Looks like Jan 08 is the earliest left. There is some number they keep I think, not sure if it is posts or posts plus replies. The low-traffic groups have posts back to the beginning.

Scott

It used to be longer than that.
I came here and answered the questions I came here for by going back years.

It's homebuilt, I'm a machinist, so it came handy for this project, except the stainless steel hopper housing, that I gave to a sheet metal shop. It uses about 48 sawblades, running at table saw speed, it grinds a 5 gal bucket of apples in about 15 seconds and the mush goes into a old fashioned, modified spinndryer, lined with a pillow case, then spinning the juice out in a matter of 3 to 5 min. running at app. 2000 RPM.
One load of apple = [one pail 5 gal.] = app. 5 liters of juice.

Is this what you were looking for?

I think the forum has gotten more active. It looks like the 2000 or so most recent posts are kept. So the fig forum for example goes further back in time since it gets fewer posts. Back in the days when Spike ran GardenWeb many fewer posts were kept in fact, something like 300 if I recall correctly.

Scott

Thank you all!

It's been only about 2 years when I posted it here with pictures, then..no sense posting it again.

Konrad

Konrad, The post does not seem to be anywhere. Would you mind reposting how it's made? My husband is a machinist also. Thanks!

Yes, please post it again, with any updates! This is timely for me as I head into the cold season and need to over-schedule projects to keep me busy. I had a great crop and want to make juice next year.
Herbert

Herbert:

Unless you have 48 circular saw blades lying around, and you are a machinist like Konrad, buy a cheap, off-the-shelf garbage disposal, and mount it in a small table at counter height. A garbage disposal will grind apples to a perfect puree consistency for pressing. I have been doing this for about 15 years, and the apples go through the disposal very quickly, although you may have to slice them in half to get them into the disposal.

You will also have to buy some heavy duty pressing bags from Happy Valley Ranch. They are not cheap (about $12 each), but they last a long time. Finally, you will have to have some kind of a press. In a good year, I can turn out over 30 gallons of fresh cider with this system.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

The disposal sounds good but what about the seeds? And if one needs a press anyway, what is the benefit of a disposal? I've never done this before except with grapes and an old-fashioned colandar. (messy!)

Does one remove the seeds from the apple before putting in the disposal? Can one use this method for grapes and other fruit?

Milehighgirl:

Seeds are not a factor in making apple slurry with a disposal. They do not have to be removed, and do not affect the slurry or juice quality in any way, including flavor. They are completely removed in the pressing bag, which is essential to make this system work.

Making apple juice is a two-stage process. Apples must be ground, either coarse or fine, before there is hope for pressing them. Fine is better for juice yield. A lot better. Try to press a whole apple, or even half an apple, and you could break your press before juice emerges. When the slurry is fine, it can be effectively pressed even in a small, tabletop press designed for grapes.

And that leads us to grapes. There is no need to grind grapes before pressing because they are soft and easy to press. The disposal can also be used for certain other fruits such as Asian pears, but these produce a very sweet juice without a lot of character. The best apple juice/cider is usually produced from a mix of sweet and tart apples. My favorite is Stayman Winesap, which make a very good single varietal with a real wake-up flavor, although there are usually lots of other sweeter apples that need the Stayman flavor for balance.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

Yes, Don, I forgot about your disposal method. That is what I need to do. I DO have 48 blades, but they are just worn-out, dirty, dusty, crusty leftovers from my remodeling career and don't need to start another project creating a machine that is beyond my means even though I just love building homemade contraptions! Good tip on the bags! As for a press, I have a modified hydraulic press that has upper and lower 1/2" thick steel plates 24" by 18", formally used for clamping large wooden puzzles two dozen at a time. I have a feeling this will work nicely if the bags fit between the plates, but a need a clean drip pan to catch the juice.

I saw the bags from HVR, but am not sure if they can be adapted to a rectangular pressing surface. I have some heavy duty nylon bags that may work for me. More contraption research to do.

Herbert

Herbert:

I use a plastic beehive cover as a catch basin at the bottom of the press. These covers are made of a very heavy, tough plastic material, and last for years. Also easy to keep clean. At the front lower edge I bored a 1/2 inch hole, and glued in a piece of 1/2 inch PCVC pipe as a spout. I think a beehive cover would be large enough to cover beneath your steel plates.

