homemade cider press

[kentish dave]

I am building a cider-press; rather than drill holes in this bucket to use it as the 'basket', I am building an insert for it with some scraps of iroko wood and bits of acrylic. What do you think? is this type of wood appropriate?

 

[Alan Clark]

How is the press going to put real pressure on the apples? One bucket inside another probably means you'll only have your own weight to press down on the apples with.

Here is what I made last year, you can probably get about a tonne of pressure with the lack before things start to come apart.

 

[kentish dave]

I'm doing something very similar, I will post more when it's done. I have a 6 ton bottle jack, a beam that sits on top of it, the bucket shown is to contain the juice during the pressing, there will be hole in the bottom, it will be mounted on a beam like yours and collect the juice in another container. I am now thinking htat the acrylic part are probably a bodge, I will use wood instead and make a bit more effort.
thanks for the reply, I realise my plans aren't very clear, I am trying to make a press that will demount nice and tidily for the rest of the year.

 

[Alan Clark]

I put the thick ply on the steel beam because the bucket under pressure would bend around the beam, you might find the same happens.

 

[Ken L]

You could always just use one of these:


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Packs away into the cupboard under the sink.

 

[kentish dave]

Alan, thanks for the tip about spreading the forces under the bucket, will do.

I built a wooden trivet this morning, deciding that the acrylic was too much of a bodge even by my low standards.

here is a bit of a mockup of what I intend:

 

[kentish dave]

tried out my press yesterday, after this silliness:

I opted for a quick rebuild:

I got 6 pints of juice out of some crabapples (didn't weigh them first),

 

[Ken L]

Did it split the bucket or did it manage to hold together ?

Looking at it, I can't tell whether the bucket holds a tower of thin cakes or a single bag of pulp. If it's a tower, you maty have got away with it.

 

[BarnsleyBrewer]

Why faff about when you can buy the juice from supermarkets that make excellent cider. :hmm:
I once collected 2 gallon of juice with a juicer and it was a right ball ache.

 

[kentish dave]

I used the pp bucket shown, with a bit more scaffolding under it to spread the load. Rather time-consuming as some have said, I assumed that the small cider presses that you see for sale would be an appropriate benchmark for size, actually I would build something on a larger scale even for my very small crop- I will probably get no more than 20 pints in total.

 

[Growler]

WARNING

iroko is not food safe!!!!!!!!

it can cause skin problems and breathing difficults when being worked and leaches some toxins

My father in law is a wood turner and the concensus of his club members is they would not use iroko anywhere it would be in contact with food stuffs unless well sealed like a work top



Iroko: effect is irritant/respiratory, to eye & skin it can be extreme caused by dust, wood and is common
taken from this site

http://www.mimf.com/archives/toxic.htm

 

[kentish dave]

thanks for the warning and I will definitley look into it more, I notice though that among the list of 'toxic' woods at the link given are included: ash, oak, alder, spruce, birch, beech, willow, rosewood, mahogany, teak, walnut,
basically; wood.

 

[tubthumper]

sycamor or maple are good hardwoods that are def food safe as its used in cutting boards but thier is some softwoods that you can use
one other hardwood i know is food safe as i have chewd it as a child is balso but its not really strong enough unless you can get really reaaly big sections of it

 

[kentish dave]

bottled my cider yesterday, only 10 litres.