Crushing and Pressing options

OOOHHH! OOOHHHH!!

hunt around for an applesauce maker. the one I got is like a funnel made of screen with a wooden handle crusher. I really want to find the crank type and try that. used it for plums, took the mashed stuff and put it in a bag and picked out the skins and added them too.. did a great job of getting the majority of the pulp off the pits. it should work just as well for small batches of grapes.

Did two 5 gallon batches so far, really wears out the arm though. I am planning on mutilating a meatgrinder to see how that works. I need to make it sloppy enough to not crush the pits, yet tight enought to squeeze the pits apart from the fruit.

Crusher: Do a search on the group, I think some people had used homemade contraptions for this.

Pressing: Bag or pantyhose work fine for small amounts like yours. For the reds I make at home, I ferment the normal way and then press through pantyhose. It's a bit of a PITA but definitely doable. I could afford a press but live in condo so it's pretty much out of the question...

Pp

Yeah to echo what Pp said... I just did a single gallon of wine with the grapes off my father in law's vine. I did them like any other wine more or less. Crushed them up in a straining bag and kept the skins in. 5 days into fermentation the juice had a great colour and I hand pressed the bag till there was almost no juice left in there, then chucked the seeds and skins away... Its richly coloured and tasty now, having finished fermenting more or less so i cant complain...

Jim

Get a hold of a 1x6 about 8 feet long. Cut it in half, and join one end of each with a door hinge or a piece of flexible heavy cloth, canvas maybe, old jeans leg material....whatever, with short dry wall screws.

Use that to smash the grapes in a bag, panyhose, laundry bag for SWMBO delicates (oops). It gives you tremendous leverage and you don't get tired at the end of the run like you do with hand sqeezin'.

OR

I built a lever press from 2x6 and 4x4 and a 2'x2' piece of plywood I had laying around. Works GREAT and fast! Driiled a 5 gallon pastry bucket full of holes for the basket use a larger size nylon mesh bag for the grapes. This year I'm putting a windlass (kind of) with a stop on the end of the lever so I can leave it to press while I get other stuff ready.

Steve Oregon

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Crushing is easy, use your hands or feet (put bread bags on your feet). Everyone asks me if I use my feet to crush grapes like it's an awful idea. If you wash first and protect your feet it's actually the safest cheapest way to crush grapes. it's next to impossible to crack a seed with your feet.

I finally rebuilt my press but a bucket full of 1/8' holes was what I used for the last 5 years. I used another bucket at the ram and placed all of that in a third to catch the must.

Joe

I've used a hand crank, three inch inside diameter meat grinder to press red wine off the skins/seeds.

An epoxy paint coated one or heavy duty plastic one would be suitable for use with wine. If it is the tin-coated cast metal meat type of grinder, the acidic wine will slowly dissolve the tin coating, so that would not be a good choice.

You only need a small amount of back pressure to squeeze out the wine. I used a 16 ounce yogurt plastic container to create my back pressure. The shallow taper of the yogurt container provided just the right amount of back pressure for squeezing out the wine. Left a dense, wrung out pomace, and this gentle pressing kept the seeds from being crushed/ground.

I almost entirely cut out the bottom of the yogurt container, leaving a heavy "bead" of plastic at the bottom for strength. I attached the container to the meat grinder by its top lip (using a home-made adapter plate) instead of a grinder plate.

It's not really quick at pressing, but for a few gallons at a time it's not too tedious. Not sure I'd buy a meat grinder for this purpose; they're not cheap.

Gene

I've been working on a concept for a home winepress. Check out

to see a photo rendering. It collapses into a 6 gallon Home Depot bucket, weighs less than 15 lbs, and is constructed entirely of FDA approved UHMW plastic and stainless steel. It generates over 1200lbs of force from the dual trigger handles. I'm building protos now and plan to market them one day if they work well. Only problem is they probably will cost the same as a conventional small press due to low quantity fabrication and expensive raw materials. It's a fun little project...

Charles Erwin

Thanks for the input so far. I'm trying to figure what way to go... the I Love Lucy method or squeeze until by fingers cramp!

With grapes, aside from not wanting to crush seeds, can you press too much? I would assume not!

ANd where does it stand on adding extra pectin enzyme to break down... I've done that in a limited fashion with other fruits, but is there a max?

Thanks!

Anyone?

THanks!

There is a point at which further pressing becomes counterproductive even if you avoid crushing the seeds. You won't reach this point if you're pressing without major equipment.

Too much pectic enzyme will basically liquefy the grapes - this can make the must harder to press and will result in a lot of gross lees.

Pp

aha! thats what all that stuff is in the secondaries of my plums! been having losses of about 1/6 that i was about to post here, but this answers it.

BTW, first batch is starting to look ruby red, about 4 more months to go before bottling.

True, gross lees are a consideration, but I was thinking more along the lines of chemical reactions or taste or smell.