You will have to be careful with the tremendous pressure you can exert with a hydraulic cylinder so as not to damage the pressing bags. They are strong, but not indestructible. I place two slurry-filled pressing bags in my pressing basket at a time, but with your steel plates I think I would do only one at a time until you see how it goes. You will have to watch those steel plates for oxidation that can occur very quickly with acidic apple juice. Unless they are stainless, that is.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

OK...I will, but a bit later, when the snow falls and I'm not so busy anymore.

In the meantime, others can bring up their idea,... good, Don!

Konrad

Original Post

Wholly cow...how did you do that?

Thanks a million!

Konrad

Jellyman, how is the internal workings of a disposal for food contact?
I'm going to be trying to figure out a way to make cider soon and I'm all for saving myself some work.

Konrad, you can search "Gardenweb" and the topic you are trying to find in a search engine and come up with them. Obviously Gardenweb isn't doing away with the posts but for some reason their search isn't finding them.

Here's how to do a "site specific" search on Google:

(whatever you are searching for) site: (www.somesite.com)

or in this case:

"My Juicer" site: forums2.gardenweb.com

Usually Google will do a much better job at searching a site than the sites own internal search.
-Glenn

Thank you for all!
I should remember use Google next time.

Here a little video clip from a demo. at our annual fruit festival.

Konrad

Here is a link that might be useful: Apple Juicer

Myk1:

The internal parts of disposals are fine for processing apples as far as I can tell, although I am not a chemist.

Some of the more expensive models use all stainless steel parts, so no question about them. I use a cheap "Badger" disposal with a housing that appears to be made of cast zinc pot metal. The grinding plate at the bottom is zinc plated steel, and the hammers are stainless. I took it all apart after several years of use to check for corrosion, and there was none, so I reassembled it and it's back in service.

It's pretty easy to thoroughly clean a disposal after use by running water from the hose through it with the motor on. It also dries out quickly.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

If they were reactive it should do something with the flavor or color I would think.
I had a metal drinking goblet that instantly changed the flavor of wine.

I think zinc would be OK. I was thinking they were cast iron, but I haven't seen a disposal since I was young, they may have been back then.

I might have to go out and price some this weekend.
Thanks.

I did some recent research before buying a new disposal to construct a
Yellman grinder.

There are essentially two companies that make disposals for everyone:
Insinkerator and Waste King. The Insinkerators have (rougly 1700RPM)
induction motors and the Waste Kings have (rougly 2600RPM) permanent
magnet motors. There are various levels of horsepower (1/2hp and up)
and quality of internal parts (plastic, galvanized, stainless). The
fancy new models have "multi-stage grind" which may not be good (grind to
finely?) for our application.

I bought a 3/4 hp Insinkerator clone with all stainless grind chamber.
I think it is essentially a (now unavailable) Insinkerator SS555 - a
model we have been using effectively for a few years. That model
has a nice big grind chamber and enough horsepower to grind whole
apples (as large as you can fit in the disposal throat).

The only issue with these seems to be that they overheat after some
time and trip the thermal breaker. But if you don't run the grinder
for extended periods this doesn't seem to be a problem. Otherwise
they seem fairly indestructable. We had one apart and they are pretty
simple to understand and fix too.

This year we easily ground and pressed 60 gallons worth of juice
with this setup and a home-built press.

You can buy such a unit for $149 from a major department store chain
(on sale right now) - drop me a note if you want specifics.

SB

Saladbar:

Thanks for your report on using the disposal apple grinder. 60 gallons is a lot. I have done 40, but 60 -- wow. I have been posting descriptions of this adaptation for nearly 10 years, on the NAFEX board, Cider-Request, and the Fruit Forum, but seldom hear from people who have actually built and used one. Mostly, I get feedback trying to pick the idea apart, but without trying it. Human nature, I guess. I figure it's their loss, because it does work, and it's not patented nor could it be.

From the outset, I have noted the problem with overheating, since the disposal motor is a sealed unit with no provision for cooling other than the cool liquid passing across the top. But, as you point out, the overheating can be dealt with by a little patience, running the disposal no more than about 20 consecutive minutes. Repeated overloads on the thermal breaker do not seem to harm it. Must be a bi-metal. Most of my apples will not fit into the disposal without cutting in half, so I consider this a routine part of the process. It doesn't slow things down much.

Over the years, I have tried to figure out some way to deal with the overheating problem -- aluminum fins, fans, or even drilling cooling holes in the motor case. Most of these seem impractical or downright foolish, such as drilling holes in the motor. My Badger is an ISE product, with the induction coils just beneath the case. ISE dominates the market where I live, with Waste King far behind. Fine, because I think the lower-RPM ISE is better for this application anyway.

