer, thermometer adapter, condenser, vacuum adapter, receiving vessel) and https://archive.org/details/laboratorymethod0000marm (condenser, receiver, adapter). Licence: own work

The drawing: Own drawing from plain geometry; nothing traced. Licence: own work

How it works

The parts of a distillation apparatus are pieces of glassware joined in a line. A liquid is boiled in the first, its vapor is cooled in the middle, and the liquid that forms is caught in the last.

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Boiling

The mixture is heated in the distilling flask. Its vapor rises into the still head, past a thermometer held in a thermometer adapter, and turns down the side arm.

Cooling and collecting

The condenser is a tube inside a jacket of running water. The vapor turns back to liquid in it, runs down through the vacuum adapter and drips into the receiving flask. That liquid is the distillate.

Questions and answers

What are the parts of a distillation apparatus?

A distilling flask on a heat source, a still head with a thermometer, a water-cooled condenser, an adapter and a receiving flask. The liquid collected in the receiving flask is called the distillate.

What does the condenser do in distillation?

It cools the vapor from the boiling flask so that it turns back into a liquid. In the common kind, cooling water flows through a jacket round the tube the vapor passes down.

Which way does the water flow in a condenser?

In at the lower end of the jacket and out at the upper end, as the two hoses in the drawing show.

What is the difference between the distilling flask and the receiving flask?

The distilling flask holds the mixture that is boiled at the start. The receiving flask catches the liquid that has boiled off and condensed, at the other end of the apparatus.