Jim Hall wrote:
You're probably not going to like my advice. I make 30 to 40 gallons of
wine every year and like a wood working project I want it to turn out to be
the best wine I can make. It's something I share with friends and give away
as gifts. There's no way I would make or use a home-made press as you
describe. The ones you buy have evolved over centuries and make the process
much easier to deal with. I'm sure you can get a used one for less than
what you will spend making one. Now if all you want to do is toy around
with making wine, then go for it. If it explodes or gets clogged in the
middle of the process, no big loss I guess. But if you get serious, you
probably won't be happy with your homemade press, especially if you're
making red wine from grapes.. Good luck..


Jim-

I do appreciate your comments. I've looked and the cheapest press to
be had is about 180$ with the most practically sized one for 300$+.
And you're right- I do want to futz around building it. Of course,
that does mean that I do want to do it right and if this one sounds
like it'll fail then I may have to re-examine the priorities. I'm
going to be spending about 1000$ on juice and skins this year, or
enough to make about 110 gallons before *hic* losses.

Ideally I'd want a stainless steel ratchet press. Cheapest one of
those was around 600$.

If you know of or see cheap presses, keep me in mind- I estimate that
if I make this all out of 2x8x8 and Fir from HD (sigh) I'm looking at
about 100 to 150$ for the size I want, plus the bottle jack.

I wonder how it would make cheese....

If you're near Rochester, swing on up

Jason