Recently, I have been thinking of trying another solution to overheating, which would be to wrap the motor case top to bottom with 3/8 copper tubing, using appropriate brass ferrules and other hardware, a little flow control valve, ending up with a female inlet fitting that could be attached to a garden hose. Discharge would be on the lawn away from the unit via copper or plastic tubing. The copper tubing would have to be in full contact with the motor case throughout its length, as well as firmly attached. I haven't figured that part out yet. But I don't see why it wouldn't work, since liquid is an excellent way to carry away heat, and it wouldn't take much of a water flow to do it.

Installation of the tubing and fittings would involve a few more shop skills than building a simple table, but if you are building a new unit you might want to try it since it would be easier to do on the motor before installation. On the other hand, you may be happy with what you've got. I may try wrapping my motor this winter when all there is to do is split firewood.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

I picked up a GE (must be Waste King going by "saladbar's" description). It says stainless impellers and galvanized grinding system (I imagine galvanized is OK for food, we've done corn boils in galvanized garbage cans). The internals actually looked better than the more expensive models and brands.
The innards are definitely different than when I was a kid.

When I was running grinder ideas by my machine shop friend he thought the disposal sounded best.

I also picked up a hydraulic jack. So after some coffee it will be back to the machine shop to run press ideas by him.
Maybe I'll be making cider before the year is done.

jellyman,
Your copper tubing idea sounds like an immersion wort chiller (beer making). Dunking a whole roll of copper in boiling water can take some water flow (not full blast, but more than a trickle) to get less than boiling water out, but you won't be dunked in boiling water where you're in 100% contact.
Making it is very simple. You just wrap the soft copper around something, use a couple of band clamps to clamp rubber hose to the copper and a reducer to get it on your spigot.

I think there are some heat conductive silicone adhesives out there that you could use to attach it. If you can't find an adhesive you could use some band clamps. I don't know how much surface the motor would take to wrap but even CPU heat sink compound may not take so many tubes that they would be out of the question.

I'm still puzzled,.. posted some more detail pictures in the old thread, [My Juicer] click on original post above, it will only show within this thread, not on it's own, nor will it come up in search, even when you Google??
Konrad

my way, 1 liter from under 3#, producing 400+ liters per hour - don't need a "fine slurry" to juice fresh picked apples, a "chunky apple sauce" gets all there is and clearer as well

the basic plans can be found in in this old Canadian ag dept booklet

Bill

I'm just about done with my press.
I've got to mount the basket on the frame and make some handles for the pressing disk and I'll be squeezing.
I'll probably have to get some PVC to direct the discharge from the disposal better. My rough estimates when planning had close to the edge of the basket.
It looks too good to reside in the shed. But my machine shop likes to over-build so it's too heavy to be moving around.

That saw grinder is slick in action. I don't see the disposal going that fast. Before the disposal burns out I'll start planning one of those.

If 3000 psi on 27" square (which my bad math figures up to be about 4 psi at the apples) is plenty I guess my press at 24,000lbs on a 12" disk (which someone else's better math figures up to be about 200 psi) will squeeze everything out.

Myk:

I don't know if you have experimented with the disposal grinder yet, but if you have built a table at countertop height, and you are discharging into a 5-gallon plastic bucket lined with a pressing bag, there will be no need to direct the discharge from the disposal with PVC or anything else. I thought I might have to do that too before I tried it, and found the discharge is straight down into the bucket, right out of the short plastic pipe of the disposal.

With the fine slurry from the disposal, you will not need all the force your hydraulic cylinders can generate to press the juice. You will be a little over-engineered. If you are using the Happy Valley pressing bags, which are the best I have found, you will not want to place undue stress on these bags. At $12 apiece, it's nice to have them last more than one season, and with excess force you can blow them out.

Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

My H-frame for the press has pipes for the verticals so I made the stand for the disposal so it slides into those pipes and hopefully discharges directly into the press. It should only take a slip joint pipe to get it where it needs to go if it's too close to the edge.
I bet I could press bearings with the frame and jack, it's extremely over-built. I kept telling him it didn't need to be that heavy.
I'll get pictures and make a thread once I get it all together.

I don't know what brand my bag is. I've had it forever for wine/beer making. I've wrung it out pretty hard with fruits and grains and haven't ripped it yet, of course I wasn't squeezing it 12tons/200psi hard.

I had a little too much carrots and beats this year, so I figured to try out the apple juicer, ....it worked fine.
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..
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Konrad